Since 2020, I’ve run the email newsletter for the Virginia’s Albemarle County Democratic Party on a volunteer basis. We release a new edition every week (formerly once every two weeks, and then the news got … busy.)

When I took over the newsletter, I wanted to give it a fresh look, find ways to hold readers’ attention, and do whatever I could to turn what they read into what they did. I created a new, bold set of logo graphics; added contact information for all our local elected officials in every edition; and prioritized links to volunteer opportunities where readers could take action instead of just getting angry or worried.

In 2024, I started experimenting with further ways to keep and hold readers’ attention. I made sections shorter — usually no more than two sentences — and kept bolded headers to no more than four words each. (If I can work a joke in there, all the better.) I began using emoji to highlight new items and add color and visual appeal.

Read recent issues of the newsletter. (Look for the names with emojis in them.)

During the 2021 governor’s race, I used the newsletter to distribute fact sheets I’d created based on my own research and publicly available data, challenging Republican talking points on key issues with hard facts and numbers. 

Read 2021 fact sheets on:

• Abortion

• Election Security

• Guns & Crime

• Tax Rates