Raleigh Burleigh is something of a prodigy in community journalism in local media. The Carbondale Native has been the editor of the Sopris Sun for more than five years. After serving for three years on the board of the nonprofit weekly at a time when news deserts replaced newspaper offices and media empires, gobble publications, and spit out reporters.
The Sopris Sun manages to crank out robust, original, award-winning local news written by paid freelancers. Burleigh has accomplished all this, and he's not quite 33 years old. Before joining the Sopris Sun, Raleigh was KDNK's News Director at the age of 23. Burleigh has announced he will be leaving the Sopris Sun and Carbondale.
I asked Raleigh where he's going and why, but first we talked about his time here at KDNK
Burleigh: Yes, in 2016, I moved back to the valley shortly before Trump was elected for his first term, and I came in here and approached Gavin Dahl about. Doing some freelance reporting and translation work when Gavin Dahl was the news director and then there was a shakeup at the station and he offered me the news director position shortly after that, and that began my career in community journalism.
Gleason: Wow, which you took to the next level or the print level at the Sopris Sun, which is just a really amazing example of a local community nonprofit paper in this kind of new model of doing journalism in a time that's really tough for journalism. So what other boards and bodies are you involved with here that are also going to see a vacancy?
Burleigh: So I've been serving a year term as treasurer on the Western Colorado Mycological Association, which has been delightful.
Gleason: Wait a minute, what's mycology?
Burleigh: Mycology is the study of mushrooms and mycelium. Lichens fall in that category as well. But it's a really cool club of people who want to go into the woods and look real close at the forest floor and find interesting forms of life.
Gleason: Sort of the new science really, of biology, I think.
Burleigh: It's quite understudied in our Western culture.
Gleason: And the CNC, which is basically the Spanish news collaboration here in the valley.
Burleigh: Right. As part of my role as, uh, editor of the Sopris Sun, I've served on the CoWest Noticias Collaborative, which is a grouping of different news organizations here in the [Roaring Fork] valley promoting Spanish language news. One board that I'm serving on, which I intend to continue to serve on from a distance is the Sol Del Valle Advisory Council.
Gleason: Talk about some of your successes at the Sopris Sun something that you're proud of there, or that you think you and the staff achieved.
Burleigh: I went into it very much desiring to add a Spanish section to the newspaper. This has grown now to a 16-page newspaper, a standalone called Sol Del Valle, which is very much made so much stronger thanks to all of the organizations that form a part of the CoWest Noticias Collaborative. We also added a youth journalism program, educating high schoolers about the craft of journalism, which is very effectively held by James Steindler, my contributing editor, who gives his whole heart to that program and those students. It's now called the Sopris Stars and is the monthly insert in the Sopris Sun. We also added a fiction section, which James has also shepherded, highlighting people's poetry, photography, and creative works in our newspaper every week.
And I would say that the introduction of art, most specifically in the form of Larry Day and his talents has been very effective at elevating the newspaper and grabbing people's attention and pulling them into articles. Amy Hadden Marsh's excellent Garfield County reports are made even better by Larry Day's Artwork.
I think, generally bringing more art into the paper, resurrecting our radio show, [and] growing our freelance pool.
Gleason: Well, where to Raleigh?
Burleigh: Well, I want to preface this by saying that my decision to leave the Sopris Sun has nothing to do with the organization being anything less than incredible. I so appreciate all of my coworkers there. All of the freelance contributors, all of the supporters, our board of directors. And my decision comes more from a personal desire to challenge myself in a new context. Carbondale has been my home for most of my life. I was born and raised here and moved back about nine years ago.
And so I just feel this stirring in my soul to get out there and explore new contexts and see where that takes me.
Gleason: Okay. Thank you very much.
Burleigh: Thank you, Marilyn.
Gleason: Burleigh will continue leading the Sun until the end of March. He plans to move to Silver City, New Mexico, a town with a community radio station, a newspaper, and more affordable housing options.
No successor has yet been named. That will happen in February at a fundraising party for the Sopris Sun to which all are invited.
