08/27/2026
One local story. Nearly 325,000 impressions. National and international attention.
This summer, Susan Berube joined HudPost through the New Jersey Civic Information Consortium’s statewide paid journalism internship program. This week, her reporting showed exactly what investing in emerging journalists can make possible.
Susan investigated the experience of a disabled woman in Weehawken who said she was served a birthday dessert with a demeaning message written on the plate.
It wasn’t an easy story to report. Susan navigated accessibility and scheduling challenges to interview her source, made repeated attempts to obtain comment from the restaurant, and ultimately visited the restaurant in person when those requests went unanswered.
Her persistence paid off.
Susan’s reporting has now generated nearly 325,000 impressions across HudPost’s platforms and has been picked up by CBS, NBC, the New York Post, NJ.com, People, and Metro UK—taking a local story from Hudson County to audiences across the country and beyond.
We’re incredibly proud of Susan’s professionalism, persistence, and commitment to telling an important local story. And we’re proud that NJCIC’s statewide paid journalism internship program helped create the opportunity for her to do it.
This is the broader impact of investing in emerging journalists. Paid internships provide meaningful professional experience while putting more reporters in New Jersey communities, expanding the capacity of local newsrooms, and helping ensure important stories get told.
And Susan’s story is just one example of what this summer’s cohort made possible. Follow along in the coming days as we share more stories and impact from NJCIC’s 2026 internship cohort.
Read Susan’s original reporting for HudPost: https://hudpost.com/disabled-woman-says-weehawken-restaurant-wrote-happy-birthday-wheelchair-on-dessert/
