By Newsdesk.org __ 
March 23, 2009 Greg Wolff The title suggests that the story will give information about the number, location, and type of trouble spots in the bay area ("a tour"). However the pitch description indicates a focus on a single community.
Will the story combine both, i.e. an inventory (say labeled google map) with an in depth report on one representative community? That would interest me more than just an in depth on one place.
Greg
That is an excellent point. For this piece we were thinking of focusing on a specific location and going in-depth. Although in truth we hope to continue and do more than any single area. We may tweak the title to reflect that more accurately.
As always though: Stories shape as we do reporting. Still - I feel confident that this piece will go in-depth on a specific area rather than shallow on several areas.
It is the first stop in a toxic tour of the Bay. We need to modify the copy to indicate this. David -- I'll check in w/ you about that.
josh w / editor / newsdesk.org
I'm sure you would have come across this already in your research, but in case you haven't, you may want to check out the area around Heron's Head Park. The only reason I found out about this toxic hotspot was because I happened to volunteer there and heard the story then. Although the PG&E plant that was responsible for the health issues in this low-income neighborhood is gone now, community groups are still involved with the cleanup efforts.
