In this episode of Behind the Beacon, Daralyse and Emily share a major update: the Bucks County Beacon is launching a completely redesigned website built on WP Engine’s Newsroom platform. Emily explains that the current site, built on WordPress with Elementor, has become heavy and slow, weighed down by JavaScript and design layers that slow performance. The new site will have faster load times, integrated caching, and 24/7 tech support .

The new site is expected to go live in September, and readers can sign up for the Beacon newsletter to be notified the moment it launches. While the site launch date is TBD, Daralyse and Emily invite reader feedback and encourage donations to support the $1,000/month hosting cost, and celebrating the fresh new site design.

To support this endeavor, click Support the Beacon - Bucks County Beacon and make a donation.

And to be notified when the new site is up and running, sign up for the newsletter at: Sign Up! - Bucks County Beacon.

In this episode of Behind the Beacon, Daralyse Lyons and Emily Smith get real about the Beacon’s digital infrastructure challenges. As Daralyse puts it, “a data center in Phoenix overheated and our servers went down, our mail went down, the forward-facing website went down...” What followed was a real-time lesson in how fragile the systems behind local news can be — and how much invisible labor goes into keeping them running.

Emily walks listeners through the anatomy of a data center, the realities of shared versus private servers, and why something happening hundreds of miles away can knock out a newsroom in Pennsylvania. She explains the cascading effects of extreme heat, monsoon conditions, and even sandstorms on the physical hardware that powers the Cloud. The conversation revisits past crises too, including hacks, the loss of a year-long development site, and the dreaded “white screen of death” caused by plugin conflicts. Emily shares how each failure has helped reshape the Beacon’s tech strategy and Daralyse highlights the human side of disruptions: the readers who bounce, the ones who write in, and the ones the Beacon never even knows it lost.

Together, they explore the cost of uptime, the price of security, and the surprising math behind producing a single article — a figure that currently sits around $1,100 when all operational layers are included. This episode is a candid, accessible look at the messy, expensive, and essential world of newsroom technology, and why even small crashes matter in big ways.

In this episode, Daralyse and Emily welcome the Beacon’s newest teammate, Ben Bennett, our first full-time staff reporter. Ben talks about how he went from writing movie reviews in high school to discovering his love for hyperlocal journalism at WHYY — and why the Beacon immediately felt like the right fit.

With thirteen school districts and endless meetings, Bucks County desperately needed someone who could focus on Lower Bucks education, and Ben is already diving in. He explains what it means to build an education beat from scratch: showing up, listening, earning trust, and connecting the dots between local decisions and bigger national trends.

The conversation also touches on objectivity, opinion, and the art of writing voter guides that help people make informed choices without nudging them in any particular direction. Daralyse talks about mission-driven journalism, Emily reflects on her long-standing commitment to civic engagement (plus one campaign mailer she regrets), and Ben says he’s excited to help build something meaningful from the ground up.

To learn more about how Ben came to work for the Beacon (supported by a grant from Report for America), read Bucks County Beacon Welcomes Ben Bennett as Report for America Corps Member - Bucks County Beacon

And, if you have a story tip, email Ben at ben@buckscountybeacon.com.

If you want to support our work financially, visit buckscountybeacon.com and click “Support the Beacon.”