That whole thing sounds ridiculous to me. I understand that it’s good money and, overall a news website, but that’s not how they lured writers in in the first place. As you said, you’re not a reporter, so it feels a bit weird that they tell you to come here and write about many things, and 3 months later they order you to cover local news and nothing else.

If you can do it with little effort, you should, and get the paycheck, but I don’t it’s worth to put much effort in it if that’s not your thing to begin with.