From 77f113e9ae32905f963cd1823f4dee958564e912 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Jordan Ramos <jordan.ramos@spectrum.com>
Date: Wed, 6 May 2026 12:30:45 -0600
Subject: [PATCH] fix: load dotenv in db.js so DATABASE_URL is available on
 import

---
 backend/db.js | 3 +++
 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+)

diff --git a/backend/db.js b/backend/db.js
index 7b25f75..0b7a973 100644
--- a/backend/db.js
+++ b/backend/db.js
@@ -2,6 +2,9 @@
 // All route files import this module instead of receiving a sqlite3 `db` parameter.
 // Configured via DATABASE_URL environment variable.
 
+// Ensure dotenv is loaded before accessing env vars
+require('dotenv').config({ path: require('path').join(__dirname, '.env') });
+
 const { Pool } = require('pg');
 
 if (!process.env.DATABASE_URL) {