Local journalism groups representing more than 3,000 local newsrooms have come together to create a new nonprofit that aims to save local news through bipartisan public policy initiatives.
If successful, the Rebuild Local News coalition believes its efforts could create thousands of local news jobs across the country.
Rebuild Local Newsaims to deliver $3 billion–$5 billion in relief for local news companies through philanthropy, business initiatives and government proposals that are focused mostly on tax credits, said Steven Waldman, a longtime local news advocate who is leading the coalition.
Waldman most recently served as president of Report for America, a nonprofit he co-founded that places emerging journalists in local newsrooms.
The coalition will build on policy work he’s been doing for the past two years, including lobbying federal agencies for antitrust reform and pushing banking regulators to make it easier for small media companies serving low-income communities to receive credit and financing to continue to operate.
The group’s members include local journalism coalitions that represent thousands of outlets, such as the Institute for Nonprofit News and the Local Media Consortium, the National Newspaper Publishers Association, the Association of Alternative Newsmedia, the National Association of Hispanic Publishers and Local Independent Online News.
It also includes several statewide local news groups, such as the Wisconsin Newspaper Association and the Mississippi Press Association, as well as major journalism philanthropic groups, such as the Lenfest Institute for Journalism and the American Journalism Project.
The NewsGuild-CWA, one of the largest news labor unions in the country, is also part of the coalition.