Local Coalition Raises Over $5.8M to Launch Nonprofit News Organization in Ohio

NEO Collaboration Conference on October 25, 2019 (photo by Stefanie Murray, The Center for Cooperative Media)

Independent newsroom in Cleveland to launch in 2022, producing daily, high-quality, community-oriented journalism as part of a new statewide network of newsrooms across Ohio

CLEVELAND – Nov. 9, 2021 –  A coalition of Cleveland-based organizations and the American Journalism Project are partnering to launch an independent, community-led, nonprofit newsroom serving Cleveland. The newsroom will be the first in a larger network of independent, local newsrooms across Ohio, as part of a new nonprofit effort called the Ohio Local News Initiative, which will aim to launch additional newsrooms across the state over time.

Cleveland’s newsroom, slated for launch in 2022, will produce high-quality journalism on a daily basis that centers community voices and lets residents help set the agenda for newsgathering. The newsroom will dramatically increase the volume of original, in-depth, non-partisan reporting in the region and support the efforts of Cleveland news outlets and community initiatives to make critical information available to all who need it—information will be available in numerous formats across multiple platforms, and will be free to access.

Residents will help set the newsroom’s priorities, through a community reporting model that will train and pay Clevelanders to report for, and gather requests, questions, and ideas from their communities. The program will begin in Central, and grow to serve more communities throughout Cleveland.

Continue reading “Local Coalition Raises Over $5.8M to Launch Nonprofit News Organization in Ohio”

Community members needed to join fifth Cleveland Consent Decree Community Conversation sponsored by NAACP- Cleveland Chapter and United Way of Greater Cleveland: 6:00 pm, May 12

By Rich Weiss, for Neighborhood & Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland

If you missed your chance to attend the April 15th public input meeting on the Cleveland Police Consent Decree, your input is still needed for the upcoming Consent Decree Community Conversation at 6:00 pm on May 12 (on Zoom).  This public meeting (co-sponsored by the local chapters of the United Way and NAACP) seeks your opinions and questions on progress of the Cleveland Division of Police in the areas of Crisis Intervention and Officer Wellness.

According to Roger Smith, Administrator of Cleveland’s Office of Professional Standards, “It’s really what the grassroots wants that should be driving this train.  It’s important for public figures and people who work in public agencies to understand with clarity what it is the community wants, here—what role they want the police to play in their communities and what kind of rules do they want to govern those interactions.  The only way to find that out is to get it from the community.”

Continue reading “Community members needed to join fifth Cleveland Consent Decree Community Conversation sponsored by NAACP- Cleveland Chapter and United Way of Greater Cleveland: 6:00 pm, May 12”