CalMatters

Last updated
CalMatters
Formation2015
Type Nonprofit (501(c)3)
PurposeCovering politics
Headquarters Sacramento, CA
Region
California
Subsidiaries The Markup
Affiliations Institute for Nonprofit News

CalMatters, a nonprofit news organization covering California state politics and policies, launched in 2015. [1] [2] Founders cited the decline in coverage of state politics in the decade leading-up to the founding of CalMatters as a major motivation. [3] As of 2017, it was becoming one of the largest nonprofit newsrooms in the country raising 90 percent of its funding from individuals with only some foundation support. [4] It has also credited its partnership with the LA Times and Capitol Public Radio, among others, as helping to grow the organization quickly. [4]

Contents

Upon Donald Trump taking office, the website detailed the punches thrown by the president at the state. [5]

CalMatters launched a rebranded website in 2019. [6]

In November 2023, Andrew Donohue was named investigative editor and has been hiring to grow the size of his investigative team to five reporters from three in 2023. [7]

In 2024, nonprofit news outlet The Markup merged newsrooms with CalMatters, citing complementary funders and expertise, with The Markup having a more technical and narrower focus on national and global technology policy. [8]

Awards

See also

Related Research Articles

Marjie Lundstrom is an American journalist. She received the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 1991. Lundstrom has worked for The Fort Collins Coloradoan, the Denver Monthly, and The Denver Post. She was a reporter and senior writer for The Sacramento Bee. Currently, she is the deputy editor for two nonprofit publications, FairWarning, located in Pasadena, CA, and CalMatters, based in Sacramento.

Voice of San Diego is a nonprofit news organization focused on issues affecting the San Diego region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Center for Investigative Reporting</span> Non-profit organisation in the US

The Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) is a nonprofit news organization based in San Francisco, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maynard Institute for Journalism Education</span> American nonprofit organization

The Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education (MIJE) is an American non-profit organization that trains journalists to become investigative journalists, editors, newspaper managers, and media entrepreneurs. The organization seeks to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in newsrooms to diversify coverage of the news itself, creating a more complex and representative picture of the American news landscape.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sue Gardner</span> Canadian journalist and past executive director of Wikimedia Foundation

Sue Gardner is a Canadian journalist, not-for-profit executive and business executive. She was the executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation from December 2007 until May 2014, and before that was the director of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's website and online news outlets.

California Watch, part of the nonprofit Center for Investigative Reporting, began producing stories in 2009. The official launch of the California Watch website took place in January 2010. The team was best known for producing well researched and widely distributed investigative stories on topics of interest to Californians. In small ways, the newsroom pioneered in the digital space, including listing the names of editors and copy editors at the bottom of each story, custom-editing stories for multiple partners, developing unique methods to engage with audiences and distributing the same essential investigative stories to newsrooms across the state. It worked with many news outlets, including newspapers throughout the state, all of the ABC television affiliates in California, KQED radio and television and dozens of websites. The Center for Investigative Reporting created California Watch with $3.5 million in seed funding. The team won several industry awards for its public interest reporting, including the George Polk Award in 2012. In addition to numerous awards won for its investigative reports, the California Watch website also won an Online Journalism Award in the general excellence category from the Online News Association in its first year of existence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Global Editors Network</span>

The Global Editors Network (GEN) was an international association of over 6,000 editors-in-chief and media executives with the mission of fostering digital innovation in newsrooms all over the world. GEN had three main programmes: Editors Lab, the Data Journalism Awards, Startups for News, as well as an upcoming hub for the international data journalism community. The organisation’s flagship event, the GEN Summit, gathered over 830 participants from 70 countries. The GEN newsletter was read weekly by more than 13,800 subscribers. It is a non-profit, non-governmental association.

The Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) is a non-profit consortium of nonprofit journalism organizations. The organization promotes nonprofit investigative and public service journalism by supporting its members and the nonprofit news industry as a whole. Examples of services offered by INN includes helping news organizations with collaborations, training in best-practices and fundraising, and providing affordable back-office services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Media in San Diego</span> Overview of mass media in San Diego, California, United States

San Diego is one of the major cities in California. The following is a list of media outlets based in the city of San Diego. People in San Diego are also able to receive media from Tijuana, Mexico.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Solutions Journalism Network</span> Solutions for the world we live in

The Solutions Journalism Network(SJN) is an independent, non-profit organization that advocates an approach of solutions journalism, an evidence-based mode of reporting on the responses to social problems. It was founded in 2013 by David Bornstein, Courtney E. Martin, and Tina Rosenberg. Its staff in New York City and Oakland, California, help journalists and news organizations across the country understand, value, and build the capacity to do solutions-oriented reporting.

<i>Malheur Enterprise</i> Weekly newspaper in eastern Oregon, United States

The Malheur Enterprise is a weekly newspaper in Vale, Oregon. It was established in 1909, and since October 2015 has been published by Malheur Enterprise Pub. Co. It is issued weekly on Wednesdays. Early on, it carried the title Malheur Enterprise and Vale Plaindealer. As of 2018 its circulation has been estimated at 1,207 to 1,277. Its print and online circulation in 2022 was approximately 3,000.

Mississippi Today is the state's flagship nonprofit newsroom based in Ridgeland, Mississippi, and winner of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting. It was founded in 2016 by former Netscape president and CEO Jim Barksdale and his wife, Donna, alongside former NBC chairman Andrew Lack. It is focused on watchdog journalism related to Mississippi's state and local government, health, economy, environment, public schools and universities, and the justice system.

The Markup is an American nonprofit news publication focused on the impact of technology on society. Founded in 2018 with the goal of advancing data-driven journalism, the publication launched in February 2020. Nabiha Syed is the current chief executive officer and Sisi Wei is the editor-in-chief.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Julia Angwin</span> American investigative journalist

Julia Angwin is an American investigative journalist, author, and entrepreneur. She co-founded and was editor-in-chief of The Markup, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates the impact of technology on society. She was a staff reporter at the New York bureau of The Wall Street Journal from 2000 to 2013, during which time she was on a team that won the Pulitzer Prize in journalism. She worked as a senior reporter at ProPublica from 2014 to April 2018, during which time she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

Berkeleyside is a digital newspaper founded in 2009. It covers life and politics in contemporary Berkeley, California, reporting on politics, schools, crime and business, as well as the food scene in the East Bay.

Chalkbeat is a non-profit news organization that covers education in several American communities. Its mission is to "inform the decisions and actions that lead to better outcomes for children and families by providing deep, local coverage of education policy and practice." It aims to cover "the effort to improve schools for all children, especially those who have historically lacked access to a quality education". Its areas of focus include under-reported stories, education policy, equity, trends, and local reporting.

<i>Block Club Chicago</i>

Block Club Chicago is an online newspaper that reports local and neighborhood news in Chicago. The website operates as a non-profit, subscription-based service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">City Bureau</span> American non-profit organization

City Bureau is an American non-profit organization based in the South Side of Chicago, Illinois. It is a non-profit newsroom that aims to produce civic journalism that brings journalists and communities together in a collaborative spirit. It was founded in 2015, and soon after won the March 2016 Sidney Award. City Bureau has since won awards from the Online Journalism Awards for their Documenters.org project, a $1M grant from the MacArthur Foundation, and trained over 80 journalists, held numerous public meetings, and co-published articles with numerous outlets.

States Newsroom is a left-leaning non-profit news organization with outlets or partner outlets in all 50 U.S. states. It began as a sponsored project of the Hopewell Fund, a left-leaning nonprofit that does not disclose its donors. In 2019, it spun off to become its own non-profit. States Newsroom grew out of NC Policy Watch, a progressive think tank in North Carolina founded in 2004 by Chris Fitzsimon, who is now States Newsroom's director and publisher.

Lookout Santa Cruz is a digital newspaper launched in November 2020 based in Santa Cruz, California. It was created by Ken Doctor, a media analyst who had studied the decline of local newspapers in the United States. Its parent company is Lookout Local. Lookout Santa Cruz receives philanthropic support, advertising revenue, and online subscription revenue. Lookout won a Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting in 2024 for its coverage of the 2022–2023 California floods.

References

  1. Biasotti, Tony (June 5, 2015). "A new nonprofit hopes to fill a void in coverage of California". Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  2. Ellis, Justin (June 8, 2015). "CALmatters aims to make people interested in state government and fill a gap in California". Nieman Lab. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  3. Doctor, Ken (February 17, 2015). "What are they thinking? CALmatters wants to shake up California statehouse". Politico.
  4. 1 2 Westphal, David (October 30, 2017). "Journalism's New Patrons: California nonprofit targets individual donors". Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  5. Schmidt, Christine (July 3, 2017). "Two years in, state government site CALmatters is collaborating to make a name for itself". Nieman Lab. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  6. Schmidt, Christine (July 10, 2019). "How CALmatters is growing out of its startup stage". Nieman Lab. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  7. Peck, G. A. (2024). Making the Team. Editor & Publisher, 157(2), 46–49.
  8. Scire, Sarah (April 25, 2024). "Seeking "innovative," "stable," and "interested": How The Markup and CalMatters matched up". Nieman Lab. Retrieved 2024-06-22.