Type of site | Nonprofit online newsroom |
---|---|
Available in | English |
Headquarters | Ridgeland, Mississippi |
Owner | Deep South Today |
Founder(s) | Andrew Lack |
Editor | Adam Ganucheau |
CEO | Mary Margaret White |
URL | mississippitoday |
Launched | May 2016 |
ISSN | 0746-2247 |
OCLC number | 1080317596 |
Mississippi Today is a nonprofit online newsroom headquartered in Ridgeland, Mississippi. Launched in 2016, it was founded by former Netscape president Jim Barksdale and his wife Donna, alongside former NBC chairman Andrew Lack, to address the decline in local news coverage in Mississippi. Initially focused on state government and investigative journalism, the publication has since expanded its coverage to include topics such as criminal justice, health policy, higher education, the environment, and sports. Known for its commitment to watchdog journalism, Mississippi Today brands itself as a nonpartisan organization and adheres to the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics.
The organization gained national recognition in 2022 for its investigative reporting on the Mississippi welfare funds scandal, a series of stories that earned reporter Anna Wolfe the Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting in 2023. Mississippi Today has also been a finalist for the 2024 Pulitzer Prizes and received numerous other accolades for its work. Supported by grants from major foundations and individual donors, the newsroom collaborates with national and regional outlets such as ProPublica, the Associated Press, and the New York Times to contribute to its reporting. In 2023, Mississippi Today merged with the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting.
In 2014, Mississippi Today's parent company Deep South Today, formerly Mississippi News and Information Corporation, incorporated. [1] [2] It received 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status in 2015. [2] Jim Barksdale, his wife Donna, and former NBC chairman Andrew Lack formed Deep South Today to compensate for dwindling local news coverage. [1] [3] Mississippi Today started publishing in May 2016 as a state watchdog. [4] [5] Deep South Today formed a sister newsroom, New Orleans–based Verite, in 2022. [1] [6]
In February 2023, Jerry Mitchel l's Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting merged with Mississippi Today. [7]
Mississippi Today was initially founded as an online newsroom to cover state government and politics, focusing on watchdog and investigative journalism. [5] [8] [9] The organization now covers criminal justice, higher education, health policy, the environment, and sports. [10] The editor-at-large, Marshall Ramsey, produces cartoons. [10]
In 2022, Mississippi Today received national attention for breaking the Mississippi welfare funds scandal, receiving a Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting. [1] Former governor Phil Bryant sued Mississippi Today and its investigative reporter on the scandal, Anna Wolfe, for defamation. [11]
Mississippi Today has often collaborated with other news organizations like the Associated Press, [12] the New York Times, [13] ProPublica, [14] and The Marshall Project. [15] The organization partnered with Siena College Research Institute for polling in the 2023 Mississippi elections. [16]
Mississippi Today is a nonprofit journalism organization [1] and a member of the Institute for Nonprofit News. [17] As of 2024, it is supported by grants from foundations, including the Knight Foundation, Ford Foundation, Public Welfare Foundation, and David and Lucile Packard Foundation, as well as via tax deductible contributions from donors such as Archie Manning, John Grisham, Shepard Smith, and Dick Molpus. [18] It previously received donations from former Mississippi governors Haley Barbour and William Winter. [18] [5]
The newsroom is headquartered in Ridgeland, Mississippi. [19] It is an affiliate member of the Mississippi Press Association [20] and a partner with States Newsroom. [21]
The organization's staff includes editor-in-chief Adam Ganucheau, a former reporter at the Clarion-Ledger , and CEO Mary Margaret White. [10] Marshall Ramsey, an editorial cartoonist, is the publication's editor-at-large. [10] Journalists adhere to the Society of Professional Journalists' Code of Ethics. [22]
In 2023, the staffers unionized through the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, and management agreed to recognize the union. [1]
Mississippi Today brands itself as a nonpartisan news organization. [2] The organization has been accused of being left-leaning or liberal by conservative journalists and Republican politicians, with individuals like Phil Bryant refusing to answer phone calls from Mississippi Today. [8] [23] [24] [25] The organization, and journalists within it, have rebutted this characterization as conflating watchdog journalism with left-leaning stances. [26] [24] [27]
Mississippi Today has won awards for its journalism from the Mississippi Press Association, the Online News Association, and the Hillman Foundation. [28] [29] [30] Mississippi Today investigative reporter Anna Wolfe won a 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting for her investigation of the Mississippi welfare funds scandal. [31] It was a 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting finalist for Jerry Mitchell's investigation into Mississippi sheriffs. [32] Other awards include two Goldsmith Prizes, [33] the National Press Club's John R. Aubuchon Award for Press Freedom, [34] the University of Mississippi's Silver Em Award, [35] multiple first-place Green Eyeshade Awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, [36] the Local Media Association's Digital Innovation Award, a Livingston Award finalist, [37] and a Toner Prize for Excellence in Political Reporting finalist. [38]
The Pulitzer Prizes are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters." They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fortune as a newspaper publisher.
The Tampa Bay Times, called the St. Petersburg Times until 2011, is an American newspaper published in St. Petersburg, Florida, United States. It is published by the Times Publishing Company, which is owned by The Poynter Institute for Media Studies, a nonprofit journalism school directly adjacent to the University of South Florida St. Petersburg campus.
The Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) is a nonprofit news organization based in San Francisco, California.
Paul D. Thacker is an American journalist who reports on science, medicine, and the environment. He was a lead investigator of the United States Senate Committee on Finance for Senator Chuck Grassley, where he examined financial links between physicians and pharmaceutical companies.
The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting is an American news media organization established in 2006 that sponsors independent reporting on global issues that other media outlets are less willing or able to undertake on their own. The center's goal is to raise the standard of coverage of international systemic crises and to do so in a way that engages both the broad public and government policy-makers. The organization is based in Washington, D.C.
Brett Murphy is an American journalist, best known as a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2018 for his investigative reporting series on the exploitation of truckers in California. He was also a child actor in the early 2000s, appearing in films including Fever Pitch.
The Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting is an award for journalists administered by the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. The program was launched in 1991, with the goal of exposing examples of poor government, and encouraging good government in the United States. There is a $25,000 award for the winner.
Scott Higham is an American journalist and author who documented the corporate and political forces that fueled the opioid epidemic, in addition to conducting other major investigations. He is a five-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and won the Pulitzer twice with his colleagues at The Washington Post. After a 24-year career with The Post, he began producing investigative projects for Bill Whitaker at 60 Minutes. He is also coauthor of two books.
The Investigative Reporting Workshop (IRW) is an editorially independent newsroom in the American University School of Communication in Washington, D.C. focused on investigative journalism. It pairs students with professional newsrooms to publish projects. It has partnered with dozens of newsrooms on hundreds of investigations, working with over 240 students journalists.
Alan C. Miller is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist and the founder of the News Literacy Project, a national education nonprofit that works with educators and journalists to offer resources and tools that help middle school and high school students learn to separate fact from fiction. In 2020, NLP expanded its audience to include people of all ages.
Gilbert Martin Gaul is an American journalist. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes and been a finalist for four others.
The Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) is a non-profit consortium of nonprofit journalism organizations. The organization promotes nonprofit investigative and public service journalism. INN facilitates collaborations between member organizations, provides training in best-practices and fundraising, and provides back-office services.
Inside Climate News is a non-profit news organization, focusing on environmental journalism about the climate crisis. The publication conducts watchdog journalism on climate policy, climate misinformation, and environmental injustice.
Honolulu Civil Beat is a nonprofit online news organization covering the U.S. state of Hawaii. It specializes in investigative reporting, watchdog journalism and in-depth enterprise coverage.
The Marshall Project is a nonprofit news organization that seeks to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about inequities within the U.S. criminal justice system. The Marshall Project has been described as an advocacy group by some, and works to impact the system through journalism.
Coda Media is a nonprofit news organization that produces journalism about the roots of major global crises. It was founded in 2016 by Natalia Antelava, a former BBC correspondent, and Ilan Greenberg, a magazine and newspaper writer who served as a staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal.
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States Newsroom is a nonprofit news network in the United States. Its newsrooms focus mostly on state politics.
The Beacon is a non-profit online news outlet in the Kansas City metropolitan area focusing on public-interest journalism. It is Kansas City’s first regional nonprofit news outlet that is not a public television or radio station.
Anna Wolfe is an American investigative journalist known for her work covering corruption in Mississippi's restitution centers and the welfare funds scandal. In 2023, Wolfe won the Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting.
The brainchild of Andrew R. Lack, former chairman of NBC News Universal, and Donna and Jim Barksdale, Netscape CEO and philanthropist, Mississippi Today...
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Readers on the right have sometimes criticized us for being too left-leaning. Readers on the left have sometimes criticized us for not doing more to directly bring about political change...But there's common ground I know we can all stand on: Unchecked power is harmful to every Mississippian. That's why we launched this newsroom five years ago. We tell stories and share perspectives we believe to be true, and we work to hold elected officials — Republicans and Democrats — accountable.