#journalism-philanthropy

#journalism-philanthropy

John Kaehny has written and successfully lobbied for the passage of state and New York City laws related to government transparency and accountability, including the first open data law in the world in 2012.

Students are actively shaping their education by addressing critical issues such as integration in elite public high schools and the need for a diverse teaching workforce.

I'm incredibly proud of the firm and what we've accomplished in the last year. We had certainly, the year before, a historic year financially, and this year was also historic in being one of our best financial years in history.

What makes reporting the greatest job in the world is that you get to talk to people and hear their stories. Writing for City Limits allowed me to be a witness to the battles everyday New Yorkers were waging in neighborhoods throughout the city.

Most for-profit companies still confine nonprofit relationships to corporate philanthropy. Donations flow through foundations, annual reports highlight community contributions, and nonprofit engagement is framed as evidence of corporate responsibility.

Losing staff could be detrimental to the projects we worked on, and there was a growing dissatisfaction with how meetings were run. These mostly one-sided discussions left the quieter half of us feeling pushed aside, like our thoughts didn't matter much. If things stayed this way, I worried the good people on our team would start quitting one by one.

Press Forward made almost $23 million in grants to 22 organizations aimed at bolstering the infrastructure for local news. The grants were the culmination of a request for proposals process that began accepting applications in November 2024, and elicited 559 proposals.

"Are you okay?" These were Alex Pretti's last words, said to a woman after ICE agents had tackled and pepper-sprayed her. Videos from bystanders show Pretti holding up a phone, attempting to document what was happening before he himself was pepper-sprayed, wrestled to the ground, and killed by those officers. He lost his life not for committing violence, but for documenting it, and stepping in to protect someone facing it.

The change in the administration's tactics in Minneapolis is not a retreat. Instead, they are regrouping and planning another mode of attack, with the hopes that their repression might be met with resistance that is easier to control and contain. People who garner their relevancy and power through the dehumanization and oppression of others will do whatever it takes to cling to their soulless sense of self.

I've seen this before-many times, in fact. What you're describing is not unheard of in the nonprofit sector. Founder energy is one of the most powerful forces driving new missions into the world. It can also be one of the riskiest. Many organizations, especially those built from lived experience, passion, and necessity, begin with little more than a vision, a problem to solve.

Dear Transparency-Committed Reader, You're not alone. So many of us want decision-making to reflect our collective values (like transparency, care, and shared power), but it's hard to actually put those values into practice. That gap between what we believe and how we decide can be frustrating. And getting stuck in the process is a common concern I hear from groups. I am happy to share, though, that decision-making doesn't have to be a nightmare.

If you've worked in a technical role in news for long enough, you likely remember when the "show your work" spirit was everywhere. Newsroom nerds shared code on GitHub, swapped tips on social media and unfurled long blogs guiding others on how to get things done. You might also have a vague sense that - like reaction GIFs, demotivational posters, and that guy who sang "Chocolate Rain" - you're seeing less of it these days.

The pandemic changed Defector's course. New York shut down, the economy ground to a halt, and the offers of capital dried up. So the group decided to launch a new website on their own dime, this time structured as a worker-owned cooperative in which the journalists, rather than media executives, made all the decisions. The site became the kind of success that's rare in digital media nowadays, bringing in $3.2 million in revenue from over 40,000 paying subscribers in its first year alone.

The arrests of journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort on Friday signal an increasing willingness for the federal government to criminalize newsgathering activities. While the legal merits of those arrests have yet to be tested, they are a red flag for journalists and newsroom leaders everywhere. Given the speed and unpredictability of recent federal actions - including the seizure of a Washington Post reporter's equipment earlier this month - every newsroom must prepare now to defend its right to report the news.