Want the News to Unite People? Let Them Report It

The test provided a living lab for Dunaway and her colleagues. They found that removing national politics from the opinion section didn’t reverse polarization in the Palm Springs region, but it did slow down feelings of distance between people of different political positions.

The exact cause of this is unclear, according to Dunaway. Is it from increasing attention on less ideologically divided local issues? Or reducing consumption of national, more partisan news? But one of the clearest insights, she says, is that it’s viable for publications to reduce national news coverage. “People had opinions and complaints, but they, on the whole, were mostly glad to see less national stuff and more local.”

For Makinen, the experience speaks to the importance of forums for civil discussion about local issues. And the community seemed to agree. When Gannett, the paper’s owner, discontinued the opinion section, community members worked with Makinen to raise money to continue to pay for an opinion editor. That fundraising effort became the Coachella Valley Journalism Foundation, a nonprofit that now supports newsrooms across the region with trainings, awards and funding for newsroom jobs.

The stories local outlets cover about what’s happening at the city and county level have a much bigger impact on people’s lives than the national stage, Makinen notes. And, they create openings where community members can build relationships with each other.

“Local news gives people so many different touch points to connect with people in their community, and sort of feel less isolated and polarized,” she says.

Documenters is one way local news is helping community members find those touch points.

The approach to citizen journalism was developed in Chicago by the nonprofit news outlet City Bureau, when the editorial team decided to recruit residents to help comb through a massive police document. It would have taken one reporter dozens of hours alone, explains Resnik. But by bringing in residents interested in flexing their research muscles, the outlet expanded its capacity and built new relationships with the community.

That evolved into Documenters, a model Resnik describes as a “civic side hustle,” where community members are paid a stipend to, as he says, “commit these small acts of journalism.” The approach has since been adopted in 25 communities, each run locally by a news or civic organization.

In Ohio, Signal Akron launched three years ago simultaneously with their Documenters program, building the network of residents into the way the publication operates. Each week, community editor Kevin Dilley recruits from a pool of more than 400 trained Documenters to cover about a dozen local meetings. Documenters apply to cover meetings as fits their schedule, and make about $90 per meeting. They write up summaries, highlighting a few points they find most important. After some light editing, summaries are posted on the Documenters Akron website. If something particularly noteworthy happens, the summary may get published on Signal Akron’s main website, alongside stories written by the outlet’s professional journalists.

The program, according to Dilley, has resulted in an extraordinarily diverse newsroom. Documenters range in age from 19 to 84, some with PhDs, others reentering from incarceration. Every zip code in the greater Akron area is represented. For Dilley, this community-driven approach provides an opportunity to rebuild trust in local news. Residents may be skeptical of news media, and even of Signal Akron. “Here’s the thing with the Documenters,” he says. “You trust your neighbors.”

One of the biggest challenges is funding. In Akron, there are more public meetings — and more Documenters interested in covering them — than the small editorial team can handle.

Dunaway, of Syracuse University, notes that there is a resurgence of attention on local news. With the internet, many anticipated that online sources about hyperlocal news issues would naturally emerge, but it didn’t happen. Now, she notes, there are concerted efforts to boost local news coverage in order to fill the need. So far, however, she says they tend to be scattershot. Urban areas tend to be better served, while rural and lower-income communities are less well-covered.

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What exactly local news looks like is also changing. Across the country, Documenters share information through messaging networks, bulletin boards and conversations with neighbors. And instead of framing local elections in the national two-party horserace, Documenters have focused on making sure community members understand the roles of the municipal positions on the ballot.

“It changes this idea of an ‘us v. them’ into something where there’s much, much more nuance,” Resnik says.

Jantzi believes every community should have something like a Documenters program. It’s not that local politics aren’t divisive, she says. Police issues tend to be highly polarized, and school board meetings get so contentious they stretch for hours. But by seeing meetings play out, and connecting with neighbors who are interested, there’s more awareness of the nuances of local governance.

“There’s just more accountability for the decision-making and more power to the community to actually learn what’s happening,” she says.

The post Want the News to Unite People? Let Them Report It appeared first on Reasons to be Cheerful.

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