Washington taxpayers are funding a great experiment in sustaining local journalism. It’s already off to a good start.
The state’s new biennial budget includes $2.4 million for “a journalism fellowship program focused on civic affairs.”
This will place eight graduating journalism students per year at local news outlets across the state. The gigs last two years so the roster will grow to 16 after the first year.
As I reported earlier this week, Washington, Oregon and California are all developing fellowship programs to help backfill their states’ news deserts and vacant newsrooms with early career journalists. I’ve got more details now from educators getting it started in Washington.
Far more jobs are needed to revive local news coverage but the fellowships are a promising start. They will provide jobs, training and valuable signals to journalism students, the public and other policymakers.
Around 70% of newspaper newsroom jobs were lost over the last two decades, including a 67% decline in Washington state from 2005 to 2020, according to a report by U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell.