Welcome to the Local Fix. Each week we look at key questions in journalism sustainability and community engagement through the lens of local news. But first, we always begin with one good idea…

One Good Idea: Refresh your newsletter 

You may notice things look different in this email today! We have moved to MailChimp, thanks to your feedback in our audience survey (more changes to come!). As we think through our next moves, we’ve found these checklists from NPR and the Local News Lab to be helpful; maybe you will, too.

A few more good things

In the spirit of one good idea, here’s a roundup of what else we’ve been exploring and thinking about this week. What’s on your mind? Reply to this email and let us know.

• One thing to learn more about: News broke this week that Chicago Public Media, the parent company of WBEZ, is likely to acquire the Chicago Sun-Times, moving the daily paper that has frequently shifted ownership into a nonprofit home. Chicago is bubbling with local media partnerships and experimentation and mergers led by public media are becoming more of a trend — there is even a playbook for it. We’re curious to see how this plays out, since it’s not yet a done deal. 
• One opportunity to apply for: Press On is hosting a training in November with Migrant Roots Media for mediamakers interested in learning about shifting toxic narratives around white supremacy, racial justice, and immigration. Deadline is October 15, and the group of facilitators looks stellar. 
• One model to share: Kat Duncan is hiring for her team at the Reynolds Journalism Institute and shared this post to clarify what she’s like as a manager, what it’s like living in Columbia, Missouri, and more. Cheers for being upfront about expectations both for the manager and the employee.

Have a good weekend,

Christine and Teresa
@heres_christine and @gteresa

P.S. One more change: We’ll be sending the Local Fix every other week for the rest of the year as we do some deeper work behind the scenes. We welcome feedback and suggestions for what to include! Email us at localnewslab@democracyfund.org.

The Local Fix is a project of  Democracy Fund’s Public Square Program, which supports work that aims to transform journalism so everyone has access to information they need to participate in our democracy. The Fix was started by Josh Stearns and Molly de Aguiar.

Disclosure: Some projects mentioned in this newsletter may be funded by Democracy Fund. You can find a full list of the organizations here.
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