This Community Information Needs Assessment was built on extensive and careful listening. California Common Cause helped facilitate 12 focus groups in English, Spanish, Cantonese, and Tagalog, in partnership with community-based organizations, and had over a dozen conversations with community news publishers.
Hardman discusses early experiences that shaped his approach, including the importance of deeply listening to communities and collaborating to meet their information needs. He outlines the development of the Listening Post Collective and its Civic Media Playbook, emphasizing strategies for establishing trust and engaging communities in creating media that reflects their voices and priorities.
We hear from two people who have been building state “ecosystems”: Rashad Mahmood, from the New Mexico Local News Fund and Stefanie Murray, from the Center for Cooperative Media at Montclair State University.
The New Mexico Local News Fund brings news organizations across the state together to harness their collective reporting and fundraising power and tell regional or statewide stories that one outlet could not fully cover on its own. The organization is building on a collaborative mindset already in place among New Mexico’s journalists and providing them with resources and training to enhance their reporting.
The organization works in collaboration with its audience to engage in two-way reporting via text message. This model replaces things like Facebook groups, which can fuel the spread of misinformation and amplify political polarization within communities. El Tímpano provides its audiences with access to the information they need from a source that’s earned their trust.
