“Sim City”-like mapping tools herald new avenues for community reporting

Education, Sprawl, Community Publishing are Key Concerns

Washington, D.C., November 9, 2000 — Clickable maps of undeveloped waterfront. Smart Growth maps of a coastal resort. Online cancer risk calculators. Webcams in Spanish-speaking homes. These are among 16 new ideas to help newsrooms engage their communities that will receive funding next year from the Pew Center for Civic Journalism.

Among the initiatives receiving some support are reporting projects that will involve the community on the state of education, growth and sprawl, medical research, growing Hispanic communities and hard-to-reach youth communities, the Pew Center announced today.

“A goal of almost all the projects is a remarkable degree of community interactivity that reaches beyond focus groups and town hall meetings and pushes for developing entirely new software that involves readers and viewers in useful ways,” said Jan Schaffer, executive director of the Pew Center.

“It’s clear that newsrooms around the country are embracing new avenues for reporting on community issues and developing new electronic tools to do so.”

This year’s projects were selected by the Pew Center’s Advisory Board from a record 60 proposals submitted by news organizations around the country.

“Striking in this year’s proposals was not only the depth of commitment to civic journalism principles but also the newsroom appetite for developing electronic roadways for engaging citizens in community concerns,” said Jack Nelson, the Pew Center’s Advisory Board Chairman and Chief Washington Correspondent for The Los Angeles Times. “They reflect civic journalism’s contribution to cutting-edge research and development.”

The Pew Center supports some of the extraordinary costs of trying to engage readers and viewers in issues of concern – costs not covered in normal newsroom budgets. Approximately $264,250 has been allocated for the 16 initiatives in 2001, an average of about $16,500 each.

Creating New Interactions

The Herald, KSER-FM public radio, Everett, WA
$15,000
To create an interactive, community-based plan for developing the city’s two waterfronts.
In a “Sim City” approach to waterfront redevelopment, the paper will invite community sketches and build clickable maps online to capture residents’ visions for the undeveloped and inaccessible land along the Snohomish River and Port Gardner Bay. The paper will convene a town hall meeting, produce a historical video, conduct a poll, examine successful waterfront development models, and create a community conversation about the land. From residents’ sketches, the paper will develop an online map that web visitors can use to “develop” their waterfront vision by clicking on icons and placing them on the maps. Schoolchildren will also be given the opportunity to “map” their vision. The paper will collect all the maps, average the input and publish the model that most closely resembles a consensus.

The Sun News, Myrtlebeachonline.com, Coastal Carolina University, Myrtle Beach, SC
$16,000
To help a booming coastal tourist community plan and control growth.
What will the Myrtle Beach coastline look like in 2020? Community residents will be invited to draw, online, their vision for a future amid explosive growth. Myrtle Beach is the nation’s fastest-growing relocation destination and second most popular family vacation destination. The paper will conduct a poll, report on Smart Growth solutions and become a key Web site for Smart Growth information as it tries to help the community manage runaway growth.

KVDA-TV (Telemundo), Channel 60, San Antonio, TX
$20,000
To create family-level correspondents in 20 Spanish-speaking homes.
The station will install Webcams, computers and DSL lines in 20 homes to collect live feeds and family-level reaction to the news, to give a voice to low-income families who might not be heard, to encourage discussions about issues that may impact their families and to provide a forum to communicate with policy makers.

MaineToday.com, Portland Press Herald/ Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland, ME
$30,000
To develop an interactive Community Publishing pilot program.
Mainetoday.com, the portal for the Portland Press Herald, the Morning Sentinel, the Kennebec Journal and WMTW Broadcasting, will develop pilot projects that allow citizens to interact with the news instead of reacting to news – and create more useful online listening posts for reporters. The project will use various self-publishing tools and provide training to help readers and Web-site users contribute their own news, responses and questions directly to online community forums. Initially, the focus will be on five communities, including communities of interests, such as religion, books, youth or arts. Eventually, the goal is to explore the use of e-mail as a news-delivery device.

Covering Education and Youth

Philadelphia Daily News, Philly.com,Philadelphia, PA
$15,000
To foster conversation and a discussion of solutions to the city’s ailing public schools.
Building on its three-year-old “Rethinking Philadelphia” civic journalism initiative, the paper will kick off a Fall 2001 focus on the public schools. A School Speak Week will launch conversations in print, in person and on the Web about a school system in which more than 80 percent of the students are poor. One goal is the creation of a virtual Home and School Association. It will allow parents and students to join Web discussion groups on homework, standardized tests and race relations; chat online with education experts; participate in polls on school issues; question other parents who can offer solutions; and navigate the school system to learn, for instance, how to apply to a magnet school or what are academic specialties of various high schools. The paper will work with public libraries and others to link people to the site and build access to people who are often left out in traditional school reporting.

The News-Star, the newsstar.com, The News-Star Teen Council, Louisiana Tech University Department of Journalism, Grambling State University Mass Communication Department, and the Society of Professional Journalists, Lincoln Collegiate Chapter,Monroe, LA
$18,250
To explore why so many fourth- and eighth-graders failed English and math proficiency tests.
This year, Monroe schools had to establish new grades, 4.5 and 8.5, for hundreds of children held back because they failed, even after summer school, to pass statewide tests. The paper will undertake an “all hands on desk” reporting project to discover the reasons behind the failures, using surveys, school focus groups, town hall meetings, online chats and civic mapping of school neighborhoods. The goal is to identify the needs and enlist community support in solving the problems. Journalism students will help set up the focus groups, design surveys and write some of the stories.

The Arizona Daily Star, The Tucson Citizen, KVOA Channel 4 (NBC), KOLD Channel 13 (CBS), KGUN9 (ABC), KUAT Channel 6 (PBS), KWBA Channel 58 (WB), KMSB Fox 11, KTTU Channel 18 (UPN), KHRR Channel 40 (Telemundo) and KUVE Channel 52 (Univision),Tucson, AZ
$15,000
To organize and simulcast an all-media town hall on education and mandatory testing.
The partners will follow up this year’s town hall on youth and family issues with an exploration of why students are failing statewide tests required for graduation. Based on preliminary test scores, two out of three seniors would fail to graduate. The partners will meet with PTA groups, neighborhood associations and others to form citizen action teams, which will gather concerns from teachers, parents and students and explore solutions. The news organizations will develop their own issues coverage before and after the town hall.

Pacific News Service’s Youth Communications Project, Yo!Youthoutlook.org, San Francisco, CA
$20,000
To produce a daily San Francisco Examiner feature by and about young people.
Youth writers will chronicle life in the Bay Area as it is experienced by those between the ages of 15 and 25 and their articles will appear in appropriate sections of the newspaper. Contributors will participate in writing workshops conducted by PNS and by Examiner editors. Participants are involved in such PNS writing projects as “The Other Internet Generation” about entry-level workers on the assembly lines of the new high-tech companies, “Campus Reports” about life in area high schools, “The Beat Within” about the juvenile justice experience, and “Roaddawgz” about homeless young people.

Covering Growth and Sprawl

KTVU-TV (Fox), San Francisco Chronicle, SF Gate.com, Bayinsider.com, Oakland, CA
$15,000
To examine the economic and social consequences of the high-tech boom.
The station will go beyond the “wow” of growth and riches in Silicon Valley to explore an underlying master narrative: the “Price of Prosperity” Bay Area residents pay for the economic boom. Collaborating with the San Francisco Chronicle, SFGate.com and Bayinsider.com, the station will explore the costs of wealth, the have’s and have-not’s, and the burdens of such frenzied growth. Using polling, town hall meetings, online discussions and a broadcast special, the station will encourage a public dialogue about how to manage the social impact of this modern-day “Gold Rush.”

Lawrence Journal-World, 6News, J-W Web Works,Lawrence, KS
$15,000
To create a community discussion focused on growth and development.
The paper will move behind a “growth vs. no-growth” frame of coverage to a broader exploration of the challenges and opportunities. Using focus groups, the paper will convene organized conversations that will probe the diverse views of different stakeholders. Polling, community publishing and other web interactions will help answer the question: “Lawrence is growing; what are we going to do about it?”

Covering Science and Medicine

Star-Gazette, WETM-TV (NBC) Elmira, NY; WSKG-FM, WSKG-TV (PBS) Binghamton, NY Elmira, Binghamton, NY
$14,000
To explain the high incidence of cancer and help reduce it.
For 20 years, the Elmira area has had a higher overall incidence of cancer than the rest of the state. In “The Cost of Cancer,” the partners will survey 500 residents to get a snapshot of how cancer has affected area families. They will look for major similarities in the area’s cancer population, investigate the financial, social and human toll of the disease and try to help residents adopt healthier lifestyles. The paper’s Web site will host a cancer risk calculator, map the area’s cancer hot spots and share poll questions online.

Lincoln Journal Star, Nebraska ETV, KMTV3 (CBS), Omaha Lincoln, Omaha, NE
$23,500
To explore the ethical decisions surrounding state-supported medical research.
The public was surprised to learn last spring that the University of Nebraska Medical Center was doing scientific research using cells from aborted fetuses. The partners will examine the kinds of medical research at the university, explore ethical and moral questions, and use surveys and online forums to engage Nebraskans in a discussion of the issues involved. The project will culminate with a documentary followed by a televised down hall meeting at the Medical Center.

Engaging the Community

WTHR-TV (NBC), The Indianapolis Star, Indianapolis, IN
$15,000
To identify and raise the visibility of key community issues.
The station will harness its broad-reaching “13 Listens” initiative and its 75 Citizen Advisors with the newspaper’s editorial page forums to explore at least six community issues. Public safety, the criminal justice system, school issues, property-tax reform and electric deregulation are targeted for consideration with town meetings, online forums and public feedback opportunities.

Bangor Daily News, The Margaret Chase Smith Center for Public Policy, University of Maine Bangor, ME
$11,800
To probe the quality of leadership and people’s aspirations for civic participation.
The paper will investigate the nature and quality of leadership and civic life as part of an effort to engage state residents in exploring: “Who will lead?” The paper will survey official and quasi-official leaders and create a “snowball” sample of other “silent” leaders. Reports will examine how Maine leaders define economic security and quality of life, the responsibilities of citizenship and the extent of other civic participation. Online discussion groups will foster discussions of shared visions and challenges.

Community Newspaper Co., Needham, MA
$10,000
To examine the grassroots political culture in Eastern Massachusetts
The Community Newspaper Co. will engage its 88 weekly and four daily newspapers in exploring residents’ relationship to government and in building reporting tools to help people talk directly to policy makers. The chain will use public forums and its newspaper Web sites to engage readers in discussions. The project will also team up with the McCormack Institute and DiscoverWhy to use instant polling and tracking software to solicit reader participation and feedback.

KUT-FM (PBS), University of Texas, Austin, TX
$10,700
To build a radio newsroom based on the principles of civic journalism.
The partners will use surveys, focus groups and civic mapping to research community attitudes and needs. Management will use the results to develop a news philosophy and coverage plan for the public television station.

R&D for News Content

Since its inception in 1993, the Pew Center has supported 108 civic journalism experiments that have helped to develop new kinds of news content that gives ordinary people a voice in identifying problems and building solutions. The Center shares the lessons learned at national workshops for journalists and journalism educators and in its training videos and publications.

The Pew Center, located in Washington, DC, is an initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts (www.pewtrusts.com). Based in Philadelphia, The Trusts make strategic investments to help organizations and citizens develop practical solutions to difficult problems. In 1999, with approximately $4.9 billion in assets, The Trusts committed over $250 million to 206 nonprofit organizations.