Journalists in 27 states receive funding and other support for specific investigations
WASHINGTON, DC; JULY 25, 2023 – The Fund for Investigative Journalism announced today that it is making a record 44 grants in its latest round of funding.
These include 22 new grants to journalists for specific groundbreaking investigations and 22 “seed” grants for early reporting and research that can lead to full investigations. The full-project grants are for up to $10,000 to cover the expenses of investigations, such as travel, open-records fees and reporting time. The seed grants are for up to $2,500 for the expenses of initial reporting.
Journalists receiving full grants can also be matched with veteran investigative reporters who provide editorial mentorship, and they can request free legal help through the Fund’s partnership with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
This new set of 44 grants is by far the largest in the Fund’s 54-year history. The Fund has grown significantly over the last three years to meet the sharply increasing need for funding and other support for investigative reporting, particularly at the state and local levels. The vast majority of investigations produced with the Fund’s support are state and local stories.
The 22 seed grants announced today are the first that the Fund has awarded. In April, the Fund acquired the Gumshoe Group’s successful program to provide seed funds, as that nonprofit organization sunset its operations.
The Fund provides grants and other support for specific investigations, but the Fund does not disclose the nature of its grantees’ stories before they are published. Below are lists of individuals and organizations awarded grants in this funding cycle.
Regular grants, up to $10,000, to cover the expenses of specific investigations:
- Gabriela Alcalde, a 2022 graduate of the Stabile Investigative program at Columbia Journalism School
- Allegheny Front, a public media outlet covering the environment in Pennsylvania
- Pramod Acharya, a US- and Nepal-based freelance journalist
- An Arm and a Leg, a podcast about the cost of health care
- Borderless Magazine, a bilingual, nonprofit news outlet covering immigration in the Chicago region, for an investigation led by Nissa Rhee
- Bridge Michigan, the state’s largest nonprofit news service
- Tom Brown, London-based freelance investigative journalist, and Christina Last, London- and Massachusetts-based data scientist
- THE CITY, a not-for-profit digital newsroom in New York
- Detroit Free Press, for an investigation led by Violet Ikonomova
- Grist, for an investigation led by Lylla Younes
- Stuart Harmon, independent documentary producer based in Northern California
- Injustice Watch, for an investigation by Alejandra Cancino, Maya Dukmasova and Grace Asiegbu
- Inewsource, a nonprofit newsroom in San Diego, California
- Pamela Kelley, freelance journalist in North Carolina
- Maine Monitor for a project led by Samantha Hogan
- Lois Parshley and Sean McDermott, freelance journalists in Alaska
- J. Weston Phippen, independent journalist based in New Mexico
- Clarissa Sosin, freelance journalist based in New York
- Texas Observer, for an investigation by Steven Monacelli
- The Times Union, based in Albany, New York, for an investigation led by Emilie Munson
- Underscore, an investigative nonprofit newsroom that covers Indigenous communities in the Pacific Northwest
- Wisconsin Watch, a nonprofit investigative news outlet
“Seed” grants for preliminary reporting and research that can lead to full investigations; these grants are up to $2,500 for the expenses of freelance journalists’ early reporting:
- Barbara Bernstein
- Mark Betancourt
- Nick Bowlin
- Alleen Brown
- Liset Cruz
- Kelli Duncan
- Tana Ganeva
- Sara Ganim
- Georgia Gee
- Ben Greenberg
- Emily Harrold
- Daryl Khan
- Austin Landis
- Patty Machelor
- Maria Martin
- Rico Moore
- Gabbriel Schivone
- David Schneider
- Jordan Smith
- Amy Whipple
In addition, seed grants were provided to two nonprofit news organizations for preliminary reporting: The 74 and Honolulu Civil Beat.
The Fund’s Board of Directors, all accomplished journalists, reviews grant proposals and votes on which to approve. A group of the Fund’s Board and Advisory Board members reviewed seed grant proposals and made recommendations to the full Board, which voted on them. That review group included Bill Marimow, Dianna Hunt, Cheryl W. Thompson, Marcia Bullard, Sarah Cohen and Peter Eisler.
The next deadline to apply for regular grants is September 5, and the next deadline for seed grants will be announced shortly and posted on the Fund’s website.
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