ASHEVILLE — The Carolina Public Press news service has been awarded a $50,000 grant from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation to expand its investigative and state government reporting, as well as increase efforts to develop a sustainable model of nonprofit public interest journalism in Western North Carolina.
Carolina Public Press, found at www.carolinapublicpress.org, is a nonprofit online news service providing Western North Carolina with unbiased, in-depth and investigative reporting as well as educational opportunities to journalists, students and others. It believes that public interest reporting is critical to an informed, engaged electorate and to ensuring government accountability. Carolina Public Press is currently the only news organization in the 18 westernmost counties of the state with reporters in Raleigh covering the N.C. General Assembly and its associated lawmakers and policy efforts.
The grant was one of 19 Ethics and Excellence in Journalism awarded to journalism organizations across the country. Based in Oklahoma City, Okla., the foundation’s mission is to invest in the future of journalism by building the ethics, skills and opportunities needed to advance principled, probing news and information.
Launched three years ago this month, Carolina Public Press shares its journalism with news organizations across North Carolina. Based in Asheville, Carolina Public Press’s reporting serves the nearly 1 million people living in Avery, Buncombe, Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Macon, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Swain, Transylvania, Watauga and Yancey counties. It was awarded a 2012 national New Media Women Entrepreneurship award, and it has also earned the recognition of PBS MediaShift and J-Lab and additional funding from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation and The Community Foundation of Western North Carolina. Hundreds of individual contributors also support its hard-hitting watchdog journalism and high-quality training programs with tax-deductible contributions.
“We are honored that the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation has recognized our hard work to improve the quality and quantity of watchdog, investigative reporting in Western North Carolina,” said Angie Newsome, the executive director of Carolina Public Press. “We are very excited that our group of journalists can now invest even more in reporting about the overlooked and under-reported issues facing our region — topics that often have impact and influence felt across the state.”
“EEJF is excited to form new partnerships with start-up investigative news organizations, as well as continue our long standing relationships with established groups” said Bob Ross, president and CEO of Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation. “We hope our portfolio of grantees will strive to find innovative best practices for high-impact journalism.”
To make your tax-deductible contribution to Carolina Public Press, please go here.
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I am fairly new to Asheville and am deaf, but use Cochlear Implants with great success. I am a member of the Hearing Loss Association of America (HLAA) Organization which has been in existence for 35 years. I became involved with this Organization in 1996. I am now in the Chapter my sister I started in Brevard two years ago this past March. We wanted to have a chapter in WNC, someday, we hope some of our members will begin a new chapter here in Asheville. I am an Asheville resident,, my sister Kathy Borzell resides in Sapphire, NC. We are creating awareness of the need for “Looping Devices” which are becoming universal. They have been around for many years, mostly in the UK, but now picking up in the US. They are a universal device that can aid so many people to attend public meetings etc. We called on Carolina Public Press to help us get the word out. Member Ann Karson of HLAA Brevard Chapter met up with Micah Wilkens, a delightful journalist who took our story about a Presentation the HLAA Brevard Chapter was hosting “LETS’S LOOP WNC” and put the word out, came to the presentation herself and did another article. A Big thank you Micah Wilkens an Carolina Public Press…I will be a loyal follower and more in the future.