Funding Tools Archives

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Report

How Funding Local News Ecosystems Helps American Communities Thrive

October 31, 2023

Reliable information fuels our lives. We need to know who is on the ballot, what’s happening in our schools, where to find rental assistance, and how to make change in our neighborhoods. From daily reporting that equips people to act, to huge investigations that reveal corruption, the health of local news is bound up with the health of our democracy.

Over five years, Democracy Fund has invested $11 million in six geographic areas across the U.S., where residents and institutions are collaborating to better meet their communities’ real information needs.

This report tells the story of how Democracy Fund grantees created positive impact in their communities through innovative, locally-driven solutions. It also shares lessons for funders and local leaders interested in advancing a more equitable future for local journalism. As more funders consider local collaborative funding, we hope that this report will serve as a valuable resource.

We believe that funding local news ecosystems is an equitable way to support local news because it is rooted in community listening and redistributing resources to areas of greatest need. In 2023, we have committed $4.75 million over the next three years to the geographic areas highlighted in the report, as part of our new Equitable Journalism strategy.

As we move forward in this work, we will continue to share what we learn, including a deeper analysis of the health of various local news ecosystems later in 2024. Sign up for our email newsletter to stay in touch.

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Transforming Media through Press Forward: Democracy Fund’s Priorities

Josh Stearns, Angelica Das & Teresa Gorman

September 8, 2023

A national coalition of 20 funders announced an exciting new initiative on September 7th. Press Forward plans to invest more than $500 million into local news and information over the next five years, aiming to transform media across America in profound and lasting ways.

Press Forward’s goal is to revitalize local news and civic media in the short term while spurring even more support for people’s access to information in the long term. We hope $500 million is just the starting place and that Press Forward will help spark a movement across philanthropy to raise millions more.

Democracy Fund is contributing to this effort because we believe pro-democracy journalism, especially led by and serving people of color, needs far more resources. We have been blown away by the work our grantees have done to reimagine local news and with more support we know their impact can be transformative. This vision will require significant shifts in philanthropy and public policy — Press Forward can be the spark.

Guided by our vision and strategy

We want you to know that our involvement in Press Forward is an addition to Democracy Fund’s existing strategy, not a departure. Our core values and vision remain central to our work with Press Forward, and our current grantmaking strategy will continue uninterrupted.

Democracy Fund has been a guiding partner in the Press Forward coalition for over a year, and we will continue to actively participate in this work. We are finalizing our financial contribution to Press Forward, which will be new dollars above and beyond our existing funding for local news.

While Press Forward’s announcement was a significant milestone, it is just the beginning of this work. There is still much to do to build this new effort. As the coalition prepares to distribute resources in the coming years, we are filled with a sense of purpose and excitement for the journey ahead.

Centering racial justice in coalition work

Equitable journalism is a priority for us at Democracy Fund. Press Forward plans to deploy half a billion dollars to local news, and we are committed to advocating for investments that move us toward a more inclusive, multi-racial democracy.

In ten years, we envision a thriving local news landscape where civic media organizations provide the reliable information people need. These organizations will be essential in helping individuals lead meaningful lives, address challenges in their communities, and actively participate in our democracy.

At Democracy Fund, we hope to foster a public square that is anti-racist and community-centered, where voices that have been marginalized for far too long have a platform. By placing racial justice at the heart of our work with coalitions like Press Forward, we aim to create a media landscape that reflects the diversity of our communities and serves them wholeheartedly.

Listening and learning every step of the way

Civic media and local news are a growing priority for many funders and donors, including those new to journalism. Thanks to the pioneering work of trailblazing organizations, we’re living through the most significant and hopeful expansion of civic news since the establishment of public broadcasting over fifty years ago. Press Forward builds upon that foundation.

When Democracy Fund shared our five-year strategy last year, we reinforced our commitment to deeply listening to our grantees. They told us about the history of racism in media, how philanthropy has perpetuated harm, and how our news and information landscape can be reimagined — these conversations continue to guide our approach to this work. We brought these lessons and inspiration from our grantees to every Press Forward meeting, as did many other partners.

We continue to trust those who know what’s most needed for their communities. In Press Forward and all our efforts, we take our cues from grantee leadership, wisdom, and creativity.

A shared commitment to impact

An unshakable belief that we can achieve lasting, meaningful change guides our path. We are energized by Press Forward’s shared commitment to pursue collective impact. We look forward to further developing and deepening partnerships toward a more resilient, diverse, and deeply impactful media landscape.

We know you’re likely to have questions, and we’ve had some of our own along the way. Press Forward is a complex new campaign with many stakeholders. It won’t always get things right. As Press Forward evolves, Democracy Fund is committed to ongoing relationship-building, listening, and sharing what we’ve learned.

Our door is open for conversation; we invite your questions, feedback, and ideas.

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Featured

Press Release

Digital Equity & Opportunity Initiative (DEOI)

June 29, 2023

The Digital Equity and Opportunity Initiative’s mission is to jumpstart the building of a lasting civic infrastructure. DEOI will provide core funding support to state broadband coalitions with broad-based community engagement and that have the mobilization capacity to maximize the opportunity and drive equitable outcomes in digital access.

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Report

What We Learned from Evaluating the Impact of Our Election Security and Confidence Investments

Stephanie Román

July 29, 2022

In the fall of 2021, Democracy Fund commissioned an evaluation of our Election Security and Confidence portfolio – the major focus of the Elections & Voting Program’s Trust in Elections strategy – to summarize our investments, activities, and impact and help us make informed decisions about future investments. Here, we reflect on the history of our election security work and share key findings from the evaluation. For a deeper dive, we invite you to read the full report.  

History of the Election Security & Confidence Portfolio

The 2016 U.S. Presidential Election was a turning point for election security following attempts by foreign actors, namely Russian, Chinese, and Iranian groups, to disrupt the election with cyber-attacks. After the election, as information surfaced about how foreign actors scanned – and in a few cases gained entry into – several state and local election networks, it became clear that election security was now a national security concern. In response to these events, the Democracy Fund Elections & Voting Program added a body of work in 2017 to focus on improving security and confidence in our elections. With an emphasis on election security, this portfolio aimed to fortify the election system to prevent further foreign interference and counter cybersecurity threats by investing in tools and training for election officials. As part of these efforts, we also launched the Election Validation Project, which focused on expanding the use of post-election audits, and Democracy Fund Voice supported coalitions that advocated for, and secured, federal funding for elections in three straight years – 2018, 2019, and 2020 – which was the first funding for elections since the passage of HAVA in 2000.

The Elections & Voting Program’s initial landscaping and research led to the development of four core areas for grantmaking to prevent election interference based on the threats posed by foreign actors and vulnerable security infrastructure. These core grantmaking areas included:

Fortifying the field with workable solutions and best practices
Empowering election officials to advocate for funding to strengthen election cybersecurity
Researching verification practices and resiliency efforts
Public messaging on the legitimate risks to election systems

Evaluating the Portfolio’s Impact

An evaluation of the portfolio’s impact, conducted by Fernandez Advisors, focused on identifying the impact, growth, and sustainability of our investments to improve both election security and confidence in election outcomes. The report found that our investments in election security resources and tools that increased the capacity of state and local election administrators to identify and manage security threats were among the most valuable. In particular, government agency partners noted the critical role that Democracy Fund played by acting quickly and early to take the financial risks necessary to develop and pilot new election security resources (e.g., trainings, tools, technical assistance, and playbooks), which were eventually adapted by local, state, and federal government agencies once the proof of concept had been established.

Our early investments in election cybersecurity contributed to the successful execution of the 2020 election. These investments in enhancing election cybersecurity through training and tools and the push for additional federal funding for elections helped create the conditions for what the U.S Department of Homeland Security called, “one of the most secure elections in history.”

Summary of Findings & Key Takeaways

Despite our work on election security and cybersecurity, public trust in the election system is dangerously low. When we started our work in election security, we believed that investing in election cybersecurity would protect the system from foreign interference, which would lead to increased public trust in elections. The first part of the hypothesis proved accurate—states and the federal government have adopted many of our grantees’ election cybersecurity training and tools, freeing election officials to turn their attention to other issues in the system. However, hyperpartisanship and threats of authoritarianism have further reduced public trust in elections and – in ways that were simultaneously unexpected and should have been anticipated – exposed new elections vulnerabilities including viral mis-and dis-information, the spread of unproven ballot review techniques, and attacks on election officials.

When we began investing in election security, it was still a young field with few philanthropic players. Democracy Fund played a role in catalyzing new approaches to improving election security, many of which are now embedded in the election system and the work of election officials. The 2016 election was a wake-up call that exposed the security vulnerabilities of our election system, and the system responded by shoring up the infrastructure. We are proud to have played a role in that initial response, and still believe that a resilient system is essential to ensuring free, fair, and equitable elections in this country.

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Report

Reflection on the Impact of Investing in Voter Centric Election Administration

Heather Creek

July 28, 2022

From its inception, Democracy Fund has invested in organizations supporting election administration. We believe that well-functioning election operations are a core component of a healthy election system. At the end of 2021, we commissioned an independent evaluation of the Elections & Voting Program’s Voter Centric Election Administration portfolio to review how our theory of change was executed and how the election system has shifted. Here, we reflect on the findings from that evaluation and invite you to read the full report.

Voter Centric Election Administration Portfolio History

The landscape of election administration in 2014 is a far cry from what we experience today. At that time, the findings of the Bipartisan Presidential Commission on Election Administration were widely praised and pointed the way toward evidence-based solutions to election challenges – such as long lines at the polls and errors on voter lists – that made use of developments in technology. Election administration has always been complicated, especially in the highly-decentralized U.S. system. However from 2014-2016, the field experienced clarity of purpose and a relatively-uncontentious bipartisan consensus on best practices to move the field forward.

In this context, Democracy Fund developed a theory of change that focused on two needs of the field:

Strong networks of election administrators for knowledge-sharing across and within states
Innovative practices and technology designed for election administrators to use.

To meet the first need, we identified the leaders of state election administrator associations and hosted convenings with them twice a year in a “train the trainer” model, whereby they would learn best-in-class practices to take back to their state associations of election officials. For the second need, we invested in a wide range of civic technology tools, research, and guides developed by civil society organizations that could be used by administrators to better serve voters. Our goal was to scale and spread practices that would improve the voting experience nationwide.

Evaluation of the Portfolio’s Impact

An evaluation of the portfolio’s impact, conducted by Fernandez Advisors, focused on the ways that election officials at the state and local level have engaged in Democracy Fund’s network convenings and used tools, training, and resources in which we have invested. The report found that investing in tools and resources for election administrators helped the field adapt to shifts in voter expectations for online services and new voting methods. Our grantees’ programs helped to improve the design of election websites and ballots, helped administrators adapt to early voting and mail voting policies, and helped voters learn where to find a polling place or ballot drop box easily and accurately. These are just a few examples of the ways our grantees supported administrators’ efforts to serve voters.

This portfolio was especially well-timed to meet the unusual needs of the 2020 election when many states rapidly adjusted their voting policies and practices to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many states offered voters more flexibility to vote early at home or at voter centers in order to avoid crowds at Election Day polling places. These states could not have rapidly adopted new voting methods without following the examples of states that had spent years innovating and experimenting with flexible voting practices. Democracy Fund grantees were instrumental in helping states learn quickly from these examples because they had documented implementation processes and offered technical assistance.

While network-building, tools, and research have been instrumental in improving election administration, the failure of local and state governments to adequately resource election offices remains a significant problem. Significant and ongoing technology changes (such as online voter registration and ballot tracking) present adoption challenges for many election administrators and their staff due to both the lack of funding for technology investments and maintenance and the difficulty covering the range of expertise needed with the very small staffs that manage elections in all but the largest jurisdictions. For example, election officials interviewed for the evaluation report that they do not have the capacity to counter growing mis- and disinformation targeted toward voters.

The job of managing elections has grown increasing complex as the field faces new challenges. Local election officials must be experts in many areas: human resources, information technology, direct mail processing, public relations, cybersecurity, and more. Most election officials are managing this load with little staff capacity. In the 2020 Democracy Fund/Reed College Survey of Local Election Officials, over half of respondents said they work in an office with just one or two staff members who may not even be full-time. Participants in Democracy Fund’s state association convenings praised the information and opportunity to share knowledge and resources with peers from other states and bring ideas back to their colleagues. However, limited staff capacity and urgent demands makes it difficult for many officials to spend time adopting new practices.

Summary of Findings & Key Takeaways

When Democracy Fund began investing in civil society organizations focused on election administration, it was still a young field, with limited philanthropic investments supporting the work. We used a systems and complexity approach to analyze the needs of the field and identify the gaps and leverage points that could improve the health of election administration. We played a role in catalyzing new nonprofit organizations that support election officials and in funding emerging election sciences research. The COVID-19 pandemic upended the 2020 primary elections and made evident the importance of well-resourced and well-functioning election administration. In response, the field of organizations supporting election administration scaled up as more donors began funding this work. Even as the context shifts over time and the field adapts, strong election administration is essential to the health of a just and equitable election system.

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Report

A new tool to measure the health of local news ecosystems

Democracy Fund

March 3, 2021

The new report “Healthy Local News & Information Ecosystems: A Diagnostic Framework,” presents a framework to help local news funders assess whether a community’s information environment is actually becoming healthier. This assessment approach was tested and refined across nine U.S. communities of various sizes.

Accompanying the report is a playbook designed as a tool to help funders and other community organizations evaluate strengths and opportunities in their locale.

Photo by Matt Donders on Unsplash.

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Toolkit

The Journalism DEI Wheel

Democracy Fund

March 25, 2020

The Journalism DEI Wheel is an interactive tool designed to help funders in particular inform grantmaking by seeing the bigger picture on a higher level, with useful examples and resources for further illumination.

Funders can explore the spokes of the Journalism DEI Wheel to see how equity in journalism is currently being addressed across key areas: education and training; organizational culture; news coverage; engagement; distribution; innovation; evaluation; the larger journalism industry; and funding.

Click on any one of these to learn more and find specific examples, including lists of relevant initiatives on the Journalism DEI Tracker.

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Toolkit

Guide to Assessing Your Local News Ecosystem

Fiona Morgan

November 5, 2019

A step-by-step toolkit to help you gather the information you need to fund local news and information in your community.

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Toolkit

New Tools for Funders: Supporting DEI in Journalism

By Angelica Das, Democracy Fund, and Katie Donnelly and Michelle Polyak, Dot Connector Studio

October 24, 2019

As part of Democracy Fund’s efforts to address diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in journalism, Dot Connector Studio has developed two tools — the Journalism DEI Tracker and the Journalism DEI Wheel — to help funders and journalists understand the complete landscape of the field, including resources and strategies for advancing DEI within journalism.

Our recent report, Advancing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Journalism: What Funders Can Do, revealed that DEI within journalism is an under-funded area, and recommended that funders share more resources on this topic across a diverse pool of grantees. These two tools are designed to help funders do just that. The Journalism DEI Tracker catalogs information and resources on DEI in journalism, and the Journalism DEI Wheel allows funders and stakeholders to focus on particular solutions for advancing DEI within journalism by demonstrating the range of strategies and focus areas to consider.

To put it simply, the Journalism DEI Tracker tracks the who and the what of the field; the Journalism DEI Wheel captures the how.

1. The Journalism DEI Tracker

The Journalism DEI Tracker is a regularly-updated online database that identifies organizations, news outlets and projects, and educational institutions working to support DEI in journalism across the country. It also collects resources related to diversity, equity, and inclusion in journalism. Foundations can use the Journalism DEI Tracker as a first-step guide for identifying prospective grantees, as well as to find useful resources to share with current grantees. Journalism organizations and other stakeholders can use it to find opportunities for professional development, recruitment, collaboration, and resources to improve their coverage.

A screenshot of the DEI Tracker

The Journalism DEI Tracker includes:

Professional organizations that support women journalists and journalists of color
News outlets and projects led by and serving women journalists and journalists of color
Professional development and training opportunities for women journalists and journalists of color (grants, scholarships, fellowships, and leadership training)
Academic institutions with journalism and communications programs to include in recruitment efforts to ensure a more diverse pipeline (Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic Serving Institutions, and Tribal Colleges)
Resources for journalism organizations to promote respectful and inclusive coverage (industry reports, diversity style guides, curricula, and toolkits)

2. The Journalism DEI Wheel

Designed to be complementary to the Journalism DEI Tracker, the Journalism DEI Wheel is meant to help funders in particular inform grantmaking by seeing the bigger picture on a higher level, with useful examples and resources for further illumination. Funders can explore the spokes of the Journalism DEI Wheel to see how DEI in journalism is currently being addressed across key areas: education and training; organizational culture; news coverage; engagement; distribution; innovation; evaluation; the larger journalism industry; and funding.

Each area is divided into smaller points of intervention. For example, if you click on “Education/Training,” you will see opportunities to advance DEI in journalism through high school programs, college programs, scholarships, internships, fellowships, mid-career programs, and executive training. Click on any one of these to learn more and find specific examples, including lists of relevant initiatives on the Journalism DEI Tracker.

The Journalism DEI Wheel demonstrates that there are many areas for addressing DEI in journalism. A funder may be focused on one aspect — say, improving news coverage — but not considering other aspects that may be related, such as improving newsroom culture. Of course, no single funder can — or should! — address every possible point of intervention, but viewing the range of possibilities can help illuminate gaps in current portfolios and identify new opportunities.

Not all areas are equally resourced. For example, there is a dearth of publicly-available resources available for journalism organizations when it comes to DEI in hiring, leadership, and general organizational culture. This is particularly disconcerting when we know that there are well-documented leadership gaps in the broader nonprofit field for people of color, women, and LGBTQ individuals. There is a clear need for leaders of DEI-focused journalism organizations to have up-to-date information on not just legal requirements, but also best practices in hiring, evaluation, and promotion. And, as our recent report shows, there is a clear need for funders to support such efforts.

We hope you will use these tools to inform your work, spark conversations among colleagues, and continue to promote this critically important work. We welcome your feedback: let us know how the tools are working for you, and how we can continue to improve them.

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Toolkit

The Journalism DEI Tracker

Democracy Fund

October 18, 2019

Foundations can use the Journalism DEI Tracker as a first-step guide for identifying prospective grantees, as well as to find useful resources to share with current grantees. Journalism organizations and other stakeholders can use it to find opportunities for professional development, recruitment, collaboration, and resources to improve their coverage.

The Journalism DEI Tracker includes:

Professional organizations that support women journalists and journalists of color
News outlets and projects led by and serving women journalists and journalists of color
Professional development and training opportunities for women journalists and journalists of color (grants, scholarships, fellowships, and leadership training)
Academic institutions with journalism and communications programs to include in recruitment efforts to ensure a more diverse pipeline (Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic Serving Institutions, and Tribal Colleges)
Resources for journalism organizations to promote respectful and inclusive coverage (industry reports, diversity style guides, curricula, and toolkits)

We hope you will use the Journalism DEI Tracker to inform your work and share these important resources with your colleagues. We want to make sure this resource remains up-to-date, so please let us know if you have additional resources to add, information about resources that are no longer up-to-date, or suggestions for improvement. We welcome your participation in making sure this resource is as useful as possible.