In 2019, the American Journalism Project, a self-described venture philanthropy backed by a broad group of funders including the Knight Foundation, Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective, and Arnold Ventures, launched with the ambitious goal of rebuilding and sustaining local journalism in a nation filled with news deserts, and beset by rampant media consolidation and declining trust in public institutions.
“When we started, the question in front of us was, ‘Is this model really viable?’” said AJP CEO Sarabeth Berman. “Nonprofit news had been successful in a few places, but there was a question of whether this could work across the country. The field was still very nascent.”
AJP’s model treats local newsrooms like startups — hence the venture philanthropy — by providing large, multi-year grants supplemented with strategic operational support. AJP also measures organizations’ success in diversifying revenue streams, cultivating and sustaining talent, and attunement to community needs.
Seven years after its launch, AJP’s new 2026 Impact Report suggests its approach is paying significant dividends. The project’s portfolio of over 50 journalism organizations serves more than 100 geographic areas in 38 states. According to AJP, 81% of its portfolio increased revenues from 2024 to 2025, and the portfolio’s median revenue increased by 17% during that same period.
Meanwhile, the 28 organizations that completed their three-year AJP grant process saw their pre-grant median annual revenue grow from $1.1 million to $2.4 million at the end of 2025, thanks in part to support from philanthropists who had not historically funded journalism organizations.
“When we spoke two years ago, we were seeing promising signs,” Berman said. “I think today, we now have meaningful evidence that nonprofit news is past the proof-of-concept phase. We’re seeing it work across the country, and we’re also seeing investment models for philanthropy that drive long-term durable sustainability.”
It’s been a busy 2026 for AJP, which has also received funding from the Democracy Fund, Craig Newmark Philanthropic Fund, and the MacArthur, Abrams and Hellman foundations. The fall looks to be especially eventful. In October, AJP plans to announce new grantees, including an investment in public media. In that same month, it also plans to introduce what Berman calls a “new local news impact model that will be a tool that local news organizations can use to both track and communicate their impact.”
Until then, here are four ways AJP is approaching the task of building a sustainable nonprofit local news ecosystem.
It employs a three-pronged approach to organizations’ impact
As any beleaguered and underfunded nonprofit news executive will tell you, great journalism, in and of itself, isn’t enough to keep the lights on.
AJP’s Impact Report spells out an “impact framework” that asks three questions: “Can our news organizations raise and deploy catalytic funding to grow and sustain their revenue streams?” ”Can our news organizations build strong organizations with talent, culture, strategy, and systems to endure?” And “Can our news organizations meet local information needs and strengthen communities?” Each question is paired with a set of “categories” that include corresponding metrics that the AJP dubs “measures.”
For years, we’ve written about journalism funders’ desire to unearth what is, in essence, the “holy grail” of organizational sustainability for often-struggling news outfits. While this probably isn’t the best analogy — most archaeologists will tell you the grail probably doesn’t exist — the AJP’s helpful, three-pronged impact framework lays out a manageable set of measurable ingredients for an outlet’s long-term success.
“You need these three things to be true — catalytic funding that translates into diversified recurring revenue, strong organizations, and community impact,” Berman said. “That’s how we’re measuring whether or not the organizations in our portfolio are successful.”
It co-created a new funding initiative in response to federal public media cuts
Berman told me the Trump administration’s public media funding cuts haven’t dramatically affected AJP’s grantees since most of them don’t rely on federal support.
Nevertheless, beyond underscoring the general need for outlets to diversify their revenue bases, the cuts “had big implications for the broader local information ecosystem,” Berman said, calling attention to the now-familiar domino effect playing out across the nonprofit world. “They created an opportunity to shore up a future-facing local news ecosystem.”
In response, AJP joined forces with the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations and the civic-minded alliance More Perfect to create the Public Media Business Transformation Initiative to support organizations in mid-sized markets with ambitious plans to expand and strengthen local news.
In July, the initiative announced a $1.4 million investment in Texas Public Radio, which merged with the San Antonio Report. The support, which includes backing from the Public Media Bridge Fund, will help the organizations expand original reporting, strengthen audience engagement, and reach more people through “digital-first” products. “We expect to make additional investments in this space,” Berman said.
It’s focusing on cultivating talent with an emphasis on AI
When I asked Berman about the biggest challenge facing local news outlets beyond the usual revenue-related culprits, she said, “We need outstanding talent across the country to build these new models for how we deliver news to the community.” The need is especially acute for building what she called “business revenue products” that help outlets adapt to changing audience habits in the age of AI.
AJP’s efforts on this front date back to 2023, when, backed by funding from OpenAI and the tech- and AI-focused Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, it launched the Product & AI Studio to explore how generative AI and other emerging technologies can strengthen local news and better serve local communities.
Over the next three years, stakeholders surfaced a set of takeaways for news leaders. For example — and echoing Berman’s earlier point about recruiting talent — the studio found that newsrooms making the most meaningful progress in AI adoption benefit from having what AI thinkers call an experienced and engaged “human in the lead.”
In late July, AJP announced that OpenAI was renewing its investment by contributing an additional $5 million over the next two years to help it move from experimentation to field-building. “We’ve been very focused on how we can leverage these technologies to help us achieve our mission of meeting local information needs and making communities stronger,” Berman said. “The other piece of it is that since the way people are engaging with information is changing, we are helping organizations understand what’s happening in the information ecosystem and position themselves accordingly.”
OpenAI’s reinvestment in the Product & A& Studio came on the heels of last December’s announcement that it was building on its partnership with AJP and the Lenfest Institute for Journalism to launch a new AI learning hub for journalists, editors and publishers called the OpenAI Academy for News Organizations. And on September 8, the company said that as part of a “major, multi-faceted initiative” to support the journalism ecosystem, it was providing more than 400 ChatGPT Edu1 subscriptions to graduate students and faculty at the Tow-Knight Center for Journalism Futures at the Newmark J-School and the Medill’s Knight Lab.
Needless to say, this is an uncertain time for jittery journalists navigating a sector being transformed by AI. But Berman pointed to an encouraging reality. “AI cannot replace trusted local relationships,” she said. “Understanding what’s not disruptable helps us think about what organizations need to build around.”
It’s constantly seeking out new organizations to support
AJP typically reaches out to promising organizations and encourages their leaders to submit a letter of inquiry. If the organization passes the proposal stage, the AJP team engages with the organization’s leadership before putting forward a proposed investment to the AJP board, whose members include Teresa Gorman, the associate director for the Public Square program at Democracy Fund, and Peter Lattman, the managing director of media at Emerson Collective.
“We’re constantly staying aware of who’s out there, who’s building organizations, who’s doing great journalism, and who have great leadership teams that are eager to build strong models,” Berman said.
It also adds organizations to its portfolio through its Local Philanthropy Partnerships program. That initiative — which includes the Barr and Cleveland foundations among its partners — involves work with civic leaders, community foundations, and local funders to help communities understand their media ecosystems through research, large-scale community listening sessions, and other activities. After designing models based on residents’ priorities, AJP raises funds from the local community to address those needs — another example of its ongoing mission to grow what Berman calls the “philanthropic market.”
Drawing on that program’s work, team members from AJP’s Startup Studio proceed to build, recruit and launch new local news organizations. Outlets launched through Startup Studio include Signal Ohio, Mirror Indy, and Tulsa Flyer.
Another key AJP partner and funder is Press Forward, the national, philanthropy-backed initiative that shares the same goal of revitalizing local news ecosystems, albeit through different and complementary means. “Press Forward is ultimately a donor collective that’s been trying to grow the number of funders in the space,” Berman said. “AJP is a specific investment model. We take a venture philanthropy approach to how we’re making investments. In fact, since many Press Forward funders are aligned funders committed to supporting local news, a huge portion of AJP funders are part of the Press Forward collaborative.”
Before signing off, I asked Berman what has become a predictable question anytime I speak with an individual attuned to funders’ grantmaking calculus: What advice would she give local news outlets attempting to drum up philanthropic support in this fraught climate?
“The most compelling case isn’t ‘journalism in crisis,’” she said. “It’s what becomes possible in a community because local journalism exists, so I think it’s really important that organizations understand what problems they’re trying to solve. Demonstrate why your organization needs to exist and then build the capability to grow the funding pipeline.”
Note (9/18/26): An earlier version of this article included the Public Media Bridge Fund as one of the initial partners behind the Public Media Business Transformation Initiative. It didn’t back the creation of the initiative, but did contribute to the initiative’s Texas Public Radio investment.
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