Today, Grist leadership is pleased to announce the organization has received a $925,000 grant from the American Journalism Project, or AJP. Grist will use the funding to create local news partnerships, embed reporters with local media outlets across the country, and engage communities with deep and innovative reporting.
The grant, awarded over a three-year period, will help fund full-time roles in development, strategy, and operations aimed at expanding Grist’s local partnerships and at unlocking national, regional, and local climate funding.
“In recent years, as we have seen various forms of the climate crisis strike different parts of the U.S., Grist began to discuss the importance of being in as many communities as possible to tell the whole story of climate change’s impact on our country in a way that’s familiar and digestible to audiences, from Hawai‘i to New England,” said Grist CEO Nikhil Swaminathan. “We are so grateful to the American Journalism Project for seeing the value in Grist being everywhere it possibly can be — and putting us in a position to grow our local partnerships, both with other newsrooms but also with community stakeholders and local and regional funders. We believe that with AJP’s support and commitment to local journalism, Grist can take several important steps to becoming a climate desk for all Americans.”
AJP’s partnership with Grist is an expansion of its investments in multi-local news networks — nonprofits organized nationally that support original local news resources in multiple communities, such as Open Campus, Capital B, The Marshall Project, Civic News Company, and ICT.
“We’re thrilled to work with AJP on our local news expansion,” said Grist Development Director Patrick Schmitt. “They have a strong track record in funding local news, a grantee portfolio that we’re proud to join, and a refreshing approach to the work. I’m not aware of another funder investing in the business and operations side of nonprofit media to the extent AJP is.”
