We preserve and expand trusted local news platforms by training outlets in civic journalism, removing barriers to news access and building a pipeline to create reporting jobs based in New Mexico communities.
n 2023, CMG initiated a three-year plan to move from a grant making organization to an operational one.
In 2023, we initiated a review of journalism job postings, losses, wages and requirements to study and identify opportunities to close New Mexico’s local news gap.
In 2024, we began to test our assumptions focused on two strategies. First, we launched a daily digital nonprofit startup (citydesk.org) to test the viability in New Mexico. Second, we sought to extend the Local News Fund +UNM +NMSU’s successful internship/fellowship for student journalists to support early-career journalists across their first 2 years in a real world newsroom.
Building the bench.
New Mexico is losing local newspapers at an astonishing rate and in direct proportion to the increase in voter apathy and declining civic participation.
Nationally, more than two newspapers a week are closing, and print frequency is shrinking.
Some 7,000 newspaper jobs were eliminated in the past year, almost 2,000 of them in newsroom positions.
New Mexico lost 23% of its journalists in two years – and we have far fewer journalists per-capita than many other states.
But we still seek news locally, when we can find it. 55% of New Mexicans seek out local news from trusted local news sites – more than social networks (41%) or radio (45%) — but fewer of those trusted options exist.