Civic Journalism Is… True Stories from America’s Newsrooms
Civic Journalism Is…
About expanding our vision.
Raul Ramirez
News Director
KQED-FM, San Francisco
Sometimes journalists are seen as being part of an unholy alliance with the powers that be. And we do suffer from a myopia simply because constant deadlines make it hard to get away from the bountiful sources of information that reside in government or corporate buildings.
Civic journalism is an antidote to that myopia. It compels us to go outside and bring our communities into our building.
For example, KQED, with other news organizations in the Bay Area, set out to look at transportation issues. Ordinarily, we get our information from transportation agencies, pressure groups or our own commutes. But we held town hall meetings for a year and we gained a richer understanding of how complex the situation is. It made us smarter, gave us more sources, enabled us to ask the right questions and gave focus to our coverage that I don’t believe we would have achieved through more traditional methods. And the people who came out gave us credit for listening to their views.
We don’t abandon journalism to pursue civic journalism. We retain the values of critical thinking, skepticism and the desire to search for a better, more accurate story. But we have better tools for making that search. And we gain credibility. People see we’re not in an unholy alliance with anyone except those who help in our search for truth.