San Jose Mercury News KNTV (ABC) KPIX-TV (CBS) KIVE and KARA Radio Santa Clara Public Libraries Solid investigative journalism documented the problem of special-interest money corrupting the California State Assembly,but the Mercury News turned to civic journalism to ensure that its investigation had impact. At the end of its hard-hitting “Legislature for Sale” project, the […]

Rochester Democrat andChronicle WXXI Public Television WOKR-TV (ABC) Eight years after a highly touted school reform effort began, Rochester area residents still had concerns about education. “Grading our Schools” got hundreds of them participating – through polls, televised town meetings, focus groups and chat rooms – in appraising and redirecting the effort. The project also […]

Detroit Free Press WXYZ-TV (ABC) Children and violence was the focus of a joint project that grew out of the paper’s “Children First” editorial and community campaign. The effort began with a poll of 1,600 children, aged 9 to 12, in the Detroit area. Nearly one in five said they had witnessed a shooting; almost […]

Dayton Daily News WPTD public television WYSO-FM The Miami Valley Issues Forum TheMontgomery County Historical Museum Marking Dayton’s 1996 bicentennial, the partners launched “Shaping the Next Century” to encourage public conversations about directing the city into the future. The Daily News ran a series of stories in late 1995 that looked at Dayton’s history as […]

St. Paul Pioneer Press KARE-TV (NBC) Wilder Research Center Breaking out of the daily police blotter routine, the paper commissioned a poll of 2,853 Twin City residents that explored public attitudes toward crime and safety and assigned a team of four reporters to look at crime in the context of race, age, gender and geography. […]

The Seattle Times KUOW-FM Radio KCTS Public TV KPLU-FM, Tacoma, WA Energized by their work together for the 1994 NPR election project, the partners used their newly formed “Front Porch Forum” alliance to tackle a number of issues facing the Seattle area. They held a joint forum on a new, multi-million dollar transit system and […]

WKRC-TV (CBS) The Community Press Chain of Suburban Weeklies Q102 and WNNK Radio An unusual partnership, with TV taking the lead and enlisting suburban weeklies rather than one large daily, “Voices of the People” sought, according to its mission statement, “to empower citizens by making sure their voices are heard and by showing their involvement […]

The Record TCI, Northern New Jersey Caucus Educational Corp. “The Quality of Life Project” comprised a number of ambitious efforts to stimulate informed public dialogue about how to preserve Bergen County’s best qualities in an era of increasing congestion, rising crime and a changing economy. The first step was to find the consensus on what […]

The Manhattan Mercury KQLA-FM The partners in “The Public Mind” project took a civic approach to exploring one local issue a month in depth and inviting citizens to discuss possible solutions. The series began, May 7, 1995, with an exploration of teenage binge drinking. In June, the topic was neighborhood associations; July, the student rental […]

Tallahassee Democrat WCTV6 (CBS) Florida State University Florida A&M; Universities The second year of the three-year “Public Agenda” project trained more citizens to lead and participate in small group discussions and continued polling to be sure the concerns of all members of the diverse community were surfacing. For more details, please see Year One (1994) […]

Grand Forks Herald WDAZ-TV (ABC) Northern LightsPublic Radio The partners held a series of “Community Conversations” via coffee klatches, focus groups and polls, assessing quality-of-life issues and forging a vision for the future of Grand Forks, a city of 60,000. The partners kicked the project off by driving a van to various public places around […]