Work

Assessing Washington’s local news ecosystem: journalistic infrastructure and news production capacity

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: Journalism, and local news in particular, has long been considered critical to an informed and engaged citizenry and an important foundation for a robust democracy. Yet over the past couple of decades, local news across the United States has rapidly shrunk in both quantity and quality. The roots of the local news crisis stem from intersecting financial challenges, including revenue losses, rising costs, and ownership consolidation. News outlets find it difficult to recruit and retain local journalists because of low wages and financial insecurity. Audiences that news outlets rely on for revenue appear to avoid the news, distrust the media, have low media literacy, and tend to consume misinformation from social media sites. Technological challenges persist, including a slowness to respond to technological change and reliance on Big Tech for advertising dollars to help news outlets stay afloat. The consequences of this crisis are severe, including decreased civic engagement and participation, decreased government transparency and accountability, increased low-quality information, and loss of social cohesion among community members as local news outlets close. As the situation worsens nationally, with dire implications for democracy, we carried out the most comprehensive assessment of Washington’s local news ecosystem to date. This report, From News Deserts to Nonprofit Resilience: Assessing the Health of Washington’s Local News Ecosystem, builds on local news scholarship nationally and aims to provide policymakers, journalists, and all who call Washington home with a practical assessment of the health of the state’s local news ecosystem. To these ends, we first created a comprehensive database of Washington local news outlets using open source data and found 1,092 outlets to examine for inclusion. To supplement the database, we disseminated a survey to local news organizations, and interviewed 32 civic leaders, journalists, editors, publishers, and journalism scholars with expertise in local news. We excluded a significant number of news sites from our database because they either lacked a web presence and thus could not be evaluated or did not meet our locality or content quality criteria. The 353 outlets that remained met our criteria, offering the most comprehensive map of the state’s local news industry to date. We collected data about key characteristics of these news outlets, including outlet ownership, publication frequency, and annual operating budget. We analyzed ownership structure because prior research has shown that it is an important determinant of newsroom sustainability, the ability to provide quality coverage responsive to local communities, and audience trust in the news media. Given the continuously shifting local news landscape, this report represents a snapshot based on data collected and analyzed between November 2023 and December 2024. As the most comprehensive ecosystem mapping project in Washington to date, this report provides key insights on challenges and opportunities facing local news in the state. Our findings also serve as an essential foundation for addressing more complex research questions, including how Washingtonians are engaging with (or avoiding) news and whether their critical information needs are being met. The report begins by introducing the local news crisis facing the nation and the importance of studying Washington. It then provides an in-depth map and analysis of the local news ecosystem in Washington. Next, it presents insights from journalists, civic leaders, and scholars about key opportunities and challenges facing local news before providing an overview of initiatives around the nation that support local news and which local organizations and policymakers could draw inspiration from. Finally, it concludes with recommendations for policymakers, civic leaders, and journalists, to bolster the health of local news in Washington state.

Source: Frontiers in Communication

DOI: 10.3389/fcomm.2026.1788095