How StoryReach Helps Local Newsrooms Build Audiences and Trust

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Last February, the Pulitzer Center launched our StoryReach U.S. Fellowship, a civic engagement accelerator that empowers journalists hosted at U.S. local and regional news outlets to develop innovative projects that reach diverse audiences and enhance public trust.

To date, Fellows across nine states have experimented with approaches such as public listening sessions, explainer videos and live Q&As on social media, and informal gatherings like “Black Moms and Mimosas,” with promising results.

To ensure Maine firefighters saw Fellow Marina Schauffler’s series about “forever chemicals” in firefighting, we helped her create a scrolly-telling explainer for her project landing page and produce an embeddable YouTube video, which reached nearly 300 fire departments through newsletters and listservs. She also produced QR-coded posters for distribution to all Maine fire stations in 2025 and landed a one-hour appearance, based on her reporting, on statewide Maine Public Radio.

In an investigation into disproportionate lead poisoning in Oakland's Latino immigrant communities, Fellow Jasmine Aguilera and her El Tímpano team engaged thousands of residents through in-person events and SMS messaging to test their soil for lead and gather stories about its impact. In October 2024, the Alameda County Joint Powers Authority Board discussed the findings and wrote an open letter urging Oakland’s mayor to have stronger oversight of funds for lead abatement projects.

StoryReach U.S. aims to address growing civic knowledge challenges faced by communities throughout the U.S. by partnering with local news outlets for intentional, audience-centered reporting and engagement. Applications for the second StoryReach cohort will open in March. 

We're eager to build on what we've learned during the pilot Fellowship to support local newsrooms in growing and diversifying their audiences and broaden the reach of StoryReach reporting through digital campaigns, events, exhibits, and education programs led by the Pulitzer Center's U.S. Engagement teams.

Best,

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Impact

Blood Timber War, a Pulitzer Center-supported project by Rainforest Investigations Network Fellow Karla Mendes on illegal logging and cattle ranching in the eastern Brazilian Amazon, has received an honorable mention in the Banrisul ARI Journalism Awards. The prize recognizes excellence in Brazilian journalism.

The three-part series revealed a correlation between environmental crimes and the killings of Indigenous Guajajara people in Brazil’s Maranhão state. According to Mongabay, Mendes’ investigation found that between 1991 and 2023, 38 Guajajara individuals were killed, but none of the accused have been convicted and most were never brought to trial.

Her reporting underscored a pattern of impunity in crimes against Indigenous communities. Now, one of those cases is moving forward in court.

Paulo Paulino Guajajara was killed in an alleged ambush by loggers in November 2019. Federal prosecutors say that they will use Mendes’ reporting and video footage in the trial, giving Paulo’s family and community hope for justice.

Read Mendes’ full project here. 

Photo of the Week

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“This picture is part of a series of reports showing the consequences of illegal mining in the Indigenous lands most impacted by this activity in Brazil. The great difficulty in carrying out this work was access to these sites, especially in the case of the Yanomami Indigenous Land. Conflagrated communities, government authorizations, organized crime and complex logistics were some of the challenges we had to face to be able to tell these stories from the territories.”

—Lalo de Almeida

This message first appeared in the February 14, 2025, edition of the Pulitzer Center's weekly newsletter. Subscribe today.

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