Washington Bureau Initiative

We are partnering with local, state and regional newsrooms to cover major decisions in Washington with an eye toward how they affect constituents across the country.

“Most states don’t have a single reporter covering Washington on the ground anymore,” wrote Columbia Journalism Review last year. “This is corrosive to democracy in many ways ... The most glaring problem is that lawmakers aren’t held to account.”

We launched the Washington Bureau Initiative to change that, closing the gap between voters and their elected officials while creating important new audience and revenue opportunities with our newsroom partners.

NOTUS produces a steady feed of locally relevant accountability coverage, and work collaboratively with our partners who have the opportunity to co-publish that reporting. hat coverage is shared with partner news room. The partnership begins with a one-year commitment and is renewable by mutual agreement.

Our partners include:

• Verite News and Mississippi Today, from Deep South Today
• Oklahoma Watch
• Times of San Diego, Santa Barbara News-Press and Stocktonia from NEWSWELL
• The Assembly (North Carolina)
• THE CITY (New York)
• The Maine Monitor
• The Salt Lake Tribune
• Signal Ohio
• Spotlight PA
• VTDigger
• Wisconsin Watch

We seek independent newsrooms with:

1. A track record of impact-generating government accountability reporting in their communities.
2. Editorial capacity to coordinate closely with NOTUS on production, distribution, and reporting when relevant.
3. Interest in working collaboratively to track and measure local and national impact of the journalism produced and the conversations generated.
4. Ability to contribute to the cost of the reporting, directly and/or through joint local and regional fundraising.

Each spring and summer, we initiate discussions with potential newsroom partners who meet our criteria.

NOTUS editors regularly identify state storylines on track to intersect with national politics, helping us identify outlets whose editorial interests align with ours.

Each fall, AJI welcomes a new cohort of accomplished, early-career journalists with underrepresented backgrounds — socioeconomically, geographically and educationally — for two-year salaried positions with benefits. 75 percent of these fellows have local news experience, and more than 25 percent come from rural communities.

The fellowship begins with a four-week boot camp with leading professional journalists. These reporters quickly get up to speed covering Washington day-to-day, and after evaluation and conversation with NOTUS editors, they receive their beat assignments. These include covering states’ congressional delegations, and often federal agencies of particular relevance to communities across the country.

We begin delivering work to our new newsroom partners by the beginning of November, or even sooner. Partners are welcome to co-publish work from across the NOTUS team, not only from the fellow assigned to cover their respective congressional delegations.