A future where community-owned, community-led local news is possible, and in some parts of the UK, is already happening. PINF’s Joe Mitchell shares what this could look like in 2030 – and what needs to happen to make it a reality. This article is part of the People-Powered Storytelling collaborative series.
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It’s early autumn in 2030. Thanks to a big uptick in public, philanthropic and citizen support for news journalism, the UK's charity for public interest news, PINF, has been able to massively scale its support for community newsrooms.
In 2027, ten community newsrooms were each granted money to buy out a boarded-up high street shop. Each has been independently and lovingly converted into vibrant community news hubs. Some host creches and cafes, others host coworking spaces, but all are home to local journalists, working with their communities to tell the stories that matter.
This is the story of how Alex, a young woman living in a seaside town in the UK, now gets the news and information she needs to live a thriving, community-centric life.
Alex is having breakfast when there’s a notification on her phone, reminding her that today, as every Thursday, the community newsroom records the weekly podcast in front of a live studio audience. The focus this week is on water pollution, the topic Alex voted for in the poll last week. As a member, and therefore a co-owner of the newsroom, Alex pays £9 per month and has a say in the editorial focus. The podcast recording promises free tea and croissants – what’s not to like?
Alex works at GP surgery just behind the high street, not far from the community news hub with its bright pink ‘Welcome’ sign above the door. If she postpones her gym session until after work, she can catch most of the recording before work starts.
By the time she arrives, there’s an audience gathered around the studio in the back of the hub, where the usual host, Pat, increasingly a local legend who seems to know everyone in the town, is moderating the audience’s questions to a water campaigner before giving a rundown of the top local stories this week.
Having learned about some serious issues with pollution in the town’s river, Alex ducks out of the recording to get to work on time. Taking her mug back to the hub’s cafe counter, she thanks Ali, one of the organisers, whom she recognises from the short-form videos the newsroom regularly puts out. Ali says that if Alex is interested, the campaigner and Pat will be on a panel tonight, this time with the water company representative and the local council, in the east side of town - and they'll be broadcasting that too.
‘Don’t worry if you can’t though, we'll be writing up for tomorrow's email newsletter. Are you subscribed?’
‘Of course!’ she says, ‘How would I find out about anything without it?'
Alex looks at her diary to see if she’s free this evening – the gym can wait. She uses the locally owned short-message platform to send the event details to her swimming group, suggesting they might like to join – several thumbs-up responses ping in.
Over lunch, Alex grabs a copy of the newsroom’s latest print magazine from the pile that is distributed to the surgery, and skims through it as last night’s leftovers warm up in the microwave. The magazine showcases the best of the stories and photography from the newsroom’s website and email newsletter, and Alex pauses over a beautiful collection of photos – all taken by members of a youth group who’ve just completed the newsroom’s ‘Intro to Photography’ course. She also sees that next month’s issue will focus on local social care, something Alex cares deeply about, given her nan’s experience. There’s a call-out for opinions and Alex sets a reminder to send something in.
After work, she walks to tonight's event – picking up some swim friends in a pub on the way. While waiting for them, she idly scrolls through the photo-feed app, part of the same locally owned social platform, where the photos have all been verified as real and from locals, thanks to publicly provided AI technology.
Alex and friends walk up the road to the care home – they can’t miss the shocking pink broadcast van of the newsroom parked outside. Last year, the newsroom’s organisers recognised that, with an increasingly elderly population, not all the town’s residents could regularly make the journey to the hub to join in the events. The organisers ran a crowdfunder to buy a second-hand van, which has been converted into a mobile studio by a local Men in Sheds group and some work by engineering students at the FE college.
The event, as per usual, runs smoothly. Expecting a lecture format, Alex is surprised to be invited to join a large circle of chairs, just like everyone else in the room. While tempers are simmering, and passions run high, facilitators from the newsroom manage the discussion fairly, and one of the newsroom organisers is running a live fact-check, which is keeping everyone on their toes.
Towards the end of the meeting, small groups break out to work on solutions together, to which the outreach officers from the water company seem genuinely interested in hearing their opinions. In Alex’s group, they make such progress on one idea that everyone wants to stay in touch and keep working on it. So Alex connects on the app with the other members to keep working on the idea, taking care to show one older resident how to do this.
She heads home, bursting with pride in her community. To think that back in 2024 there was barely a trusted news source in the town – and that the town had seen riots thanks to nonsense shared on Facebook – it's amazing how far they’ve come together.
This doesn't have to just be a story. Indeed, a lot of this work is already happening, in parts, perhaps in piecemeal fashion, and only in a scattering of places across the country. But it’s happening. In the west of Leeds, there’s a community newsroom built by volunteers and training volunteer writers. In Bristol, there’s a cooperatively run newsroom where locals set the agenda. In Glasgow, there’s a newsroom with regular in-person debate nights.
But it’s every community that deserves this kind of high quality, innovative community-centric news ecosystem. Right now, the economic model for this doesn’t exist, while at the same time, spaces on our high streets lie empty and willing local volunteers remain untapped. A one-off transfer of philanthropic or public capital could allow local news coops to buy buildings: a solid foundation and an income source to ensure they can sustainably serve communities like Alex’s for years and years to come. Ultimately, we need the vision and the will to invest significant public and private capital in making this happen. And it needs to start now.
This article is part of People-Powered Storytelling, a new collaborative series showcasing the transformative impact of community-centred media initiatives in the UK. Read more about the series, and the other contributions that are part of it, here.
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