INN Mission & History

INN accelerates and shapes the emerging field of nonprofit news.

The Institute for Nonprofit News strengthens and supports more than 475 independent news organizations in a new kind of news network: nonprofit, nonpartisan and dedicated to public service. From local news to in-depth reporting on pressing global issues, members of the INN Network tell stories that otherwise would go untold – connecting communities, holding the powerful accountable and strengthening democracy. INN programs help these news organizations develop revenue and business models to support strong reporting, collaborate on editorial and business innovation, share services and advance the diverse leaders who are forging a new future for news.

View the interactive INN Network map.

Our Mission

INN’s vision is to build a nonprofit news network that ensures all people in every community have access to trusted news. To that end, we pursue our mission of providing education and business support services to our nonprofit member organizations and promoting the value and benefit of public-service and investigative journalism.

Learn more about how INN is building a nonprofit news movement.

Our Values

At INN, we believe that:

Nonprofit journalism serves people and communities.
Independence builds public trust.
Equity is fundamental to all our actions and news coverage.
Antiracism work is necessary in journalism.
Collaboration, camaraderie, and mutual respect are the basis of a positive work culture.

INN is committed to transparency. View our bylaws and other governance documents.

Our Priorities

Grounded in hard data and the lived experience of our members, INN has an unparalleled depth of knowledge about nonprofit news. We know what’s working, what isn’t, what’s missing, and what’s possible now.

We use our informed perspective to design services with transformative potential for our members and field. INN’s top priorities — each of which contributes to the overarching goal of journalistic excellence — are to:

Elevate journalism as a philanthropic cause, creating sustainable revenue for members.
Center diversity, equity and inclusion as field norms.
Sponsor experimentation that allows nonprofit news models to adapt and grow.
Invest in the talent and human capital that drive sustained change in an emerging field.

To see how we put our priorities into practice, view Our Work.

INN History

In 2009, journalists from 27 nonpartisan, nonprofit news organizations gathered at the Pocantico Center in New York to plan the future of investigative journalism. The result of that meeting, the Pocantico Declaration, established the Investigative News Network (now named the Institute for Nonprofit News) and laid a foundation of collaboration among a new collective of nonprofit newsrooms dedicated to serving the public interest.

“We, representatives of nonprofit news organizations, gather at a time when investigative reporting, so crucial to a functioning democracy, is under threat. There is an urgent need to nourish and sustain the emerging investigative journalism ecosystem to better serve the public.” — The Pocantico Declaration

The founders of the Institute for Nonprofit News at The Pocantico Center in 2009, when they formed INN as a consortium of independent, nonprofit newsrooms.

In 2015 Sue Cross joined INN as executive director to build its emerging media network and advance social enterprise models for investigative and other public service journalism. During her eight-year tenure, the number of independent newsrooms in the INN Network quadrupled, to more than 425. Since the beginning of 2024, Karen Rundlet has led INN with a focus on excellence in journalism, equity and inclusion, and the financial health of news.

For year-over-year data on the expanding nonprofit news field, see our recurring INN Index.

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