Between Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning in Philadelphia, seven people were shot and one man was killed. But with the election serving as the media’s main course Tuesday night, the shootings were only reported by one outlet: the Gun Crisis Reporting Project, a nonprofit journalism organization that covers gun violence in Philadelphia. Or used to cover it–the site announced on Tuesday morning that it would cease daily reporting due to a lack of funding.
CJR wrote about the Gun Crisis Reporting Project in our September/October issue. The organization is only two and a half years old, but in that time it’s published nearly 2,000 posts, often writing about violence that wouldn’t otherwise be covered. It’s a crucial service for a city where 80 percent of homicides are a result of gun violence, co-founder Jim MacMillan says.
The organization doesn’t need much money to stay afloat–$150,000 a year would keep current operations running, MacMillan says, but none of the grants Gun Crisis applied for came through. And while Gun Crisis will continue to report on gun violence when possible and maintain a monthly email newsletter, MacMillan worries about the effects of less coverage. “We’ve been making it harder for decision-makers to look the other way,” he says, “and now we’ll be making it less hard.”
He’s not giving up the cause. Although he says it’s too early to provide any details, MacMillan hopes to partner with another Philadelphia organization on a new project aimed at reducing gun violence.
Gun Crisis isn’t the only violence-reporting startup with grim news this week. According to NiemanLab, Homicide Watch DC will shutter its site at the end of the year. While other Homicide Watch sites have found local partners, the original branch is on its own, despite winning a Knight Public Service Award in 2012 and receiving accolades from The Atlantic, The New York Times, and CJR.
Homicide Watch DC was co-founded by Laura and Chris Amico in 2010. The couple ran the site until 2012, when they moved to Boston after Laura received a Nieman-Berkman Fellowship and later took a job at The Boston Globe. Interns kept the site running with funding from a Kickstarter campaign, but the model isn’t sustainable without a local partner, reports Nieman.
Christie Chisholm is a CJR senior editor. Follow her on Twitter at @c_chisholm.