Bay City News Foundation is proud of the work we do and we are honored that our peers in the local news industry recognize our efforts. Here are some examples of our newsroom’s accomplishments, our incredible staff, new and ongoing projects, and some behind-the-scenes views of how we produce our journalism.
November 2025
Bay City News Foundation has received a $15,900 grant from the California Arts Council to sustain its cultural coverage on LocalNewsMatters.org.
This funding will support our essential Arts & Entertainment and Bay City Books sections, which provide weekly coverage, newsletters and radio segments spotlighting local artists, performers and authors across 13 NorCal counties.
October 2025
Two journalists supported by Bay City News Foundation were recognized in the Society of Professional Journalists’ NorCal Chapter’s 2025 Excellence in Journalism Awards.
Steve Brooks, a California Local News Fellow reporting from inside San Quentin, was honored for commentary and analysis pieces published in Time Magazine, Local News Matters and Prism. Sarah Stierch received recognition for Best Scoop for her reporting on local government and community issues in Mendocino County.
September 2025
The Marin Community Foundation has awarded Bay City News Foundation a $120,000 grant to enhance local coverage, adding a dedicated reporter whose work will be given away to local outlets.
The new reporting, focusing on pressing issues and underserved populations, will be made freely available to all local news outlets in Marin County, and to residents directly on the Marin News Matters section of BCNF’s LocalNewsMatters.org website.
Read more here.
The Contra Costa Youth Journalism program, with Bay City News Foundation as its fiscal sponsor, won gold at Global Youth & News Media Prize Awards for training high school students to report, write and produce community stories. Launched in 2024, the program focuses on underserved students and students of color, helping fill local news gaps. The international jury praised CCYJ’s remote training model for its accessibility, structure and real impact in empowering young journalists.
Bay City News Foundation 2024-2025 Impact Report
Growth has been a consistent theme over the past year at Bay City News Foundation, and we are proud to report how much positive impact that has meant for our readers and the communities we serve.
August 2025
Katherine Ann Rowlands, owner and publisher of Bay City News, was featured as a Hometown Headliner by Macalester College. The alum was recognized for her “entrepreneurial and mission-driven” work to keep Bay Area journalism strong through a hybrid structure that pairs daily wire coverage with nonprofit-supported reporting through Local News Matters.
She was also honored for her leadership in defending transparency and democracy as board president of the First Amendment Coalition.
July 2025
Katherine Ann Rowlands, owner and publisher of Bay City News and director of its nonprofit arm Local News Matters, was featured on the latest What Works podcast to discuss how she acquired The Mendocino Voice and transitioned it to a nonprofit. She also shared why she believes co-op models haven’t worked for local news and reflected on how the pandemic disrupted earlier plans for the outlet. Listen to the podcast episode here.
June 2025
Bay City News reporter Joe Dworetzky, creator of the editorial cartoon series Bay City Sketchbook, was recently featured in Nieman Lab for experimenting with AI tools to enhance his cartoons. “Dworetzky sees cartoons as primed for assistive AI, considering the form is not tied to accuracy in the same way as other kinds of visual journalism, like courtroom sketches. But he worries about the long-term impact of these tools on the profession.”
Read the story here.
May 2025
Bay City News was recently spotlighted by the Reynolds Journalism Institute for its innovative approach to election coverage, blending journalism with the power of AI. In a conversation with Randy Picht, BCN publisher Kat Rowlands and digital editor Ciara Zavala shared insights from a playbook they developed to guide other news organizations in adopting AI-assisted workflows. “Our goal was to figure out if we could use these new tools to save ourselves time and allow our staff to do more important work,” Rowlands said.
California Local News Fellow and Bay City News Foundation contributing writer Steve Brooks received two honors in the 2025 Stillwater Prison Journalism Awards:
- Prison Journalist of the Year — Third Place
- Best News — Second Place, “As many Californians fled potential tsunami, San Quentin inmates weren’t able to prepare,” published by Bay City News
April 2025
Local News Matters won two awards from the 2024 LMA Digital Innovation Awards:
Best News Website – The judges commended Local News Matters “for its beautifully designed website, use of photos, original graphics, easy-to-navigate special sections, and innovative use of web tools.” In particular, they said, “LNM’s website is consistent and cohesive across sections and pages.”
Most Innovative Use of AI in a News Organization – LMA recognized Bay City News Foundation’s “ambitious use of AI during the 2024 elections,” which enabled “real-time reporting across 13 Northern California counties, demonstrating how automation can streamline complex, time-sensitive coverage.”
The AP Fund for Journalism, supported by the Google News Initiative, has announced a pilot program to help nearly 50 nonprofit newsrooms strengthen local reporting through access to AP content, tools and training — with Bay City News among those selected to participate.
March 2025
Bay City News Foundation has been selected to join a six-month Local Media Association program aimed at helping newsrooms generate revenue, with a focus on The Mendocino Voice, our sister publication. Our project, Sustaining Rural Voices: A Fundraising-Driven Journalism Initiative, addresses the challenge of expanding coverage in underserved areas while developing innovative strategies to sustain our reporting.
February 2025
The Contra Costa Youth Journalism (CCYJ) program is launching a new season with an exciting opportunity for its high school student reporters: covering the prestigious Lesher Newsmakers Speaker Series, beginning Feb. 24.
The program, fiscally sponsored by BCN Foundation, provides students — many from underserved schools — access to unique learning experiences that help build future careers in journalism.
Bay City News Foundation has been selected to participate in the Google News Initiative’s inaugural AI Lab for News Sustainability.
This program delivers practical AI solutions to boost engagement, streamline operations and drive revenue.
Through this, BCN aims to develop AI-powered podcasting to enhance audience engagement and drive revenue growth.
December 2024
At the San Francisco Press Club’s 47th annual awards dinner in December, Bay City News received five awards:
- Joe Dworetzky, First Place, Digital Media, Profile “Nomad in a Settled City: Tales of a Traveller”
- Joe Dworetzky, First Place, Digital Media, Investigative Reporting “Living in Camp Dismal: An Investigative Series on Alternative Shelter Approaches”
- Joe Dworetzky, First Place, Editorial Cartoon, “Bay City Sketchbook: Experiencing Homelessness”
- Anna Leah, First Place, Digital Media, Photography/Sports “Down the Home Stretch: Golden Gate Fields fans pony up for memories at track’s finale”
- Joe Dworetzky, Third Place, Blog/Commentary, “Making AI Contact: Can Generative Artificial Intelligence Help A Cartoonist Achieve His Vision?”
November 2024
Bay City News Foundation highlights its accomplishments and recognitions in the Fall 2024 Impact Report as it continues to provide comprehensive and independent journalism serving the Bay Area.
Bay City News owner and publisher Kat Rowlands discusses BCN’s unique hybrid model for serving newsrooms and communities in the San Francisco Bay Area in an episode of the Local News Matters Podcast, hosted by Colorado Press Association CEO Tim Regan-Porter.
October 2024
Bay City News helps launch a new Contra Costa Youth Journalism cohort, offering high school students mentorship from professional journalists to report on local communities.
September 2024
Bay City News is expanding beyond the written word to bring local news and arts reporting to Radio Sausalito. The partnership, a first of its kind in the region, brings together two different but independent community media voices. Two reporters, Ruth Dusseault and Leslie Katz from Bay City News, will debut new weekly shows on Radio Sausalito.
The first show, “Local News Matters,” is a weekly roundup of reporting by independent journalists featuring stories affecting Southern Marin and the greater Bay Area.
The second show, “Bay City Beat” showcases a unique listing of weekend arts and cultural events around Marin County and the Bay Area.
August 2024
The Mendocino Voice, an independent nonprofit news site serving Mendocino County since 2016, and KZYX Radio, an NPR affiliate public radio station serving the region, have formed a reporting partnership to expand local news coverage.
Sydney Fishman, a Mendocino Voice reporter who is part of the California Local News Fellowship program, will deliver a weekly news report to listeners starting in August.
A fundraiser in memory of writing coach Mary Ann Hogan raised $9,000 for the Bay City News Foundation’s internship program. This puts the foundation two-thirds of the way toward its goal of raising $75,000 for the 2024 internship program.
This marks the fifth year the Hogan-Newton Fund at the Miami Foundation has supported Bay City News interns (nearly 50 in all), totaling $33,000 in grants.
July 2024
Bay City News Foundation highlighted its accomplishments and recognitions in the Spring 2024 Impact Report as it continues to provide comprehensive and independent journalism serving the Bay Area.
Bay City News Foundation, in partnership with The Mendocino Voice, welcomes California Local News Fellowship journalist Sydney Fishman to our reporting team.
For the next two years, Sydney will cover stories in Mendocino County, deepening our local reporting in this region.
June 2024
Mendocino Voice partners with Bay City News Foundation.
Bay City News Foundation is among the 60 nonprofit newsrooms participating in the fourth cohort of GNI Fundamentals Lab and funding program — a collaboration between Google News Initiative and Institute for Nonprofit News.
This three-month training will run from June to September 2024.
Prison journalist and California Local News Fellow Steve Brooks won 2nd place in the Stillwater Awards’ “Prison Journalist of the Year” category. Brooks is a contributing writer for LNM’s Inside/Out covering issues of incarceration and criminal justice.
The Stillwater Awards are a joint effort between Society of Professional Journalists and Prison Journalism Project.
May 2024
Joe Dworetzky has been doggedly pursuing public records in his series on homelessness in San Francisco and has been thwarted by city bureaucrats at nearly every turn. He went to the effort to pursue the case with the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force and got a unanimous ruling in favor of Bay City News. The underlying public information kept by public agencies is so important to doing in-depth and investigative work.
Bay City News won second place in the Local Media Association’s recognition for Best Audience or Engagement Strategy for its survey work and engagement event at Stagg High School in Stockton. The strategy “could be a new product or tool meant to gather audience input, a reader survey, an event series, or some other content type focused on listening, including social media.”
