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Matter takes multimedia deep dives into 2 important local issues, publishes 50 pieces, secures member base, builds portable studio, covers protests, spurs public accountability, and hosts innovative community events in first 3 years.
Matter takes multimedia deep dives into 2 important local issues, publishes 50 pieces, secures member base, builds portable studio, covers protests, spurs public accountability, and hosts innovative community events in first 3 years.
An investigative journalist, an environmental and journalism school graduate, and a government innovator met in 2018 and began working to cofound Grey Matter Media. We launched our publication Matter in November of that year and we’ve been running toward startup success ever since.
Matter is one of the very few Columbus publications that is independent, locally-owned, or nonprofit and it is the only one founded by millennial women, 2 of whom identify as LGBTQ+. It is the only local publication that creates explanatory and investigative multimedia content that is community-informed. And we are the only local outlet to dive deep into the issues impacting the people here.
We designed an intentional model that takes what works in traditional journalism and combines it with carefully crafted changes to make our journalism more accessible and impactful.
Our leadership, reporters, and board are a diverse mix of people from various age groups, career, racial, gender, geographic (within central Ohio) and other backgrounds, resembling the larger Columbus community.
Rather than scratching the surface of a slew of topics, we dive deep into specific issues affecting people in central Ohio in order to provide better context to things that matter. We have shared 50 stories via articles, explainers, mini documentaries, and other mediums for immersive storytelling.
We aim to make the news as accessible as possible, providing it for free, and even posting our articles in their entirety on places like our Instagram. Our goal is to meet our readers where they’re at, and for the majority of our audience, that location is Instagram. We gained a whole new audience, including people nationally, from livestreaming protests to our Instagram as well.
Matter goes beyond traditional journalism in proactively engaging the community in our work. We engage with our audience on social media, send most pieces of our content to a targeted list of relevant stakeholders, have hosted 8 events (many being innovative and multimedia) and 11 livestreams, and built a portable audio/visual studio to further meet people where they are.
And we have worked to advance the larger conversation around the evolution of the news industry. We cultivate conversations about news industry issues and solutions via our Matter Monday livestreams, UnBreaking News blog, and we published a press freedom investigation in collaboration with Eye on Ohio and funding from the U.S. Press Freedom Accountability Project.
For the first year, our only “matter” was DevelopUS, an investigation that is still open today. DevelopUS explores city and economic development, as well as related issues like gentrification. We have published content ranging from a mini documentary about a hotly contested development project, to an explainer about historic districts, to an interactive map that allows residents to explore how economically segregated various neighborhoods in Columbus are.
The then-director of development for the City of Columbus thanked us for our explainer on area commissions, stating that “educating residents on issues this complex is one of our ongoing challenges”.
In June 2020, we opened our second investigation four years ahead of schedule. When protests erupted, the Matter cofounders were out in the streets live-streaming from personal accounts. That's when the posts and messages began to pour in: people were turning to Matter for reliable coverage. The problem? Matter wasn't covering policing nor protests. We had envisioned opening our next investigation with community input in the form of a city-wide poll and meetings with community leaders. But, we changed our vision to stick to our value of being community-informed and opened an investigation into local policing issues. We saw a spike in donations and our coverage of local policing has pushed the mainstream media to cover the issue in ways we have not historically seen.
The most telling feedback we've received in regards to the impact we've had is from a woman with PTSD who said our protest coverage made her feel safer: "I always know what’s going on and I know if something is going on, your team is there ... As a Black woman living here, it’s a really scary place to be sometimes so again, I just really value you and your team." She also became a monthly donor.
Since then, we’ve spurred real public accountability with our work. Editor-In-Chief Marisa Twigg was the only local media to report a late-night incident of police dragging and body slamming protestors in the street and a public records request revealed that coverage directly prompted an investigation into the officers’ misconduct. Reporter Edie Driskill wrote a two-part series that included information from documents leaked to us that proved the then-Columbus Chief of Police lied to the public about progress on promised reforms and even stalled reforms he personally disagreed with. The first piece that contained information about the leaked document was to be published on a Friday morning and the Chief of Police was demoted on that Thursday afternoon in a sudden press conference.
In our first year we: launched our publication and news site; developed branding and produced an about video; published 11 pieces of long form news content, a monthly newsletter, and social content; got started on 3 documentaries, a blog, and 2 podcasts; began to create social media-specific news content; built a portable studio and took it to community events; and put together a small board and bylaws.
In our second year we: published 14 pieces of long form multimedia content; livestreamed protests all summer; began paying contributors; hired our first employees; won our first national grant; raised $4,500 from small donors during our first NewsMatch fundraiser; and filled out our board.
In our third year we: published 24 pieces of multimedia long form content, including our first groundbreaking investigations and podcast series; evolved our publishing model to a bimonthly digital magazine; raised $15,300 from small donors at our second NewsMatch fundraiser; raised $6,000 during our first summer fundraiser including landing our first large donor; hosted 3 big events; hosted 11 livestreams; established 2 committees of our board; and were granted 501c3 nonprofit status.
Chief demoted day before Matter publishes leaked documents showing Columbus Police lied about and stalled reforms
Chief demoted day before Matter publishes leaked documents showing Columbus Police lied about and stalled reforms
Matter reporter Edie Driskill exposed reform progress reporting inaccuracies not only to the public, but to the Columbus Division of Police itself. She has been told by sources within the division that her work led to the demotion of the police chief.
As part of Matter’s ongoing deep dive investigation into Columbus policing, we published a two-part series that included information from documents leaked to us that proved the then-Columbus Chief of Police lied to the public about progress on promised reforms and even stalled reforms he personally disagreed with.
The first piece that contained information about the leaked document was to be published on a Friday morning and the Chief of Police was demoted on that Thursday afternoon in a sudden press conference. We ended up publishing a couple of days later because we had to reframe the story with the breaking news.
The mayor said: “It became clear to me that Chief Quinlan could not successfully implement the reform and change I expect and that the community demands. Columbus residents have lost faith in him and in the Division’s ability to change on its own."
The mayor was under pressure to fire the chief all summer and fall during mass protests. We’ve since learned that the kinds of concerns we uncovered were being circulated privately within the Chief's Advisory Panel full of civilians. But it wasn’t until Matter began investigating contradictions in the police accountability dashboard and set to publish in January that he was demoted.
Reporter Edie Driskill has developed good reporting relationships with everyone from activists to the police division and has leveraged these relationships to dig into engrained corruption within the local government and police division. She demonstrated ingenuity and persistence in breaking ground others didn’t have an eye on.
She did not set out seeking leaked information, but spent so much time speaking to different people within the Division and City developing those relationships that she was able to uncover discrepancies even they didn’t know existed. The articles contain quotes from the public information officer that exposed he was unaware of his own public-facing reform progress dashboard, who ran it, and whether it was accurate; the closing quote has him admitting he has never visited the site himself.
Edie has continued to dig into and update this investigation. She continued to monitor their public facing dashboard and recently interviewed the newly appointed accountability officer to learn why the information was not updated over six months after we published our damaging article. The third piece in the series exposed more technological ineptitude and a lack of understanding of how accountability should work. This manager has now promised to work with Matter News to help bring accurate information to the community.
Our Impact 2020-2021
Our Impact 2020-2021
Please briefly describe the top two or three ways your organization has been successful in having an impact on your community or audience, including any relevant links to stories or projects. Describe how your journalism has improved lives in your community or audience rather than only telling us about the journalism. Please note any feedback you receive from your community or audience about each activity listed.
Impact 1: investigating public officials and spurring accountability
Matter reporter Edie Driskill exposed reform progress reporting inaccuracies not only to the public, but to the Columbus Division of Police itself. She has been told by sources within the division that her work led to the demotion of the police chief.
Part 1 https://www.matternews.org/crossing-the-line/quinlan-stalled-police-reforms-he-opposed-leaked-document-shows
Part 2 https://www.matternews.org/crossing-the-line/columbus-police-falsely-reported-progress-on-promised-reforms
Part 3 https://www.matternews.org/crossing-the-line/how-accurate-is-the-columbus-police-accountability-dashboard-now
Impact 2: providing a watchdog at protests
Editor-In-Chief Marisa Twigg was the only local media to report a late-night incident of police dragging and body slamming protestors in the street in summer 2020. And a public records request revealed that coverage directly prompted an investigation into the officers’ misconduct. https://www.matternews.org/crossing-the-line/columbus-police-dragged-a-woman-threw-another-to-the-ground
The most telling feedback we've received in regards to the impact we've had is from a woman with PTSD who said our protest coverage made her feel safer: "I always know what’s going on and I know if something is going on, your team is there ... As a Black woman living here, it’s a really scary place to be sometimes so again, I just really value you and your team." She also became a monthly donor.
Impact 3: giving a platform to underserved people and leaders
We have hosted 2 events in the past year full of community leaders we felt deserved the mic on the topics we cover. We curated a storytelling lineup of 12 mostly Black community leaders including community organizers, a police lieutenant, restored citizens, and artists in 2020 as well as a panel of 4 Black community leaders in 2021. https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=search&v=1698483690331070 https://www.facebook.com/matternews.org/videos/361465595364262
We have produced pieces like this video that tells the story of Christopher Radden, a Black man and the first person to be arrested by Columbus Police for protesting for George Floyd. He was a one-man protest and the police brutalized him. We gave him a chance to tell his story. https://www.matternews.org/crossing-the-line/before-columbus-mass-floyd-protests-there-was-christopher-radden
FINANCIALS
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