Sacramento, CA – Today, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed AB 2222, the Community Newsroom Employment and Workforce Sustainability Act, or “Community NEWS Act,” into law. Sponsored by Assemblymembers Chris Ward and Buffy Wicks, AB 2222 creates a journalist employment tax credit model with a straightforward approach: to preserve local journalism, the bill helps publishers afford to employ and retain local journalists. It offers a “news-neutral” mechanism, one that creates refundable employment tax credits for qualifying local news organizations – regardless of size, speech, and structure – that hire and retain journalists across the state.
The Governor praised the value of journalism in the state, specifically praising the LA Times for an investigative piece on Bell, CA, in which the paper uncovered extensive municipal corruption, including local officials being paid nearly a million dollars a year. “No one would have known had it not been for local journalism,” the Governor said, emphasizing the importance of the work that journalists do to uncover waste, fraud, and abuse.
In response to this signing, Danielle Coffey, President and CEO of the News/Media Alliance, said, “The News/Media Alliance applauds Governor Newsom for signing AB 2222, the Community NEWS Act, into law. This law creates a common-sense model to support the sustainability of journalism in California, and its greatest strength is that it is ‘news neutral,’ covering the full, diverse scope of news media within the state. This breadth is why it was supported by an unprecedented coalition of over 180 state and national news organizations, and demonstrates a successful proof-of-concept that legislators in other states should follow as they consider how best to support local journalism.”
The Governor’s signing of AB 2222 comes after an outpouring of support for the legislation from a historically broad coalition of state press associations, journalism support organizations, independent and nonprofit publishers, identity‑based media groups, labor unions, university journalism leaders, and national industry advocates. More than 180 local, state, and national organizations joined a series of letters that urged California Governor Newsom to sign the bill, and hundreds of California media outlets ran ads declaring the journalism industry in support of AB 2222.
