Meet the 51 finalists for the 2025 LION Sustainability Awards

LION Publishers is thrilled to announce that 51 member organizations are finalists for the 2025 LION Sustainability Awards. This year’s program includes 10 categories centered around LION’s pillars of sustainability: journalistic impact, financial health, and operational resilience. 

Our independent panel of judges reviewed a total of 239 entries from LION member organizations, an increase from 200 entries in 2024.

This year, for the first time, we also asked LION members to submit nominations for the Community Member of the Year Award, which honors a publisher who embodies LION’s core values. Seven outstanding individuals were nominated, and a membership-wide vote yielded four finalists: The Haitian Times’ Garry Pierre-Pierre, Conecta Arizona’s Maritza L. Félix, Burlington Buzz’s Nicci Kadilak, and Borderless Magazine’s Nissa Rhee. Additionally, LION staff nominated La Noticia, The Charlotte Ledger, and Streetlight as finalists for the Transformational Impact Award.

Winners will be announced live, in person, at the LION Awards Ceremony & Dinner on Wednesday, September 3, in St. Louis, Missouri, during LION’s Independent News Sustainability Summit on September 3-5, 2025. You can purchase tickets here.

Thanks to our generous sponsors, LION will distribute at least $60,000 total in cash prizes to award winners, with each winning entry receiving a minimum of $2,000.

Sponsors include the Carol Oppenheim and Jerome S. Lamet Charitable Fund, Google, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, RJI, BlueLena, Democracy Fund, The Lenfest Institute, Spot-On, The Associated Press Fund for Journalism (APFJ), Flying Comet Games, and The New York Times. If you’re interested in sponsoring the Summit and LION Awards, please email sponsorships@lionpublishers.com for more details about packages and sponsor benefits.

And the finalists are:

Finalists were selected by an independent panel of judges. Descriptions were self-reported and slightly edited for length and clarity. Finalists are listed in alphabetical order. Use the quick links below to scroll to specific sections.

LION Business of the Year
New LION Business of the Year
Operational Resilience Award
Financial Health Award
Public Service Award
Community Engagement Award
Collaboration of the Year
Product of the Year
Transformational Impact Award
Community Member of the Year

LION Business of the Year

Recognizes a LION member that has made significant progress toward achieving sustainability through strengthening its operational resilience, financial health, and journalistic impact.

Small Revenue Tier

Between $50,000 and $500,000 in annual revenue

The Berkeley Scanner
The Scanner is approaching its third birthday stronger than ever, thanks to a reader-focused membership program built on trust, thoughtful public safety coverage, a strategic approach to audience and membership growth, and robust partnerships. By utilizing partner BlueLena’s infrastructure and co-developing tools like AI-assisted campaigns and lifecycle automations, TBS is growing faster, engaging more deeply, and building a sustainable model while maintaining editorial independence.

Santa Cruz Local
Santa Cruz Local’s strategic planning last spring aligned the team with its North Star – civic engagement – and catalyzed 58 percent year-over-year fundraising growth by Q1 2025. The newsroom provided raises of 16 to 24 percent across the staff, prioritizing those at the lower end of the pay scale to address the high cost of living, and hired new staff to build teams focused on its three audiences: English speakers, Spanish speakers, and young people. Plus, Santa Cruz Local’s Election Guides were read by one in three voters this fall, including many new voters.

Oviedo Community News
Florida-based Oviedo Community News doubled down on establishing editorial partnerships, significantly expanding its impact and reach within the community. OCN also achieved great success in attracting new donors and strategically invested in its staff by hiring its first full-time reporter and development director to enhance its public-service journalism.

Medium/Large Revenue Tier

More than $500,000 in annual revenue

Borderless Magazine
Borderless began a major transformation last spring, resulting in a new organizational structure and doubling its staff, revenue, Instagram followers, and newsletter subscribers. The Chicago newsroom also expanded its award-winning investigative reporting and field canvassing efforts to connect readers with crucial information and shed light on the city’s struggling migrant shelter system.

Cardinal News
Cardinal News shares the stories of Virginians whose voices have been silenced in the state’s political and economic centers simply because of where they live. In just three and a half years, Cardinal has published more than 5,000 of these stories. The newsroom also established a development team that has significantly increased membership and sponsorship revenue, restructured its news team to provide both hyperlocal coverage and in-depth investigations, and launched new products, such as an app and podcasts, to respond to audience requests.

Mission Local
This year, San Francisco’s Mission Local focused on three key areas: content (including comprehensive election coverage), expanding its donor base through events and candidate forums, and motivating existing donors to give more. The team’s experience offers a model and a valuable lesson: it is much easier to attract donors when the content is strong, but strong content must be supported with smart, strategic fundraising efforts. In this case, that includes coffees, email campaigns, events, and ongoing outreach.

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New LION Business of the Year

Recognizes a LION member — founded after January 1, 2024 — that exhibits, even in its very early stages, a clearly defined commitment to working toward achieving sustainability through operational resilience, financial health, and journalistic impact.

Mat-Su Sentinel
Alaska’s Mat-Su Sentinel is on its way to sustainability, thanks to a series of purposeful steps that focus on listening closely to what readers want and need from local news. By leveraging resources from support organizations (including LION), producing high-quality, award-winning journalism, and developing diversified funding streams from the start, the Sentinel has built a revenue system that includes grants, small individual donations, memberships, event fees, syndication, and corporate sponsorships. Just 10 months after its launch, the Sentinel serves nearly 20,000 readers each month and delivers a weekly newsletter to about 3,000 subscribers.

Spotlight Delaware
Spotlight Delaware launched in March 2024 with a mission to engage, empower, and connect Delawareans with local news and information. With long-term sustainability in mind, Spotlight’s board of directors elected to build both sides of the house simultaneously. In its first year, twelve staff members were hired — six for editorial and six for operations. Working together, the operations team created a suite of products (sponsored content, events, and a membership program) based on key audience demographics identified by the editorial and community engagement teams, resulting in a projected earned revenue budget of $500K for 2025, which will cover about 25 percent of expenses.

Tucson Spotlight
Tucson Spotlight is a bilingual, community-centered newsroom that launched in September 2024 to address critical gaps in Southern Arizona’s local news ecosystem. In just seven months, it has published more than 445 articles, including 170 in Spanish, and has built a vibrant social media presence. The newsroom is also committed to promoting civic engagement and cultivating the next generation of journalists through paid internships and mentorships. By prioritizing community trust, operational resilience, and financial sustainability from the outset, Tucson Spotlight is redefining what a modern, inclusive newsroom can be and building a scalable model for high-impact, local journalism in historically underserved communities.

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Operational Resilience Award

Recognizes a LION member that has made significant progress toward strengthening its operational resilience by establishing processes, policies, and a people-centered company culture designed to support staff, manage growth, and promote sustainability.

Micro/Small Revenue Tier

Less than $500,000 in annual revenue

Oviedo Community News
In anticipation of significant strategic growth in its staff and board of directors, OCN collaborated with several experts to guide a comprehensive update of its hiring and onboarding practices. These revamped processes and materials have helped introduce new faces into the organization in an effective and thoughtful way, ultimately increasing efficiency and success.

Santa Cruz Local
Santa Cruz Local utilized its strategic plan to develop a future organizational chart featuring multiple editors and teams, each centered around its three primary audiences. So far, the newsroom has addressed gaps at the director level by collaborating with top-tier consultants and has hired a lead editor for Noticias Watsonville, its Spanish audio news on WhatsApp, along with a full-time social media staff member and photojournalist to help create a new product for young people. Plus, an employee survey resulted in raises for all staff, and Santa Cruz Local increased its healthcare reimbursement benefit to the maximum allowed.

Medium/Large Revenue Tier

More than $500,000 in annual revenue

Borderless Magazine
Borderless started a major transformation last year, resulting in a new organizational chart, new accountability structures, a critical staff engagement survey, and significant growth. In 2024, it doubled its staff size and more than doubled its annual revenue compared to 2023. So when President Trump took office in 2025 and quickly began changing immigration policies, the newsroom had the systems in place to meet the challenges of the moment.

Cityside Journalism Initiative
Bay Area pioneer Cityside has taken great strides to ensure it is an organization that not only does great work, but is a great place to work. In the past 18 months, the newsroom hired a full-time director of people operations, successfully negotiated its first Collective Bargaining Agreement — enshrining policies and practices that will benefit its employees for years to come — and implemented a range of trainings, benefits, and social opportunities for its staff aimed at fostering operational excellence. The results have been uniformly positive and are reflected in the number and quality of candidates Cityside receives for new job openings. 

VTDigger
VTDigger has overhauled its internal operations to build a more resilient and people-centered organization. The outlet has implemented a range of initiatives — from a new employee platform that offers transparent salary and benefits information, to streamlined and more robust financial and administrative processes, regular employee engagement surveys, and cybersecurity training — all designed to support transparency and staff well-being. These changes have not only enhanced operational efficiency but have also freed up leadership’s time to focus on strategic fundraising and long-term growth.

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Financial Health Award

Recognizes a LION member that has made significant progress toward strengthening its financial health by developing a plan for earning money, managing a budget, and/or monitoring revenue and expenses to extend its financial runway. This can also include the development of a successful and creative strategy to grow or diversify revenue while positively impacting their financial health.

Micro/Small Revenue Tier

Less than $500,000 in annual revenue

Athens County Independent 
Seeking more financial sustainability, the Athens County Independent pursued grants to support a year-long contract with a fundraising consultant and the Ohio organization’s first business-side hire. With three grants totaling $54,400 — including a Google News Initiative grant from LION — the Independent successfully secured a Press Forward grant and tackled many ‘firsts,’ like conducting a major gifts campaign, hosting a large fundraising event, securing significant sponsorships, and writing a comprehensive revenue strategy. The result: nearly quadrupled net revenue over FY23 and a firm foundation for future revenue growth.

Eden Prairie Local News (EPLN)
Following a plan initiated during a LION Sustainability Audit, EPLN experienced an increase in subscribers, donations, grants, and advertising. By clarifying goals through survey data, internal discussions, and experiments, the team was able to better target grants, simplify reader messages, and launch a newsletter to broaden its readership demographic in Minnesota. Donations and subscribers rose by 55 percent in the first eight months of FY25. Revenue doubled from $90,250 to $185,214, and the newsroom is on track to achieve its FY25 forecast of $270,674.

The Record North Shore
The Record has doubled its revenue and tripled its staff size over the past two years by prioritizing revenue diversity and data-informed budgeting. In 2024, five distinct revenue streams each accounted for at least 15 percent of its total income. The suburban Chicago newsroom also built reserves that cover more than half of its annual budget. New products, like a print edition and upgraded fundraising events, contributed to growth, while a board-approved reserve policy added another layer of long-term security.

Medium/Large Revenue Tier

More than $500,000 in annual revenue

Cardinal News
In its third year, Cardinal News continued to support its expanding news team in a sustainable way, especially by having a full year with a dedicated development team of three (executive director, development director, and sponsorship manager). The team successfully built and strengthened a membership program, established corporate sponsorships, and handled legal notices — and could now afford to make its stellar volunteer accountant a full-time financial director.

Dallas Free Press
In April 2024, Dallas Free Press was a month away from running out of money. Over the next year, the newsroom rebuilt — not just its reserves, but how it plans, budgets, asks, and operates. The team created systems that showed them where they stood and stopped relying on assumptions. They made tough decisions, communicated more transparently, and adjusted their approach to stewarding relationships with funders and donors. The result: they raised more in 12 months than ever before, moved from LION’s Small to Medium revenue category, and ended the year with six months of runway and a multi-year strategic plan in place.

The Nevada Independent
Over the past year, The Nevada Independent has made significant strides in financial sustainability by diversifying its revenue through philanthropy, individual giving, advertising, and event sponsorship. This model has driven record growth in earned revenue — from 1.3 to 19 percent — and expanded the newsroom’s community of monthly donors, who now contribute nearly 20 percent of its annual budget. The Indy has deepened philanthropic partnerships, hosted high-impact events (like IndyFest), and adopted smart financial practices, including scenario planning and a six-month reserve.

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Public Service Award

Recognizes a LION member that has consistently produced journalism with meaningful and demonstrable impact in its communities.

Micro Revenue Tier

Less than $50,000 in annual revenue

Estes Valley Voice
In its first six months, the Estes Valley Voice discovered that the local fire department violated the state’s open meetings law when making a decision about hiring a new chief. The outlet formally requested the recording of the meeting under the Colorado Open Records Act. When denied, they took the matter to court and won. Afterwards, the EVV invited the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition to hold a workshop for the area’s town boards about Colorado’s Sunshine Laws. More than 60 people attended, and the chair of the fire district board resigned. On May 6, all five seats on the fire board were up for election.

Ethiopique
Ethiopique is an Amharic-language news outlet serving over 100,000 immigrants in the D.C., Maryland, and Virginia area. Over the past year, Ethiopique has bridged critical information gaps by connecting Amharic-speaking readers directly with elected officials, translating vital legal and civic information, and organizing a live webinar with immigration lawyers. Its reporting reflects the voices of its readers — including a post-election survey of 55 participants — and is published on platforms they already use. Ethiopique’s work is rooted in public service, ensuring that no one is left behind because of language.

Ocean State Stories
Many of the newsroom’s stories, including one about how heart-transplant donor shortages cause an estimated 17 deaths per day, have increased awareness of important societal issues and injustices through a local perspective. Many of these stories have also been published by the outlet’s partners, both in print and online, offering a genuine public service to readers in Rhode Island and nearby Massachusetts.

Small Revenue Tier

Between $50,000 and $500,000 in annual revenue

Burlington Buzz
In 2024, Burlington Buzz provided its most comprehensive coverage of municipal elections to date. From printed booklets and household mailers to a digital Election Corner, in-person events, and podcast interviews, the newsroom ensured that every Burlington, MA resident — regardless of access to technology, time constraints, or political knowledge — had a way to engage with the information to participate meaningfully. This effort resulted in more candidates, better-informed voters, and higher-than-average voter turnout for the second consecutive year.

California Health Report
Over the past year, the California Health Report published stories and columns that exposed gaps in care for children with disabilities in California and highlighted solutions to improve support. The newsroom held systems accountable by examining flaws in new health programs, provider shortages, and the potential impact of federal policy changes. The team also engaged caregivers through a public survey and expanded its reach with multilingual content, cross-publication, and targeted outreach. This work empowered families, sparked dialogue, and informed advocates and policymakers.

Conecta Arizona
In 2024, Conecta Arizona led an initiative to combat disinformation and enhance civic engagement among Arizona’s Spanish-speaking communities during a critical election year. The newsroom organized the state’s only Spanish-language electoral forum, “Voto Latino: El Mañana lo Construimos Hoy,” facilitating dialogue between community members and officials. The team launched campaigns to counter political violence and misinformation, offered support via WhatsApp “cafecitos,” and developed a robust expert network for accurate information sharing. By improving translation processes, strengthening fact-checking, and prioritizing digital security, Conecta Arizona provided trustworthy content to those often overlooked.

Santa Cruz Local
Santa Cruz Local’s Election Guides have helped county residents become informed and engaged with local issues and elections. Over 70,000 voters accessed its online bilingual Election Guides this past spring and fall. On average, 7,000 Pajaro Valley residents aged 18 to 29 viewed its Election Guide for Students on Instagram each day in October. And its Spanish-language print Election Guide also reached about 7,000 Pajaro Valley residents.

Large Revenue Tier

More than $1.1 million in annual revenue

Mississippi Free Press
The 2024 Mississippi Trusted Elections Project examined serious issues with the state’s election systems and compiled the only comprehensive public lists of polling places and changes to polling locations. After years of ongoing reporting by the newsroom, the Mississippi Legislature passed a law in 2025 prohibiting polling place changes within 60 days of an election. The publication engaged with voters in person and virtually as part of this project, which took a systemic approach to investigating the roles and (in)actions of state and local officials across all 82 counties.

Mission Local
There is no more important public service than informing the electorate during local elections, and Mission Local’s coverage did this consistently, creatively, and comprehensively during the 2024 elections to meet San Francisco residents where they were. The newsroom published critical information in English, Spanish, and Chinese, making it available online, in person, and in print.

Outlier Media
Outlier Media’s reporting on Wayne County’s failure to return surplus proceeds from tax-foreclosed homes exposed how the county profited from Detroiters who lost homes over small debts, as well as how many homeowners and heirs were unaware they could legally claim the profit. The team launched a direct outreach campaign, making over 2,100 calls and reaching 463 people who may be owed more than $5.6 million. Together with legal advocates, they helped guide residents through the initial claims process. This reporting pressured officials to improve communication, raised awareness of systemic financial harm, and supported Detroiters in reclaiming what’s rightfully theirs.

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Community Engagement Award

Recognizes a LION member that has achieved general excellence in journalistic impact by demonstrating an intentional and systematized approach to community engagement that consistently tells stories for, with, and by the people they are working to serve. 

Micro Revenue Tier

Less than $50,000 in annual revenue

Estes Valley Voice
Estes Valley Voice is passionate about the connection between community engagement and the media. Since its launch nine months ago, it has organized six community engagement events and acted as the media sponsor for two additional community events: a dementia conference and an Indigenous people’s fashion show. Additionally, Estes Valley Voice is currently serving as a media sponsor for a major Rotary Club community fundraiser that aims to raise tens of thousands of dollars for local nonprofits.

Ethiopique
Ethiopique’s work is directly shaped by its readers through surveys, Facebook polls, and community-submitted questions. A survey of 279 participants led the Washington, D.C. area newsroom to focus on immigration, education, local government, the economy, and crime. When 84 percent requested daily news, the team adjusted its publishing schedule and saw an increase in engagement. They hosted a legal webinar on immigration and were also the first to represent the Amharic-speaking community in the Montgomery County Thanksgiving Parade. Now, they’re developing a community event called Fishing with Ethiopique and running a Community Resilience Survey to explore launching mutual aid as economic and immigration pressures grow in the DMV.

Going Local Media
“Going Local Weeks on Long Island” is a grassroots initiative launched by Going Local Long Island and local business Jackson Hall to support local businesses with marketing and outreach. After helping a neighborhood BBQ place remain open, the duo decided to take the initiative island-wide. Through “Going Local Week,” small and local businesses offer unique incentives that are promoted for free on goinglocalweek.com, resulting in increased foot traffic and sales at these shops.

Small Revenue Tier

Between $50,000 and $500,000 in annual revenue

AfroLA
Internships that prioritize close mentoring, reporting project collaborations, and additional support for students and student journalists are part of what has made AfroLA so successful. And efforts like the newsroom’s election accountability follow-up and community listening hours are central to its model, which is grounded in solutions journalism and community-based work. 

Conecta Arizona
In response to rising anxieties after the 2024 election, Conecta Arizona answered hundreds of urgent questions daily, collaborated with legal and subject-matter experts, and organized televised forums to address community concerns. The organization’s work includes distributing “Know Your Rights” materials, hosting informational sessions, providing one-on-one support in neighborhoods, and fostering ongoing dialogue. Despite facing threats and risks due to the team’s own diverse backgrounds, they prioritize safety for both themselves and their audience. 

La Converse
La Converse launched Les Dialogues La Converse, a public video dialogue series created in collaboration with residents of underserved Montréal neighborhoods. Each year, the initiative brings people together in accessible community spaces to discuss topics chosen by locals, ranging from housing and immigration to racism and intergenerational challenges. These dialogues are then published on YouTube and its website, and accompanied by content co-created with participants. Over the past year, the project has engaged more than 500 community members and established new partnerships with local organizations that now utilize the content for educational and advocacy purposes.

Santa Cruz Local
Santa Cruz Local adopted a whole-staff approach to scale its ability to drive civic engagement. The newsroom reached over 800 residents, both online and in person, to gain a better understanding of the news they wanted. This deepened the organization’s relationship with residents, resulting in reporting projects that serve the community’s interests and ultimately leading to real-world civic impact. Santa Cruz Local’s listening work inspired a resident-led candidate forum, an Election Guide used by one in three voters, an Instagram Election Guide for students, which was accessed by 7,000 18- to 34-year-olds daily, and civic events that drew hundreds of residents.

Medium Revenue Tier

Between $500,000 and $1.1 million in annual revenue

Canopy Atlanta
Canopy Atlanta partners with residents to share stories about its community — neighborhood by neighborhood. Every article, podcast, or photo it publishes starts from conversations with community members, and most of its work is also written or researched by local residents. The team’s thoughtful approach to community engagement is redefining who journalism is by and for.

Kansas City Defender
In the past year, the Kansas City Defender launched B-REAL, an abolitionist freedom school that has reached over 30 participants across generations; hosted monthly Defender’s Cabarets featuring Grammy-nominated musicians; and co-organized Town Halls in collaboration with the city’s oldest Black newspaper. Its journalism has sparked real change: the city’s most powerful unelected official was suspended within hours of an exposé, and a racist school board reversed course after its coverage. And it’s the only newsroom consistently reporting on jail alternatives, like the REACH program.

LOOKOUT
LOOKOUT is bringing journalism off the screen and into real life. Informed by a statewide survey, the Arizona organization has shifted from accountability reporting to also creating solutions-focused events and resources. In 2024-25, the team hosted 37 activations, including the “Summer of Solutions” roundtables and OUTWATCH Fest, serving over 700 people with health services, education, and community-building. Its tabling efforts use history, art, and interactivity to spark connection and action. Every program is designed to meet information needs, uplift LGBTQ+ voices, and turn storytelling into impact, demonstrating that a newsroom can be both a watchdog and a community anchor.

Large Revenue Tier

More than $1.1 million in annual revenue

Block Club Chicago
Although Chicago Public Schools has long served immigrant, Spanish-speaking students, the arrival of waves of migrants in Chicago, sent on buses by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, has resulted in thousands more children identifying as English Language Learners. While reporting a related story, Block Club Chicago’s Mina Bloom and Chalkbeat’s Reema Amin discovered that many parents were unaware of their legal rights within the school system. So they created “Know Your Education Rights” postcards — printed in English and Spanish — specifically for families new to the country, distributing them where families have settled.

Prison Journalism Project
To tackle one of the most pressing issues facing prisons today, the Chicago-based Prison Journalism Project published a special project on summer heat in prisons in partnership with The Marshall Project, utilizing fill-in-the-blank journalism. PJP developed this approach to enable more incarcerated writers to contribute to its reporting, knowing that 70 percent of incarcerated individuals are functionally illiterate. In 2024, PJP showcased 42 writers from 27 states, including 17 who published with PJP for the first time. Writers’ ages ranged from 27 to 77 years. Among them, 32 percent identified as Black, and 21 percent were women, which is twice the proportion of incarcerated women in the U.S. overall.

Richland Source and Ashland Source
Tomorrow’s Talent is a reporting project by Richland Source and Ashland Source that engaged over 1,100 high school students and 94 employers throughout north central Ohio to explore workforce challenges and opportunities. Through original surveys, accessible data storytelling, and a culminating community event, the project fostered a shared understanding of what Gen Z wants from work — and identified gaps between youth expectations and employer needs. More than 70 community members participated in the final event, where attendees received a printed magazine summarizing the key findings.

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Collaboration of the Year

Recognizes a LION member that has successfully formed a short-term or long-term collaboration with at least one other organization to positively affect their journalistic impact, financial health, and/or operational resilience. Entries can include both business-focused and/or editorial-focused collaborations; however the most successful entries will be able to demonstrate a positive impact on more than one of LION’s pillars of sustainability (journalistic impact, financial health, and operational resilience).

Small Revenue Tier

Between $50,000 and $500,000 in annual revenue

Ink Link News
As a founding member of the Granite State News Collaborative, Ink Link News celebrated two big wins. The first was the establishment of the NH Community News Fund, which raised more than $51,000 (including over $11,300 from NewsMatch) shared across member organizations. Additionally, GSNC, in collaboration with Ink Link News, launched an indie news site to serve New Hampshire’s second-largest city. This accomplishment would not have been possible without the knowledge and support gained from a decade of affiliation with LION, tools from vendors like Broadstreet Ads, and a forward-thinking plan to grow more sites.

Taproot Edmonton
Taproot Edmonton and the Edmonton Coalition on Housing and Homelessness collaborated on “Housing Complex” to explore Edmonton’s housing system. This partnership enabled Taproot to secure funding from a charitable foundation, allowing them to hire a writer and a photographer to document the stories of 12 individuals involved in the housing system. These portraits became the heart of a multi-part series supported by the editorial team. Taproot also worked with ECOHH to acquire additional funds for an in-person event attended by about 70 participants, including interviewees, Taproot members, readers, housing advocates, and city council members.

The Daily Catch
In 2024, The Daily Catch merged with The Hudson Valley Pilot to resolve confusion in a saturated local news market and strengthen journalism in New York’s mid-Hudson Valley. The Catch brought its award-winning, traditional reporting model, while The Pilot contributed an engaged Rhinebeck audience. The Daily Catch absorbed The Pilot’s debts, migrated its content, and added a third reporter, enabling deeper coverage of key issues like agriculture and infrastructure. The merger yielded dramatic gains: fundraising more than doubled, major donors were retained and expanded, and readership surged.

Medium Revenue Tier

Between $500,000 and $1.1 million in annual revenue

LOOKOUT
Under LOOKOUT, the Queer News Network (QNN) launched its inaugural project: the QNN Elections Desk 2025, uniting 10 LGBTQ+ newsrooms across the U.S. to monitor anti-LGBTQ+ political threats. Led by LOOKOUT, QVegas, and Q Voice News, and supported by content partners like Them, Los Angeles Blade, and Bay Area Reporter, QNN trained eight interns through a partnership with the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism. The project produced over two dozen stories, reached 80,000+ readers, and built a national coalition for queer accountability journalism — proving LGBTQ+ coverage is essential, powerful, and ready to reshape how elections are reported.

Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk
The Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk is an independent environmental journalism collaborative with 15 journalists working in newsrooms covering the country’s largest watershed. It experienced a year of learning and growth, including expanding its geographic boundaries and media types, increasing its staff, boosting publication and audience reach, securing national grants, launching shared fundraising efforts, and publishing two major collaborative projects that have reached millions of people. 

The Sopris Sun/el Sol del Valle
Sol del Valle is a Spanish-language newspaper created through a groundbreaking collaboration among news organizations in Colorado’s Roaring Fork and Colorado River valleys. Originally a small section within The Sopris Sun, it became an independent publication through strategic partnerships, shared leadership, and community input. Funding from state and philanthropic sources was used collaboratively and sustainably, enabling the hiring of bilingual staff, expanded distribution, and deeper reporting to serve the region’s 40,000+ Latino residents.

Large Revenue Tier

More than $1.1 million in annual revenue

Charlottesville Tomorrow 
The Charlottesville Inclusive Media Project is a collaboration between Vinegar Hill Magazine, In My Humble Opinion, and Charlottesville Tomorrow to create a framework for rebuilding local media in service of communities of color in Virginia. In 2024-25, they launched several initiatives: a professional development and networking program to support local journalists of color; a community leadership roundtable series; the CIM fellowship for community-centered media projects; an internship program for emerging media professionals; a news series highlighting important but overlooked community members; and an event series that encourages community feedback and connects it with local decision-making.

Investigative Journalism Foundation
A collaborative investigation by the Investigative Journalism Foundation and CTV News uncovered a massive international fraud scheme, exposing significant regulatory gaps in Canada’s corporate oversight system. By combining resources and expertise, the two organizations produced a four-part series that revealed how weaknesses in existing frameworks allowed fraudulent operations to thrive. This reporting led to concrete outcomes, including government action to strengthen regulations and dismantle fraudulent entities. 

Spotlight PA 
Last year, a court order estimated that Pennsylvania could receive up to $1.8 billion from settlements with drug companies over their role in the opioid epidemic. But when Spotlight PA and partners from WESA (Pittsburgh’s NPR station) followed that money, they found efforts to spend the funds on police and prosecutors, barriers to a widely supported public health intervention, confusion about the process, and decisions made in secret. Despite facing resistance, their reporters found ways to make spending information publicly available in a consistent manner. They filed 77 open records requests in a single day and created a first-of-its-kind database. Their reporting has been cited by families, advocates, researchers, and other media outlets.

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Product of the Year

Recognizes a LION member that developed a successful and creative short-term or long-term product to strengthen their journalistic impact, financial health, and/or operational resilience. We use News Product Alliance’s definition of a news product: “A defined article, series, program, or other content created by a news organization to meet the needs of news consumers, membership and subscription programs, and streaming services.”

Micro/Small Revenue Tier

Less than $500,000 in annual revenue

Green Philly
Launched in 2024, Green Philly’s EcoFair is a vibrant, community-driven sustainability event that connects Philadelphians with practical, local environmental solutions. Designed around direct community feedback, EcoFair offers interactive experiences like a sustainable vendor marketplace, textile recycling, a community paint day, and upcycled art activities, alongside enjoyable experiences such as flash talks, local food, yoga, and live music. The event attracted over 1,300 attendees, generated $14,000 in revenue and nearly $8,000 in profit in its inaugural year, and boosted Green Philly’s visibility.

La Esquina TX
La Esquina TX launched “Preséntanos Tu Caso” to empower Spanish-speaking immigrants to report consumer fraud. Through its online forum and phone line, community members submit complaints about scams and fraudulent businesses. The team then investigates each case, helping victims recover lost money or connecting them directly with legal authorities. This service has recovered nearly $60,000 for victims of fraud. For 2025, they’ve secured local business sponsorships to fund a dedicated freelance consumer investigative journalist, expanding their community support.

The Charlotte Ledger
The Charlotte Ledger launched Mountain Updates, a pop-up newsletter that delivered timely, heartfelt coverage of Hurricane Helene’s impact on Western North Carolina. Although outside its usual coverage area, the team introduced this free, opt-in product to serve Charlotte-area readers connected to the mountains. Written by an Asheville-area native, it combined original reporting with curated updates, publishing daily for 16 consecutive days. It fulfilled a vital community need, quickly attracted 2,100 subscribers, and expanded the newsroom’s audience.

Medium Revenue Tier

Between $500,000 and $1.1 million in annual revenue

Ctrl+P Publishing
Small independent publishers often struggle with limited reach and attracting large advertisers. So seven New Mexico publishers used reader surveys and compared audience lists to find a solution. The group discovered that 40 percent of their subscribers appeared on multiple lists, and two-thirds wanted more news than individual publishers could provide. To address this, they created a shared platform to cross-promote stories and establish a joint ad network. With nm.news, each newsroom retains its independence but shares a section of its newsletter with the network. Revenue generated by the network is redistributed to publishers, providing “big network” digital income to small publishers.

Dallas Free Press
Civic Atlas is a zoning tracker created in collaboration with DFP and shaped by the experiences of residents from South and West Dallas, who have long sought a better way to monitor development before decisions are finalized. The tool transforms inaccessible city data into searchable maps, case timelines, and plain-language summaries. It now powers the newsroom’s editorial workflow, helping the team surface story leads, inform real-time coverage, and provide residents with a clear path to engage.

Enlace Latino NC
Enlace Latino NC’s WhatsApp Community is a dynamic, bilingual journalism product serving over 4,500 Spanish-speaking North Carolinians. More than just a messaging tool, it serves as a trusted public service space, delivering daily news, live Q&As with experts, immigration tips, weather updates, and resource directories — directly to users’ phones. Built around accessibility, listening, and two-way communication, the product reflects the newsroom’s mission to meet its audience where they are and create journalism that’s truly useful.

Large Revenue Tier

More than $1.1 million in annual revenue

Cardinal News
By its third birthday in September 2024, Cardinal News had expanded from a daily newsletter to an organization producing five different newsletters. Through community listening and surveys, the team discovered two key things: 1) readers wanted to learn more about the stories behind the stories, and 2) they wanted to listen to them via audio stories and podcasts. The team quickly got to work, utilizing a generative AI tool that can read stories for those who prefer listening and creating a podcast to provide listeners with deeper dives, featuring their reporting team.

Montana Free Press
Montana Free Press launched Free Press Fest in 2024 as a live, in-person civic journalism event designed to connect Montanans with timely, trusted reporting and public dialogue. Over three days, the festival drew hundreds of attendees, featured 38 speakers, and reached audiences statewide through livestreams and recorded sessions. Developed through deep audience engagement and refined through real-time feedback, the Fest prioritized accessibility, relevance, and editorial excellence. It also advanced key business goals — generating sponsorship revenue, energizing donor support, and expanding brand awareness.

The Austin Chronicle
In June 2024, The Austin Chronicle launched Free Press Forever, a monthly music series and donor drive to strengthen community ties and help sustain its journalism. Over the course of seven months, the series attracted more than 500 new recurring donors, generated nearly $50,000 in gross revenue, and fostered invaluable connections among journalists, supporters, and business leaders. Beyond financial gains, Free Press Forever reaffirmed the power of face-to-face engagement, proving that a sustainable press thrives not just on funding but on deep-rooted community relationships.

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Transformational Impact Award (selected by LION staff)

Recognizes a LION member that has achieved a transformational impact for its organization through dedication to improving operational resilience, financial health, and/or journalistic impact. This member organization is not only making an impact internally, but their growth has also had a positive effect on the communities they serve and the independent news ecosystem.

La Noticia
La Noticia is a multi-decade, Spanish-language news business in Charlotte, NC, and a model for those building digital businesses to complement print success. In the past year, La Noticia updated its newsletter editorial strategy, resulting in a 28 percent increase in subscribers and $20,000 in new newsletter advertising revenue within the first six months, with projections to double both in the next quarter. To complement its product strategy, La Noticia committed to greater financial reporting at the product level, allowing leadership to assess the success of each product and understand when to experiment, when to pivot, and when to double down.

The Charlotte Ledger
The Charlotte Ledger began as a one-person newsletter. As it enters its seventh year, in the words of its founder, the Ledger has moved “from a news company with a few newsletters to a full-blown media company with a variety of different facets and multiple entry points for our subscribers and followers.” The Charlotte Ledger launched a new website to complement its presence on Substack and expand its engagement with new audiences. It also hired an operations manager to streamline business development efforts, successfully experimented with events for audience engagement and revenue development, and invested in audience research to fine-tune its product and event strategy. 

Streetlight
Streetlight is a nonprofit news site in Oklahoma City that focuses on in-depth and investigative stories about housing, criminal justice, and inequality. Internally, Streetlight has invested in systems to support fundraising and audience feedback, which has improved staff efficiency and allowed for tailored approaches to editorial content and fundraising, resulting in new reporting opportunities and the acquisition of new donors. Streetlight has also successfully turned the 85 percent increase in site visitors attributed to audience-centered reporting into numerous new donors who help sustain the organization.

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Community Member of the Year (selected by members)

This award recognizes an individual affiliated with a LION member organization who exemplifies LION’s core values. This person routinely goes above and beyond to support, acknowledge, and celebrate their fellow news entrepreneurs.

Garry Pierre-Pierre
Founder, The Haitian Times (Brooklyn, NY)
From the nomination: First of all, Garry is a pioneer in ethnic media, and he’s always willing to share the lessons he’s learned with others. His work has not only impacted the Haitian community, but also other ethnic, migrant, and diaspora media entrepreneurs that he so graciously mentors. This past year was tough for his community, and The Haitian Times proved to be an important source of news. They also build their priorities by listening to their community. Finally, in 2024, he showed us what true sustainability looks like by creating a successful succession plan.

Maritza L. Félix
Founder and Director, Conecta Arizona (Phoenix, AZ)
From the nomination: Maritza embodies the spirit of the LION community — generous, innovative, and deeply rooted in service. As the founder of Conecta Arizona, she’s built a trusted, Spanish-language news outlet from the ground up, reaching audiences across the U.S.-Mexico border with critical, community-informed journalism. Her leadership has helped center immigrant and Spanish-speaking voices in industry conversations and inspired other publishers to think differently about audience, access, and sustainability. Additionally, Maritza is always ready to mentor others, offer tactical advice, and share hard-won lessons about building a news business from scratch.

Nicci Kadilak
Publisher and Founding Editor, Burlington Buzz (Burlington, MA)
From the nomination: Being a solopreneur is HARD. Nicci recognized that and still offered to do more, bringing together LION’s Solopreneur Peer Group for both formal and informal gatherings. In addition to being a connector, she models resourcefulness, puts new learnings into practice, and pushes to track the impact of the Burlington Buzz, such as by monitoring voter turnout.

Nissa Rhee
Cofounder and Executive Director, Borderless Magazine (Chicago, IL)
From the nomination: Nissa’s leadership and vision have been a beacon of light to understand how immigration journalism needs to happen. Borderless Magazine’s reporting consistently shows the power of immigrant voices as a key part of telling the stories of our community. Nissa’s work has informed my own work as a publisher and journalist.

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Special thanks to this year’s volunteer judges, without whom the 2025 LION Sustainability Awards would not be possible: Adam Schweigert, Adriana Lacy, Agnes Varnum, Alexandra Smith, Alexis Hyder, Andrew Losowsky, Anika Anand, Anne Galloway, Ariel Zirulnick, Ashley Woods Branch, Ashley Kang, AX Mina, Bene Cipolla, Blair Hickman, Bridget Thoreson, Celia Wu, Christine Schmidt, Christopher Brennan, Clara Soteras, David Grant, Elaine Ramirez, Frances Dinkelspiel, Hanaa’ Tameez, James Breiner, Jennifer Mizgata, Jennifer Hack, Jessica Morrison, Jill Blackman, Joanne Griffith, John Davidow, Jonathan Kealing, Katie Mercer, Laura Amico, Mark Potts, Matthew Green, Max Resnik, Meena Thiruvengadam, Nicole Mastrangelo, Peter Gottlieb, Richard Brown, Samuel Gross, Shane Pekny, Shannan Bowen, Shira Center, Stacey Peters, Stephen Jefferson, Steve Katz, Susanne Beck, Todd Stauffer, Tom Davidson, Tom Kearney, Trish Rodriguez Terrell, and Wendy Rosenfield.