Chicago Public Media has acquired the Chicago Sun-Times, creating one of the largest nonprofit media organizations in the U.S. The Sun-Times’ new nonprofit model and partnership with Chicago Public Media will strengthen the media landscape serving diverse communities in Chicago.
MacArthur contributed multi-year funding to support the organizations as they work to preserve local journalism and help the local media thrive. Both the Sun-Times and WBEZ, Chicago’s NPR station housed at Chicago Public Media, reinforced that they maintain full editorial independence, with a firewall between news coverage and sources of revenue and the Board of Directors.
“MacArthur is proud to support ‘the hardest-working paper in America’ as it joins forces with and one of the premiere public media organizations in the country,” said John Palfrey, President of the MacArthur Foundation. “We are confident this deal will result in two stronger news organizations that will do a better job covering all of Chicago’s communities, and that this collaboration can serve as a national model for addressing the financial crisis in the news industry at a time when our democracy needs it most.”
