When readers across New Hampshire clicked “donate,” mailed checks or dropped contributions off at local newsrooms this fall, most weren’t thinking about fundraising totals or matching formulas. They were thinking about school board meetings, town budgets, lake health, housing shortages — and the reporters who keep showing up to cover them.

That collective show of support has added up. Partners in the Granite State News Collaborative have raised more than $77,000 to support local newsrooms across the state through a coordinated fundraising campaign that combines community donations with national matching funds.

These types of campaigns have been instrumental in helping local news organizations sustain and sometimes even grow their reporting capacity.

“Since the pandemic days of 2020, news consumers across the state have been incredibly generous to their local news organizations,” said Monitor publisher Steve Leone, who is also a board member of the Granite State News Collaborative. “Many of the same people give year after year because I think they see that the money is being put to good use by the partner news organizations across the state.”

The shared donation drive marks another way that news organizations that have competed fiercely for generations have, in recent years, found ways to work together in support of readers in our state.

“The newscape in New Hampshire is constantly shifting, as are people’s news consumption habits,” said Carol Robidoux, editor and publisher of the Ink Link News Group. “Anything we can do collectively as professional journalists to reinforce the enduring value of journalism in the context of a vibrant and connected community is important to us as a news organization.”

You can donate to the Ledger-Transcript, any other partner news organization and the Collaborative itself by visiting the donation page on ledgertranscript.com.

As of this week, the overall campaign has generated nearly $60,000 in direct contributions from readers and supporters, with additional matching funds bringing the total to $77,848.59 so far. The fundraiser runs through midnight on Dec. 31, and additional matching dollars may still be unlocked before it closes.

The campaign is part of the New Hampshire Community News Fund, a shared initiative created by the Granite State News Collaborative to help strengthen local journalism across the state. GSNC is a nonprofit journalism collaborative that brings together newsrooms, higher education institutions, and community partners to support local reporting, share resources, and build sustainable models for news in New Hampshire.

“At its core, this campaign is about people showing up for the newsrooms that show up for them,” the Granite State News Collaborative said in a statement. “Local news is deeply personal. It’s about your town, your school board, your neighbors. Seeing people support this work — not just one outlet, but many — is incredibly meaningful.”

A shared approach to fundraising

Rather than running separate, competing appeals, participating outlets took part in a coordinated campaign supported by shared messaging, marketing tools, and fundraising infrastructure produced by GSNC. Donations came in both online and offline, and were then amplified through matching programs, including national journalism initiatives such as NewsMatch.

For local editors, the campaign’s success has been both affirming and instructive.

“I’m blown away by the support for this campaign, and humbled that many of our readers have given to sustain local journalism,” said Julie Hirshan Hart, editor of the Laconia Daily Sun. “It shows not only that people are reading and consuming local news, but that they place real value on the work we do.”

Robidoux, who is a founding partner of GSNC, said the response reflects a shift in how audiences think about trust.

“What seemed to start as a broad distrust in ‘the media’ has turned into something more specific — people questioning which sources are real, trustworthy, and human-driven,” she said. “The success of this campaign tells me that New Hampshire readers are ready to be more discerning, and that ‘local’ really matters.”

Supporting local reporting

Funds raised through the campaign are distributed back to participating outlets based on donor intent, giving each newsroom flexibility to address its most pressing needs.

At the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript, all support we receive will go directly to our “Preserving Our Region” Solutions Journalism project.  This year-long effort will spotlight towns, businesses, and residents across the Monadnock region who are making a positive environmental impact. Each story will focus on everyday people achieving real, evidence-backed results — solutions that are practical, replicable, and inspiring. Our goal is to show what’s possible and motivate action to protect what makes this region so special. Support for the project will fund the editorial time and effort needed to produce these stories and share them as widely as possible. In addition to the reporting, the project includes a youth environmental initiative and a contest aimed at sparking new ideas.

For smaller outlets, Robidoux said the added financial stability can be critical.

“Most local news organizations operate with very little margin for error,” she said. “Having even a short runway helps us weather the unpredictables that, unfortunately, can mean shutting down a news operation.”

For the Granite State News Collaborative, the campaign’s impact extends beyond the final tally.

“This is a reminder that people still care deeply about having trustworthy, local reporting in their lives,” the Collaborative said. “When newsrooms work together — and when communities are invited into the process — local journalism can still thrive.”

The fundraiser runs through midnight on Dec. 31.

Participating partners include Business NH Magazine, Concord Monitor, Granite State News Collaborative, Laconia Daily Sun, Manchester Ink Link, Monadnock Ledger-Transcript, NH Business Review, NHPBS, NHPR, Nashua Ink Link, and Valley News.

Melanie Plenda is the Executive Director of the Granite State News Collaborative. To learn more about the NH Community News Fund collaborativenh.org/support-the-gsnc.

These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. Don’t just read this. Share it with one person who doesn’t usually follow local news — that’s how we make an impact. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.