The Clinic’s Local Journalism Project provides legal assistance to local news outlets and journalists. Among many other services, it offers newsgathering advice and pre-publication review of articles to help protect its clients from litigation. It assists with pursuing FOIL requests, and it litigates for clients when governments improperly deny access to records or proceedings. It defends journalists and news outlets against subpoenas that seek their testimony or the identity of a confidential source, and it fights defamation lawsuits intended to suppress protected free speech rights.
The Clinic recognizes that the needs of local media go beyond newsgathering and publication. Local outlets enter into commercial contracts, license material, hire employees, and must comply with regulations just like any other entity. The attorneys within the Local Journalism Project provide counsel on a range of issues crucial to the operations of community newsrooms. The Clinic also partners with the Cornell Entrepreneurship Law Clinic to provide media clients with the corporate advice they need to structure themselves for success.
There are many small news outlets, including those in under-served communities, that are eager to learn of legal tools that would enhance their work and allow them to conduct more investigative reporting. Part of the Clinic’s goal is to encourage news outlets to consider pursuing additional investigative pieces related to the workings of state and local government and to involve the Clinic at the outset of an investigative piece of reporting so that the legal strategy can best aid that reporting.
The Clinic created the Local Journalism Project as a distinct initiative after just one semester of the Clinic’s existence, recognizing the critical need that local journalists face for legal help. Originally focused on local news outlets in New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and nearby geographies, the Local Journalism Project is now providing services to outlets and journalists in states throughout the country, including in Arizona and Texas. The initiative helps expose Clinic students to the full breadth of media law work, from litigation to corporate advising.