At the end of August, the state of California passed a bill to give news organizations tax credits based on the number of journalists they employ. It’s the largest local news bill in the United States — expected to generate as much as $40 million for the state’s newsrooms each year — and on Wednesday, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed it into law.
Assembly Bill 2222, known as the Community Newsroom Employment and Workforce Sustainability Act, gives newsrooms tax credits of $20,000 each for up to five journalists on staff, and $15,000 for every journalist after, as well as $7,500 credits for journalists working part-time and $15,000 new hire credits.
The nonprofit Rebuild Local News sponsored the bill. “If you hire more people, you get more money,” Matt Pearce, Rebuild Local News’s director of policy, told Nieman Lab in August. “If you lay people off, you get less money. If you don’t employ anyone, you don’t get anything.”
Gov. Newsom told reporters that he sees some downsides of the bill, including the fact that it will benefit hedge fund– and billionaire-owned newsrooms. (The guidelines about the types of newsrooms that qualify are here; the program is “designed to be broadly inclusive.”) From the L.A. Times:
While speaking with reporters on Wednesday, Newsom acknowledged some of the concerns that have been raised about those who will receive benefits from the bill’s funds, specifically hedge funds and billionaire owners and outlets that he accused of spreading propaganda.
“It does subsidize those that don’t need to be subsidized,” he said. “We have hedge funds in this space. We have billionaires in this space. We have people that are profiteering in this space by gutting the newsrooms and extracting value out of the space that also are the beneficiaries.”
Newsom said he chose not to veto the bill because he believes its benefits outweigh the liabilities. He added that he hopes the Legislature and next governor can work to narrow down who benefits most from the legislation.
“We should not be subsidizing hedge funds,” he said. “We should be focused on where the need is the greatest, in my humble opinion, and I do think when you have no cap, the limitlessness of this…to some of the most well-heeled organizations, where now they simply could pull from this bill the benefits that they didn’t even ask for or need, is self-evident.”
The law goes into effect January 1, 2027, and newsrooms should see credits beginning in 2028.
