When the local paper goes dark, the town record shouldn’t go with it.
ConnectedNews pairs AI-assisted reporting infrastructure with local voices to bring an affordable community newsletter back to towns that lost theirs — original reporting from public records and public meetings, written for neighbors, by people who live there.
News deserts are growing — and it’s the boring, vital stuff that disappears first.
When a local paper closes, a town doesn’t just lose headlines. It loses the everyday civic record that keeps a community running and its institutions honest:
- Who voted how at the council meeting
- What the school board is deciding, and when
- Road closures, zoning changes, and public notices
- Which local businesses are opening and closing
- A shared record neighbors can point to and trust
AI-assisted infrastructure. Human judgment. Local bylines.
Full-scale newsrooms are expensive. Most of what made them expensive — monitoring records, transcribing meetings, tracking filings — is exactly what modern tools do well. That’s where the AI goes. The judgment, the questions, and the bylines stay local.
We watch the public record
Our tools monitor the sources that were always public but rarely read: meeting agendas and minutes, public notices, permits, budgets, and filings — then transcribe and organize them so nothing slips by.
Local voices do the reporting
Residents and local contributors turn that raw record into original reporting — attending meetings, asking follow-up questions, and adding the context only someone from town can add.
Your town gets its newsletter back
An affordable community newsletter, delivered on a schedule neighbors can rely on — the civic record, restored and readable.
Everything we publish is reported from primary sources: public records, public meetings, and interviews. We never scrape or rewrite other outlets’ work. That’s a legal principle and a point of pride — we exist to add coverage where there is none, not to skim from the newsrooms that remain.
Built with the town, not just for it.
A community newsletter only works if the community steers it. ConnectedNews is designed so residents shape the coverage from day one.
Flag what needs covering
See a pothole hearing, a zoning notice, or a shuttered storefront that deserves attention? Residents can flag it, and it goes on the reporting docket.
Neighbors on the byline
Contributors are recruited locally and paid for their work. The people covering the school board have kids in the district and a stake in getting it right.
Affordable by design
Because the infrastructure is shared across towns, each community pays a fraction of what a standalone newsroom would cost — priced so small towns can actually sustain it.
Want ConnectedNews in your town?
Leave your email and we’ll be in touch as we choose our first communities. If your town lost its paper, we especially want to hear from you.
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