Starting NewJerseyNewsroom

Source 
Author 
Coverage Type 

Public libraries have become substitute offices for the recently disenfranchised, so it wasn't unusual that 40 bright, talented and unemployed people found themselves in a conference room on a dreary day at the Montclair Public Library last January. But they had something else in common: they were all refugees from The Star-Ledger, which had required deep layoffs to stay in business. And while journalism seemed to be done with them, they were not done with journalism. Less than three months later, NewJerseyNewsroom (newjerseynewsroom.com), a Web site owned and operated by journalists, is up and running. Last Friday, the site was topped with an article by Tom Hester, a longtime State House reporter, deconstructing the decision by the New Jersey Supreme Court. It upheld Gov. Jon Corzine's decision to upend a 34-year-old formula that pushed the most public school financing to the poorest districts. Sitting last Friday at the same public library where the enterprise was conceived, Hester, 65, talked with wonder about the ability just to push a button and find an audience, bypassing the editors, printing and trucks that used to convey his work.


Cast Out, but Still Reporting