The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette will live on past its slated May 3 closure date, thanks to a new deal with a nonprofit journalism organization.
Block Communications, which has owned the Post-Gazette for a century, has agreed to sell the paper and its assets to the Maryland-based Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism.
The Venetoulis Institute is the owner of the Baltimore Banner, a news website launched in 2022.
The sale is expected to take effect May 4. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The new owner said the Post-Gazette will continue to serve Western Pennsylvania. The newsroom and local business leadership will remain based in Pittsburgh, though teams such as technology will be combined with those at Venetoulis.
“We are committed to working with exceptional journalists, along with civic and business leaders across the region, to build a new future for local journalism in Western Pennsylvania,” said Bob Cohn, CEO of the Venetoulis Institute. “We are clear-eyed about the task ahead. We have learned in Maryland that this work takes time, discipline and investment.”
According to reporting in the Post-Gazette, Venetoulis plans to keep the paper’s Thursday and Sunday print schedule.
The Baltimore Banner reports that founder Stewart Bainum Jr. funded the institute with $50 million at its start. Bainum, a Maryland businessman, plans to give $30 million more over the next five years as part of the Post-Gazette purchase.
This sale is a best-case scenario, said Andrew Conte, Director of the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University. He said it’s now often private equity companies that buy struggling newspapers, to profit off selling their assets.
“And instead you’ve got a buyer who’s coming in and saying, ‘we’re investing in this because we believe in journalism and we believe in the ways that journalism affects community.’ And instead of trying to extract money, they’re offering to put money into the ecosystem. That’s what makes this a big win for the community,” Conte said.
New ownership could give the Post-Gazette a chance at a reset from the hard feelings of the drawn-out labor dispute between Block Communications and the union that represents editorial staff at the paper, said Conte.
Mike Dillon, a journalism professor at Duquesne University, said the sale could be a chance to bring in new or returning readers.
“The Post-Gazette is a known entity. It’s a very prominent brand,” Dillon said. “So, I think it has built-in credibility, and that some people who may have drifted away might say, ‘time to give the Post-Gazette a second look here.”
Dillon said it’s heartening that there is a buyer for the Post-Gazette. He said losing the paper would be a blow to the city’s identity, much like if the Steelers or Pirates left.
He hopes that another entrant into the nonprofit realm won’t be too much of a good thing.
“We have Public Source and we have WESA and people who want to be informed are accessing those news sites. So, we’re addressing the supply part of journalism, but I don’t know if we’re addressing the demand part,” Dillon said. “At least in the social media era, the last 20 years or so, people are really reading to be affirmed, not informed. I’m not sure how we overcome that.”
Conte said the switch to nonprofit doesn’t change the fact that the Post-Gazette will need to raise enough revenue to pay reporters and grow as an organization.
“The status of the organization in terms of for-profit or nonprofit is less important than how the community responds to the news organization and whether advertisers get behind it and subscribers get behind it and people pay attention,” Conte said. ”The journalism that we have in Pittsburgh is going to be a reflection of what Pittsburghers want and what they’re willing to invest in.”
Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato said she was encouraged by the sale in a post on Bluesky, calling the paper “a cornerstone of our region’s civic life for generations.”
“A strong local press is essential to a healthy democracy, and that must include supporting the journalists and workers who make this work possible with good-paying, family-sustaining jobs,” Innamorato said.
It’s unclear how many of the Post-Gazette’s roughly 100 journalists will continue with the new owner. Cohn told the Post-Gazette that its “current business model does not support the size of the current newsroom.”
Also in question is how outstanding liabilities to formerly striking workers will be handled.
A new nonprofit, LocalMatters, has bought City Paper from Block Communications.
Block Communications announced the Post-Gazette’s closure in January after it lost a legal fight with the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh. In November of last year, a federal appeals court ordered the company to pay for health care and return to bargaining for a new contract, following a three-year strike by members of the paper’s bargaining unit.
Andrew Goldstein, president of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh and Post-Gazette reporter, said the liability from that judgement is not erased by the sale.
Goldstein said he hopes to meet with the new owners soon.
“ I’m pleased that a group with this sort of reputation is taking over. I’m hoping, of course, that we’ll be able to have better relations moving forward. I think we have really almost nowhere to go but up at this point in time. I am optimistic about the possibilities here,” Goldstein said.
He said his priorities will be to preserve as many jobs as possible in the Post-Gazette newsroom and to make sure workers feel supported.
