Dallas Voice has been chosen as one of 450 newsrooms from 52 countries as a recipient in Google’s News Equity Fund, a global commitment by Google to provide financial support and opportunities to news organizations primarily serving under-represented communities.
According to a statement from google, the News Equity Fund is intended to “strengthen inclusion, further empower a diverse news ecosystem and specifically support small and medium-sized publishers creating original journalism for under-represented audiences around the world.” Dallas Voicer publisher/owner Leo Cusimano said, “Today, the name of the game is sustainability.
With Google’s assistance, [Dallas Voice and five other LGBTQ media outlets have] established a collaborative called News Is Out.” News Is Out is “a pioneering national collaborative of the leading local queer news publishers” that includes “six of the leading local and queer-owned LGBTQ+ publishers across the nation.” The collaborative’s mission is to “deliver compelling journalism which engages, amplifies and connects the LGBTQ+ community” and to”advance LGBTQ+ equality through solutions-oriented journalism, in the face of continued discrimination.” (Subscribe here.) Dallas Voice, founded in 1984 by Robert Moore, Don Ritz and William Marberry.
Within the first year, Moore and Ritz bought out Marberry’s share in the business, and they ran the Voice together until Ritz’s death in early 2001.