Climate Reporter, CalMatters

Job Description

CalMatters and Grist seek a reporter to cover the impacts of climate change in California’s Central Valley, a vibrant and diverse community that serves as the nation’s bread basket while sitting at the center of important climate issues.  

In this role, you’ll be based at CalMatters, a statewide nonprofit newsroom that wins national awards for investigative and in-depth journalism, and work directly with Grist, the nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to reporting on climate change. Through CalMatters and Grist, your work will reach statewide and national audiences. 

You’ll have the opportunity to tell the untold stories of how climate impacts this critical region and whether the state’s policies – climate-related; agriculture-related; water, air, and energy-related – improve outcomes for the people and communities most affected.

If you’re the right person for this role, you’ll be also interested in approaching the beat from a solutions lens: How are people working to address the problems caused by climate change? Can those solutions be scaled up to statewide or national levels? What are the drawbacks? And you’ll be mindful of the equity issues that are often at the root of human-based climate stories.

Best Pillars

• Exploring the impacts of a changing climate, including, but not limited to:
  • Climate impacts on agriculture, including changing seasonal variations, extreme weather, and pest infestations
  • Increasing impact of communicable diseases like valley fever
  • The effect of drought on Central Valley communities
  • Extreme heat and its impact on vulnerable populations, including outdoor workers and youth
  • Affordability of energy and health costs
• Impact of public policy at the local and state level on climate and environment, including, but not limited to:
  • USDA or state-level climate policies’ impact on agricultural communities and businesses
  • Enforcement of state climate-related laws by the California Environmental Protection Agency
  • Extreme weather preparedness funding, policies, and plans
  • Energy policy (fossil fuels vs. renewables vs. emerging technology)
  • Financial policies around energy and climate (tax breaks for water- or energy-hogging data centers, for example, or boosting fossil fuels, eradicating tax credits for renewable energy, etc) 
  • Environmental impact of data centers, fracking, and power plants
• The ways Californians are taking action outside of government in response to climate change, including, but not limited to:
  • Community organizing around specific climate issues (for example, extreme heat)
  • Businesses that are leading community or individual action
  • Emerging technologies being developed in the state

What You‘ll Do

• This job will require you to tie policies to the ways they directly impact people in the Central Valley and be able to tell these stories on multiple platforms. At the same time, you’ll propose, conceive and execute enterprise stories that go beneath the surface. We expect you’ll write with depth and nuance about complex climate issues that have a real impact on the Central Valley. Here are the core duties:  
  • Write with depth and nuance about complex environmental and climate issues that have real impact in the Central Valley
  • Propose, conceive, and execute in-depth, thought-provoking stories, typically at least two to four stories per month
  • Work with partner organizations to create or adapting content to run in local newspapers and on Grist.org
  • Tell stories on multiple platforms, including radio, television, in-person events and social media
  • Perform other duties as assigned

What We’re Looking For

• Bachelor’s degree in journalism or a related field, or equivalent experience.  
• Three or more years of reporting experience.
• Demonstrated news judgment, ethics, and creative approaches to storytelling.
• Demonstrated ability to be able to tell a deeply reported, well-written story that includes data and narrative elements.
• Strong organizational skills and ability to juggle multiple tasks and deadlines.
• Enthusiasm about using journalism engagement practices to serve audiences. 
• Demonstrated record of collaboration with colleagues from various perspectives and experiences on team projects, and a desire to be part of a team that values hard work and humor.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills. 
• Ability to thrive in a deadline-driven environment where attention to detail and accuracy are key. 
• Comfort using a variety of technologies, including content management systems, social media, and project management platforms.
• Ability to respond constructively to feedback and positively engage with collaborative and team-based projects.

Preferred Qualifications

• Based in California’s Central Valley.
• Digital storytelling experience. Portfolio submission and/or writing assignment is highly likely as part of the interview process.

Compensation And Benefits

The salary range for this position is $75,000 to $95,000 per year. This full-time position is represented by the Pacific Media Workers Guild. This role is a co-funded partnership between CalMatters and Grist.

The salary range above is our best estimate, in good faith, of what we expect to pay for this position. Our final salary figure will consider the candidate’s experience and skills, as well as our commitment to pay our staff equitably.

We offer a complete benefits package with medical, dental and vision insurance — we cover 95% of the cost for employees and dependents — from a range of HMO and PPO providers. We also offer paid family leave and will match contributions of up to 4% of your salary to our 401(k) program and provide life insurance at no cost.

How To Apply

CalMatters is committed to becoming an antiracist organization. We are an expanding and collaborative newsroom, successfully forging a new model for sustainable, intelligent, nonprofit journalism. We do our best to center justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion in all that we do—of which hiring is just one part. We encourage you to ask us about what concrete steps we are taking in service of these ideals. We strongly encourage applicants who are people of color, LGBTQ, and people with disabilities, regardless of national origin, alienage, and/or former incarceration status.

A college degree is not required. If you’re interested please submit your resume, a cover letter explaining your interest in this beat, and 3–5 clips here: https://calmatters.org/about/jobs/climate-reporter-calmatters/
 

About CalMatters

CalMatters is an award-winning nonprofit, nonpartisan news venture dedicated to explaining the policy and politics of America’s biggest state and the world’s fifth largest economy. In 2024, we merged with The Markup, a nonprofit national news publication that challenges technology to serve the public good.

We produce vivid, original multimedia journalism, data-driven news analyses and watchdog accountability reporting on calmatters.org and themarkup.org, and we distribute our work at no cost to more than 250 media partners. Our success metric isn’t clicks — it’s impact. Products at CalMatters/The Markup serve millions of people. For example:

• More than 1 in 5 California voters head to the polls informed by CalMatters’ nonpartisan Voter Guide.
• Blacklight, our real-time privacy inspector, has been used over 18 million times and helped journalists, nonprofits, and academics hold tech accountable.
• Digital Democracy, our unprecedented, custom-built AI tool that tracks everything you’d want to know about state legislators has unearthed stories and prompted legislators to call for change.

About Grist

Grist is a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to reporting on climate change. Since 1999, we have used the power of journalism to engage the public about the perils of one of the most existential threats we face. We seek to document the often unequal impacts of climate change on communities in the United States and globally — as well as to show the promise of equitable climate solutions.

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