Dallas Free Press

Dallas Free Press's nonprofit journalism aims to amplify voices in disinvested Dallas neighborhoods and explore solutions to the city’s systemic inequities.

Dallas Free Press follows the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics and continually learns from groups such as the Institute for Nonprofit News, the Local Independent Online News Publishers, Trusting News, Gather and their members to assess and refine their editorial practices toward fairness and transparency.

As a nonprofit news organization, Dallas Free Press is strictly nonpartisan, but admits they are not completely objective and are unabashedly biased toward the two neighborhoods they cover — South Dallas and West Dallas — as well as the voices of the people who live in them.

Prior to 2020, what is now Dallas Free Press was Advocate magazines’ charitable arm, Advocate Foundation Inc, which was founded in 2007 to provide small grants to neighborhood businesses and schools. The Great Recession of 2008 and the simultaneous internet revolution rendered the foundation dormant by 2015, so Advocate president Rick Wamre, handed the reins over to Keri Mitchell, who revamped it as a standalone news nonprofit. The two entities still are mutual advisors on community and civic journalism projects, but are no longer connected in terms of finances or business practices. Advocate Media has since become its own nonprofit entity as well.

In 2020 a legal DBA certificate was filed for Dallas Free Press.

Dallas Free Press centers on and amplifies voices of the people who live in the South Dallas and West Dallas neighborhoods, as part of its mission, and therefore pays attention to whether their story sources live in, grew up in or work in their communities, or whether they reflect the culture and experiences of these communities. South Dallas and West Dallas are predominantly Black and Latinx neighborhoods, respectively, whose residents still suffer from decades of neglect and disinvestment on the part of the powers that be (including, in some cases, the media).

Dallas Free Press commits to telling its readers when an error has been made, the magnitude of the error and the correct information, as quickly as possible. This commitment and transparency is applicable to small errors as well as large, to short news summaries as well as long features. Possible errors can be reported to info@dallasfreepress.com.

Reliable sources with direct knowledge of information are key to Dallas Free Press's reporting. The policy only allows its journalists to cite an unnamed source is when the source is in a vulnerable position and anonymity is vital to their safety. Dallas Free Press journalists must get approval from the board before citing an anonymous source.