The Center Square

The Center Square, formerly Watchdog.org, is an American news websites that features reporting on state and local government from a conservative perspective.[1] It is a project of the Franklin News Foundation, an online news organization.[2] The Center Square distributes its content through a newswire service. The website broke the story of the phantom congressional districts in the wake of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

The Center Square
TypeState and local government reporting
Owner(s)Franklin News Foundation
FoundedSeptember 2009
Political alignmentConservative
LanguageEnglish

Overview

The Center Square says that it seeks to "fulfill the need for high-quality statehouse and statewide news across the United States. The focus of our work is state- and local-level government and economic reporting."[3] The Center Square's content reflects a focus on government waste and public employee unions. Columbia Journalism Review said the productivity of the website was "impressive," and noted the commitment to original news reporting, as opposed to news aggregation or punditry.[2]

The Center Square is a project of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization the Franklin News Foundation. The Franklin Center received 95% of its 2011 revenue from the donor-advised fund Donors Trust.[4] In 2012, Watchdog.org had sites in 18 states.[5] In 2014, the Franklin Center said they had one reporter in each of 14 state capitols and two in Nebraska and Virginia. In 2015, most of the Watchdog sites had one staff reporter in addition to accepting contributions from citizen journalists via a platform called Watchdog Wire.[5][6]

The Project for Excellence in Journalism of the Pew Research Center surveyed and analyzed nonprofit news organizations active on the state or national level in 2011 and again in 2013.[7][8] The studies found that the most consistently ideological of the news outlets were those that were organized in networks, specifically the conservative Watchdog network and the liberal American Independent News Network.[1][7]

Reporting on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

In 2009, Watchdog New Mexico analyzed data published on the $84 million website, Recovery.gov,[9] regarding the stimulus expenditures authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. A series of articles were published on the stimulus topic, initially examining the number of jobs created and the cost per-job, but the conversation turned to the revelation that $6.4 billion in grants had been awarded in 440 non-existent congressional districts:[10][11]

Journalist Jim Scarantino found that stimulus spending had reached nearly $314,000 per job created in New Mexico.[12] He reported that millions of dollars of federal stimulus funds had been allocated to projects in congressional districts that did not exist; for example, to the twenty-second congressional district in New Mexico, although New Mexico has just three congressional districts.[13]

A government official said that the stimulus recipients made these data entry errors and confirmed the $84 million budget for the Recovery.gov website.[9] ABC News published a story targeting other states and territories, "Exclusive: Jobs 'Saved or Created' in Congressional Districts That Don't Exist".[14]

Jim Scarantino wrote a follow-up story,[10] referencing Watchdog reporter Bill McMorris' finding that $6.4 billion was distributed to 440 non-existent congressional districts. McMorris also found that nationally, just under 30,000 jobs had been created, at a cost of just under $225,000 each.[11]

The Associated Press confirmed that Scarantino's discovery and original reporting was correct. Scarantino stated, "I'm not going to say it went into a black hole," but adds that non-existent congressional districts are a "huge red flag," when asked if people are using the data discrepancy to suggest loss or misuse, "They should do some of their own research," he replied.[15]

Reuters' reporter James Pethokoukis independently validated the cost per stimulus job "saved or created" at $246,436. Pethokoukis calculated the average salary paid per stimulus job as $59,867 when annualized.[16]

Writing for Washington Monthly, Laura McGann inferred that ABC News scooped the "phantom congressional districts" story as an exclusive without attribution to Watchdog; although similar, the ABC News story covered different localities.[17]

References
  1. Benton, Joshua (July 18, 2011). "Pew: Nonprofit journalism doesn't mean ideology-free". Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
  2. Peters, Justin (September 13, 2012). "'Serious, point-of-view journalism'? A look at the most ambitious conservative news organization you've never heard of". Columbia Journalism Review. Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
  3. "About Us". The Center Square. Retrieved 2 April 2020.
  4. Abowd, Paul (February 14, 2013). "Donors use charity to push free-market policies in states". Center for Public Integrity. Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  5. "Franklin Center". Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
  6. Stverak, Jason (March 12, 2010). "The pros and pros of 'citizen journalism'". Online Journalism Review. University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. Retrieved October 27, 2015.
  7. Holcomb, Jesse; Rosenstiel, Tom; Mitchell, Amy; Caldwell, Kevin; Sartor, Tricia; Vogt, Nancy (July 18, 2011). "Assessing a New Landscape in Journalism". Project for Excellence in Journalism. Pew Research Center. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
  8. Mitchell, Amy; Jurkowitz, Mark; Holcomb, Jesse; Enda, Jodi; Anderson, Monica (June 10, 2013). "Nonprofit Journalism: A Growing but Fragile Part of the U.S. News System". Project for Excellence in Journalism. Pew Research Center. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
  9. Michael Noyes (16 November 2009). "Stimulus Adds 13 Congressional Districts to Montana". Watchdog Montana. Archived from the original on 3 December 2015. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  10. Jim Scarantino (17 November 2015). "$6.4 Billion in Fed Stimulus Goes to 440 Non-Existent Congressional Districts". Watchdog New Mexico. Retrieved 3 December 2015. Michael Noyes, my Monatana Watchdog colleague at the Monatana Policy Institute, was able to get a telephone interview with Ed Pound, director of communications for the Recovery Accountability and Transparency board, which oversees the recovery.gov site. When asked about millions going to fictitious Congressional districts, Pound blamed it on the recipients not knowing in which congressional districts they live.
  11. "$6.4 Billion Stimulus Goes to Phantom Districts". Watchdog National. 17 November 2009. Retrieved 3 December 2015. A reporter from the Montana Policy Institute confronted the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, which oversees the site, about these non-existent congressional districts on Monday afternoon. Ed Pound, Director of Communications for the board, said that the faulty information came from recipients of stimulus funds.
  12. Jim Scarantino (15 November 2009). "More Than 4,800 New Jobs Created in New Mexico in Less than a Month from Stimulus, According to Obama Administration Data". Watchdog New Mexico. Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  13. Scarantino, Jim (November 16, 2009). "Updated: Obama Stimulus Creates New Congressional Districts and Promotes New Mexico from Banana Republic to Coconut Republic". Watchdog New Mexico. Retrieved October 27, 2015.
  14. Karl, Jonathan (November 16, 2009). "Exclusive: Jobs 'Saved or Created' in Congressional Districts That Don't Exist". ABC News. Retrieved October 27, 2015.
  15. Associated Press (18 November 2009). "Did "Phantom" Districts Get Stimulus Cash?". CBS News. Retrieved 4 December 2015.
  16. James Pethokoukis (7 December 2009). "Cost-benefit analysis of jobs stimulus". Rueters. Retrieved 7 December 2015.
  17. McGann, Laura (May 2010). "Partisan Hacks; Conservatives have discovered the virtues of investigative journalism. But can their reporting survive their politics?". Washington Monthly. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
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