What happens when journalism shows up on your block, not just in your inbox?
That’s one of the questions we’re exploring through our neighborhood zines, which are short, tangible collections of stories, reflections and resources created with and for a specific community.
We recently launched our first one on Pittsburgh’s North Side — or Northside, depending on who you ask. (Our style guide uses two words, but we love a neighborhood that sparks passionate spelling debates.)
This is the inside story of how the zine came to be and where we hope it leads.
Scenes from PublicSource’s North Side zine party on May 22, at MuseumLab in Allegheny Center. (Photos by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource)
At PublicSource, we believe journalism should feel human, not distant, not abstract, not like it was made somewhere else for someone else. It should reflect the realities of the people it’s meant to serve. And sometimes that means shifting the format, the tone or the place where journalism lives.
This zine is one of our efforts to make local journalism feel more local.
The idea: Make journalism more personal, more place-based
We’ve spent the last 14 years producing deep, investigative reporting and community-centered storytelling for the Pittsburgh region. We’ve reached people by issue, interest and identity through stories on health, government, education, the environment and more.
We’re building on that work by getting even closer to home, so our journalism can matter more in your everyday life.
With 90 neighborhoods in the city of Pittsburgh, 130 municipalities in Allegheny County and 43 school districts, our region is one of the most fragmented in the country. That’s daunting, but it also invites a place-based approach that can help people see the relevance of journalism in their everyday lives, not just in times of crisis or election season.
The neighborhood zines are one part of this approach. They’re meant to reach people offline and offer a kind of storytelling that feels approachable, grounded and maybe even delightful.
The format: Low-tech, high-touch
We intentionally chose the zine format: a small, printed publication you can hold, flip through, pass to a friend or tuck into your bag. It’s low-tech and high-touch. It slows you down just a little. It doesn’t ping or scroll. And it doesn’t require an algorithm to find its audience.
We designed the zine as something that might be picked up at a community center or a coffee shop. It’s something we hope feels familiar and serves as a snapshot of the people and ideas animating a place.
The North Side edition includes a mix of PublicSource stories rooted in the neighborhood, along with new reflections, photography and community input.
As we wrote in the foreword, this project grew from a belief that stories shared close to home can deepen our understanding of ourselves, our neighbors and the region we live in. That’s the heart of it.
The bigger picture: Journalism that connects
This zine isn’t just about repackaging what we already publish. It’s about rethinking what journalism can be and how it can be delivered. We know there are many reasons people disengage from the news: lack of trust, overwhelm, digital fatigue or the sense that it’s just not for them.
Our job is to ask: What would change that?
We believe journalism can be part of reconnecting people to each other and to the place they live.
We also know that one format or one strategy isn’t enough. The zine is just one piece of a broader effort, and it all feeds back into our core mission: To inform and inspire the Pittsburgh region through the power of deep, independent journalism.
What we’re hoping for: Dialogue, discovery and what comes next
We don’t see the zine as a one-off. We hope this is just the beginning of a deeper conversation with North Side residents and with other neighborhoods across the region.
We’re curious to know:
- Did something in the zine resonate with you?
- Do you have a story idea you’d want us to follow up on?
- Want to stay in the loop about what we’re doing next?
If you got a hold of one of our zines, we’d love to hear what you thought and what you want to see more of. You can email us with your ideas and sign up for our newsletters.
We’ve also launched a page on our website curating all of our North Side–relevant stories, from those based in the neighborhood to others that prominently feature people, organizations and issues across its 18 neighborhoods. Find our North Side page here, and bookmark it to stay connected.
And if you’re reading this and thinking, “I’d love to help bring a zine to my neighborhood,” please get in touch. We’re already planning what comes next.
Halle Stockton is the editor-in-chief and co-executive director of PublicSource. She lives on the North Side. Contact her at hstockton@publicsource.org.
