The board of directors of the California HealthCare Foundation met over the weekend and approved funding to create the California Center for Health Care Journalism. For the past several months, the center has been a pilot project managed by former Los Angeles Times editor Michael Parks. The Foundation’s initial commitment of $3.46 million will fund the effort for the next three years at USC’s Annenberg School of Communications.
The center has been focusing on reporting partnerships with media in California to help deepen coverage of health care and health policy. AHCJ previously reported on a partnership with the Merced Sun Star. Over the next few months, USC will oversee the hiring of an editor in chief, managing editor, senior writer, reporter and multimedia editor, to be based in Los Angeles or Sacramento.
And a heads-up to AHCJ members:
Spencer Sherman, the foundation’s director of publishing and communication, will be attending Health Journalism 2009 in Seattle this week. He’s willing to meet with journalists interested in applying for one of those jobs as time allows. Send him a note of interest at ssherman@chcf.org.
