The Star receives grant to help pay for 3 reporters covering Missouri gun violence

The Kansas City Star on Monday was awarded a grant from the national service program Report for America to help pay for three full-time reporters covering gun violence in Missouri.

Missouri has for years ranked No. 1 in the nation for its rate of black homicide victims. The state’s three biggest cities — Kansas City, St. Louis and Springfield — have been among the top 12 most dangerous cities in the United States.

Starting next year, the three RFA journalists based in The Star’s newsroom will travel across Missouri covering the issue on a statewide level.

The reporters will investigate the causes, consequences, and possible solutions to the gun violence problem in Missouri, where black people are killed at a per capita rate nine times the overall national homicide rate.

The Star was one of several McClatchy newsrooms around the country selected to host reporters in the program.

RFA is an initiative started in 2017 to train young journalists and place them in newsrooms to help cover underserved regions or important issues.

The reporters are assigned for one year, with the option to renew for a second year. They have an average of three to six years of experience and often return to their home states, according to RFA.

Candidates will be interviewed by The Star before starting in the summer of 2020.

In addition to recruiting journalists, RFA provides them with development opportunities via training and mentoring before and during their assignments in local newsrooms.

Journalists can apply to join RFA at reportforamerica.org.

As part of this project, The Star will seek the community’s help.

A major goal of this grant program is to bring more philanthropy in to support local journalism.

A portion of the reporters’ salaries come from RFA. A portion will come from The Star, and another portion will come from community support.

The program receives funding from organizations including Facebook, the Google News Initiative, the Knight Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Heising-Simons Foundation, Dirk and Natasha Ziff, Galloway Family Foundation, Craig Newmark Philanthropies, The Tow Foundation, Select Equity Group Foundation, the Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation, the Lenfest Institute for Journalism, The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation, The Joyce Foundation, The Steans Family Foundation, Henry M. Kimelman Family Foundation and the Duo Collective.

This story was originally published December 2, 2019 at 5:00 AM.