The Independent Journalism Atlas looks at “wells” and “springs” in news deserts

What do we mean when we talk about news deserts?

The term has become a shorthand for areas devoid of local news coverage. But a new essay from the Independent Journalism Atlas recalls that when Penny Abernathy popularized the term through her research, she used it to describe a more nuanced picture:

To show what information can look like in news deserts, the Independent Journalism Atlas — an initiative that aims to “[document] independent creators who inform, educate, and advance public knowledge outside traditional media structures,” cofounded by Liz Kelly Nelson, Justin Bank, and 2025 Nieman Fellow Ryan Kellett — took a closer look at 46 of the 238 news desert counties identified in this year’s State of Local News report from Medill.

“Look at the ground and news moves like water,” writes Bank. “It doesn’t stop at a county line. It runs off the surface, sinks underground and comes up wherever someone digs.” The team found that “in more places than the desert map shows, someone has picked up a shovel.” (That might help explain why people who live in news deserts don’t feel deprived of local news.) The team identifies a few patterns in how information looks and travels in news deserts, including “surface” information, wells, and springs.

Posts from the local sheriff, weather alerts, and obituaries from the funeral home are all examples of “surface” information that “runs off,” Bank writes, typically telling you what happened without telling you why.

Wells are newsrooms that form when a local paper shutters. The team points to the Anaconda Weekly Review in Deer Lodge County, Montana, as an example of a well appearing in a county Medill identified as a news desert.

Springs, meanwhile, are “harder to spot” than wells because they’re smaller and more ad hoc. The Independent Journalism Atlas applies this label to efforts like the Gallatin County Board Illinois Unofficial Facebook page, which livestreams the board’s public meetings and posts its agendas.

The team also paid attention to coverage of news deserts by outlets in neighboring counties. They found high school sports are often a gateway to coverage, pointing to a channel covering southern Illinois high school sports that interviewed the principal in Harrisburg, the seat of Saline County, another news desert county.

In recent years, efforts to “map” local news through different lenses have proliferated. The Independent Journalism Atlas is one such effort, focused on news creators. A better understanding of information sources in news deserts matters, Bank argues, because “you can’t tend a basin you haven’t mapped.”

Read the full essay here.