{"id":4697,"date":"2014-08-28T11:00:52","date_gmt":"2014-08-28T16:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.robertfeder.com\/?p=4697"},"modified":"2014-08-28T12:42:50","modified_gmt":"2014-08-28T17:42:50","slug":"grant-helps-insure-tribunes-obamacare-reporting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/2014\/08\/28\/grant-helps-insure-tribunes-obamacare-reporting\/","title":{"rendered":"Grant helps insure Tribune\u2019s coverage of Obamacare"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Wes<\/a>

<\/a> Wes Venteicher<\/p><\/div>\n

A $30,000 grant from a private foundation focused on health care issues is helping defray the salary of a Chicago Tribune<\/a> reporter covering Obamacare.<\/p>\n

Wes Venteicher, who\u2019d been a TribLocal suburban reporter since June 2013, recently shifted to the Chicago Tribune consumer watchdog and investigative reporting team\u00a0as a full-time reporter covering the Affordable Care Act and consumer health issues \u2014 a new position funded in part by Kaiser Health News.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Tribune is one of at least six major newspapers across the country to receive funding from the nonprofit news organization, which is tied to the Kaiser Family Foundation <\/a>and says it is \u201cdedicated to filling the need for trusted information on national health issues.\"<\/p>\n

\"Gerry<\/a>

Gerry Kern<\/p><\/div>\n

News of Venteicher\u2019s assignment was first reported by the\u00a0Chicago Radio and Media<\/a>\u00a0blog, which inaccurately stated that \u201ca government grant is supposedly helping to pay\u201d for the position. Chicago Tribune editor Gerry Kern said there is no government funding involved.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe $30,000 originates with the Kaiser Family Foundation and comes to the Tribune via an arrangement between Kaiser Health News and various news organizations across the country,\u201d Kern told me Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cStories are controlled solely by the Chicago Tribune, which assigns, edits and determines their news play,\" Kern said. \"Neither the foundation nor the news organization assigns, edits or otherwise controls the news stories Chicago Tribune produces as part of this arrangement. We label each story with this tagline: \u2018This story was produced in partnership with\u00a0Kaiser\u00a0Health\u00a0News, an editorially independent program of the\u00a0Kaiser\u00a0Family Foundation.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Kern noted that other newspapers receiving similar funding from Kaiser\u00a0Health\u00a0News this year include the Miami Herald, Philadelphia Inquirer, Seattle Times, Atlanta Journal Constitution and St. Louis Post-Dispatch.<\/p>\n

In addition to Venteicher\u2019s role, coverage of the Affordable Care Act and related health topics also is handled by business reporter Peter Frost and Washington bureau reporter Noam Levey, among other Tribune staffers, Kern said.<\/p>\n

The Kaiser Family Foundation calls itself \u201ca non-partisan source of facts, analysis and journalism for policymakers, the media, the health policy community and the public\u201d and says it \u201ctakes no position on the ACA or other law or proposal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kaiser Health News, which employs its own reporters and editors who produce stories for its website<\/a> and in conjunction with other newspapers, receives no government funding. Neither Kaiser Health News nor the Kaiser Family Foundation is affiliated with the health insurance company Kaiser Permanente.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A $30,000 grant from a private foundation focused on health care issues is helping defray the salary of a Chicago Tribune reporter covering Obamacare. Wes Venteicher, who\u2019d been a TribLocal suburban reporter since June 2013, recently shifted to the Chicago Tribune consumer watchdog and investigative reporting team\u00a0as a full-time reporter covering the Affordable Care Act... Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4697"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4697"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4703,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4697\/revisions\/4703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}