About Tarrant County Desk

Independent local journalism for the cities, schools, and county government inside the Tarrant County line.

Who we are

Tarrant County Desk is an independent local-news publication covering all of Tarrant County, Texas. We're the second site in the CountyDesk Network, an emerging group of independently-operated county-level news publications across North Texas. Each CountyDesk is its own newsroom with its own editor; we share editorial standards, the same publishing platform, and a commitment to giving 1% of revenue to a county-resident 501(c)(3) every quarter. We do not share reporters or content across counties.

Tarrant County Desk is not affiliated with Tarrant County government, the City of Fort Worth, the City of Arlington, any other municipal government, any school district, or any candidate or political party. When we cover those institutions, we cover them as outside observers and neighbors.

Editorial standards

Our standards are simple, public, and meant to be held to.

  1. Real bylines. Every story has a named human author. No "Staff" or "Newsroom" bylines on opinion or original reporting.
  2. On-the-record by default. We grant background and anonymity only when sources face credible retaliation, and we document the reason internally.
  3. No undisclosed funding. Sponsorships, ads, and donations are listed on this page. If a story involves a sponsor or major donor, we say so in the story.
  4. No quoting from press releases without attribution. If a sentence came from a release, we say "in a written statement."
  5. Public-document originals. When we report on an agenda, ordinance, or court filing, we link directly to the source document.

Ethics policy

  • Reporters do not accept gifts, meals, travel, or comped tickets from subjects of coverage. A $20 limit applies to working coffees and de minimis hospitality.
  • Reporters do not hold elected office, do not work for candidates, and do not write checks to candidates whose offices they cover.
  • Conflicts of interest (family employed at a covered institution, ownership in a covered business, etc.) are disclosed at the top of any affected story, or the story is reassigned.
  • We do not publish unverified single-source claims about identifiable private citizens. Public officials performing public duties are subject to different standards.

Corrections policy

We correct errors quickly and visibly. Corrections appear at the top of the corrected story, dated, with the original wording preserved. Send correction requests to the email below. Substantive corrections are also listed on our public corrections log.

Diversity policy

We seek source lists, advisory voices, and freelance contributors that reflect the demographics of the county we cover. Tarrant County is more than half Hispanic, Black, or Asian American per the 2020 census. Our masthead and source diversity should track that over time, and we publish an annual review of how well we're doing it.

How we're funded

Tarrant County Desk is a for-profit Texas LLC bootstrapped by its operator. Current revenue sources, in order of size:

  1. Local-business sponsorships (listed in the site footer when active)
  2. Reader memberships (when launched)
  3. Affiliate income from explicitly-labeled affiliate links
  4. Grants from journalism-support foundations (when received and disclosed)

We do not currently take advertising from candidates, political action committees, or partisan organizations.

Our 1%-to-community commitment

Each quarter, 1% of net revenue from this site is donated to a Tarrant County–serving 501(c)(3). The current quarter's recipient is:

  • Tarrant Area Food Bank — tafb.org — EIN 75-1785382. TAFB sources and distributes more than 100 million meals a year across 13 North Texas counties from its Fort Worth warehouse.

Past and planned recipients are listed on the giving page once we have more than one cycle in the books.

Contact