The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette announced Tuesday morning that it was acquired by a nonprofit and will no longer shut down in May.
Block Communications, Inc., which has owned the Post-Gazette for nearly a century, is selling the paper to the Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism, publisher of the Baltimore Banner. The sale is effective May 4, the day after the Post-Gazette was scheduled to cease publication.
Near the start of 2026, Block Communications announced they were shutting down two of their subsidiaries — the Post-Gazette and Pittsburgh City Paper — following a national trend of newspaper closures.
In response, members of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh, local community representatives and labor leaders announced the creation of the Pittsburgh Alliance for People-Empowered Reporting, a coalition with the goals of researching media alternatives to the Post-Gazette and highlighting underrepresented local communities.
On March 19, Pittsburgh City Paper announced that it had been purchased by LocalMatters, a new nonprofit dedicated to ensuring the long-term sustainability of local newspapers, and would resume publication after shutting down in December.
In a press release from the News Guild, Andrew Goldstein, president of the News Guild of Pittsburgh, said the Post-Gazette staying open is “a win for Pittsburgh.” Stewart Bainum Jr., founder of the Venetoulis Institute, indicated that the Post-Gazette newsroom would need to be smaller moving forward.
“The community has made it clear over the past several months that it wants a newspaper that serves the needs of the people,” Goldstein said in the press release. “That requires a robust staff that has the freedom to pursue the truth under dignified working conditions.”