BEFORE YOU GO, consider: If not for the article you just read, would the information in it be public? I started working at New York Focus in 2022, not long after the outlet launched. Only a handful of journalists do this type of work in New York. In the last decades, the number of local news outlets in the state has nearly halved, making our coverage all the more critical. Our criminal justice reporting has been cited in lawsuits, spurred legislation, and led to the rescission of statewide policies.