Arts & Culture Reporter

CityBeat is looking for an Arts & Culture Reporter to help us cover the people, places and creative forces shaping the Cincinnati region's cultural landscape. This role tells the stories that bring our community to life - arts, theater, food, nightlife, subcultures, and community identity. 

Salary: $40,000-$45,000 per year, plus benefits 

What We Expect from You:

• Report and write timely, compelling stories on arts, culture, entertainment, and community life in the Cincinnati metro, with emphasis on the urban core. Two briefs and one byline are expected daily, along with longer-form print stories as assigned. 
• Identify and pursue enterprise stories exploring deeper cultural trends, creative movements, and the people shaping the region.
• Cover a wide variety of beats, including theater, music, restaurants/bars, festivals, nightlife, public art, local makers, and emerging cultural scenes.
• Develop deep community relationships with artists, venues, cultural leaders, performers, organizers, and neighborhood stakeholders.
• Break news on cultural developments—openings, closings, controversies, announcements, and creative milestones.
• Contribute to multimedia storytelling through video, audio/podcasts, social content, and strong visuals in partnership with the digital team.
• Collaborate closely with editors to plan coverage, pitch creative ideas, and ensure representation of diverse voices and communities.
• Attend and cover events, including some evenings and weekends (gallery openings, concerts, festivals, community gatherings).
• Use audience analytics to shape coverage that resonates and grows engagement.

Skills We Need You to Have:

• Experience reporting on arts, culture, entertainment, lifestyle, or community topics (professional, freelance, or collegiate).
• Strong writing, interviewing, and storytelling skills—especially capturing scene, voice, and atmosphere.
• Familiarity with the Cincinnati creative community or deep curiosity to dive in.
• Ability to balance quick-turn daily content with longer-form enterprise work.
• Comfort working across platforms—digital, social, and print.
• Strong collaboration, communication, and deadline management.
• Flexibility for event-based coverage outside regular business hours.

What You Can Expect from Us:

• Full benefits package - medical, dental, vision and life
• PTO and paid holidays
• All the equipment you need to do your job
• Training and support on CityBeat's internal style and our culture
• A giant newsroom full of tiny desks in beautiful downtown Covington, KY

You'll Need to Share Our Mission and Uphold Our Guiding Principles

Mission: LINK Media (CityBeat's parent company) strengthens vibrant communities through independent, sustainable local journalism. 

Guiding Principles:

We are:

Solutions-Focused: We don’t just report the news of the day. We dig deeper, informing our audience about how our community might solve its biggest issues. 

Unapologetic Community Fans: We believe in this community—in what it is today, and what it has the potential to become. We want to see this community advance, and we understand the part that we play in that advancement. 

Inclusive: We explore the issues that affect all of our readers, and give a voice to all segments of our diverse community.

Good Stewards: It is our responsibility to make good use of our resources and to maintain a sustainable business model, so that we may serve the community long into the future.  

Independent: The publication does not make endorsements, and has a commitment to fact-based reporting about the issues that are facing our community. In addition to our reporting, outside opinions from multiple viewpoints will be sought, and clearly marked as such, in order to provide the robust debate that our community needs to make critical decisions about our collective future.