EXCLUSIVE STORY | Columbia Journalism Review Cites The Fostoria Free Press in a New Report on TiffinOhio.net and Partisan Ohio News Sites

TIFFIN — The Columbia Journalism Review published an investigation today into websites that look like Ohio local news outlets but are run by partisan networks, and it cites The Fostoria Free Press as the outlet that had already reported on who operates TiffinOhio.net.

The review, by Kali Bomeli for CJR’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism, describes many of those sites as examples of what researchers call “pink slime”: partisan content disguised as local journalism. It says TiffinOhio.net is one of six sites run by NorthStar Civic Media, and that Democratic-aligned groups spent more than a million dollars on Facebook ads promoting TiffinOhio stories between early August and Election Day.

CJR says a review of campaign finance and union records found no direct payments to publisher Dylan Poe, NorthStar Civic Media, Tiffin Publishing, or any of its websites. That distinction matters. The Tow Center’s figure is money spent to promote TiffinOhio stories, not a documented payment to the company.

On Oct. 16, The Fostoria Free Press reported that TiffinOhio.net is operated by NorthStar Civic Media LLC, an Illinois company headquartered in Chicago, and that its publisher, Dylan Poe, has a background in Democratic politics. CJR now writes that the Free Press, “whose articles carry the byline ‘FFP Ai Bot,’ appears to be the only site that has published substantial information about NorthStar’s connection to TiffinOhio.”

TiffinOhio.net is a different website from tiffinohio.info. This article is about TiffinOhio.net.

What CJR found about the ad campaign

According to the Tow Center, TiffinOhio.net itself spent about $1,300 on Facebook ads between Aug. 4 and Nov. 2. During the same period, outside groups spent far more promoting its stories. CJR says nearly all of that outside money came from Democratic-aligned groups and campaigns, including Amy Acton’s campaign for governor, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees’ Ohio political fund, the House Majority PAC, and WinSenate, a super PAC funded almost entirely by the Democratic Senate Majority PAC, according to FactCheck.org as cited by CJR.

WinSenate alone, CJR reports, spent between $894,000 and $1.06 million, much of it on ads promoting a TiffinOhio story that connected Sen. Jon Husted to House Bill 6, a 2019 law that added fees to electric bills to bail out nuclear and coal plants. CJR notes that federal prosecutors later found the nuclear plants’ operator had secured passage of the bill with more than $60 million in bribes, that Husted has not been charged in connection with the scheme, and that he has denied involvement.

TiffinOhio.net states on its website that it accepts no money from political parties, committees, candidates, or campaigns, and that it is funded by readers, “limited earned revenue,” and “mission-aligned partners.” It does not name those partners or say how much they contribute. Poe declined to identify them, CJR reports.

In an email to the Tow Center, Poe said “third parties are free to share or promote” NorthStar’s work, and that “advertising expenditures by outside organizations should not be conflated with funding received by NorthStar Civic Media.”

What the Free Press reported first

The Free Press’s October investigation was based on TiffinOhio.net’s terms of service, privacy policy and About page, NorthStar’s website, the Facebook page’s transparency panel, federal campaign finance filings, domain registration records, and earlier news coverage.

The terms of service, effective Sept. 7, 2026, identify the operator as “NorthStar Civic Media LLC, an Illinois limited liability company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.” The site’s privacy policy calls NorthStar its parent company. Facebook’s transparency panel lists NorthStar Civic Media LLC as the organization responsible for the page, which Facebook said was created July 8, 2013.

The Free Press reported that legal notices are directed to 2501 Chatham Road, Suite R, in Springfield, Illinois, the address of a registered-agent service, not a newsroom. CJR, writing later, describes NorthStar’s registered address as “a Chicago apartment.” This article has not independently rechecked that apartment description. The Springfield address and a Chicago registered address could both appear in records; they should not be treated as the same place.

At the time of the October story, the Free Press was unable to retrieve NorthStar’s filing from the Illinois Secretary of State’s business database. CJR reports that in October 2024 Poe formed DJP Holdings LLC in Chicago, that the company was renamed NorthStar Civic Media in March 2025, and that Poe is listed as its only manager and signed every filing the Tow Center reviewed.

The Free Press also reported, citing a 2020 Marion Star account of Poe’s then-public LinkedIn profile, that he had worked for Sen. Sherrod Brown’s 2018 campaign, the Ohio Democratic Party, and President Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign. CJR cites the same Marion Star report. Poe told CJR that his “background in political work is a matter of public record.” In 2020, Tiffin Publishing said it and its staff “do not endorse or coordinate with any candidate or campaign.”

The Free Press further reported three small 2020 ActBlue contributions from a Dylan Poe of Tiffin who listed Tiffin Publishing LLC as his employer: $5 earmarked for Joe Biden’s presidential campaign on March 3, 2020, and $25 each to Georgia Senate candidates Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock on Nov. 8, 2020.

On Oct. 16, the Free Press counted about 65,000 followers on the TiffinOhio Facebook page and wrote that recent posts had focused heavily on Republican candidates. CJR later put the page at about 67,000 followers. The Free Press also found that the Facebook transparency panel showed the page was not running ads on the day of that review. That snapshot is not in conflict with CJR’s later finding of about $1,300 in ads over the August-to-November window.

The October story ended by saying the Free Press had found no reporting by national media watchdogs about NorthStar or its sites. Today’s CJR investigation is that national reporting.

Poe’s response, and the ‘pink slime’ label

CJR says the NorthStar network “shares several traits of pink slime”: generic local names, nearly identical content across sites, a pre-election expansion, staff reporters who could not be identified, undisclosed funding, and heavy promotion by political groups.

Poe denied that TiffinOhio is pink slime, saying the site has “proudly served Tiffin, Seneca County, and other Northwest Ohio communities for over ten years.” He pointed instead to sites such as Buckeye Bulletin and Ohio Pulse as “actual ‘pink slime’ websites.” He also said NorthStar “proudly operates a network of freely accessible news websites” and that “our work should be evaluated on its factual accuracy, sourcing, and public-interest value.”

CJR reports that TiffinOhio consists mostly of stories republished from established newsrooms, and that its original articles are largely critical of Republicans, including Ramaswamy, Husted, Merrin, and Rep. Gary Click, and are credited either to Poe or to four staff reporters whose identities Tow Center researchers could not independently verify. Asked about those reporters, Poe said they are “real people,” and that “the absence of publicly available photographs or professional profiles should not be interpreted as evidence that these individuals do not exist.” CJR says he did not answer a question about whether any of their work is produced with AI tools.

CJR also reports that, after its inquiry, States Newsroom and the Ohio Capital Journal said they had not agreed to be listed on TiffinOhio’s author page and asked that their journalists be removed. By Nov. 11, CJR says, the author page had been taken down. Poe said the site’s content-management system had “automatically added the authors,” and that NorthStar had “never claimed a partnership or arrangement with States Newsroom beyond their standard republishing permissions.”

A wider, bipartisan landscape in Ohio

The Tow Center says TiffinOhio.net and the Buckeye Bulletin are two of more than 60 websites that look like Ohio local news outlets but are run by partisan networks. The Los Angeles Times, CJR notes, later connected Buckeye Bulletin to the Lincoln Media Foundation, a nonprofit affiliated with the Lincoln Club, which the Times described as “the oldest and largest conservative donor organization in California.”

CJR also points to Metric Media, a conservative network tied to Brian Timpone, which it says publishes at least 52 Ohio-branded sites, and to Ohio Pulse, which it says is funded by the Senate Leadership Fund, a Republican super PAC, and spent more than $500,000 on Meta ads between early August and Election Day.

A separate Tow Center investigation, published Feb. 5, 2026, examined how Metric Media used thousands of public-records requests. That article does not mention TiffinOhio.net, NorthStar, or the Free Press. It is noted here only as additional CJR context on partisan networks that present themselves as local news.

NorthStar’s other sites, as listed by both the Free Press and CJR, are Seneca Live, the Toledo Ledger, the Cleveland Monitor, Columbus Wire, and Cincy Current. CJR says domains for the Cleveland, Columbus, and Toledo sites were registered Aug. 21, 2026, and the Cincinnati domain two days later, roughly 10 weeks before the midterms. The Free Press, working from UTC dates in domain records, had reported Aug. 22 and 23. Converted to Eastern Time, the public registration timestamps fall on the evening of Aug. 21 for the three northern and central Ohio sites and on Aug. 23 for the Cincinnati site.

The Fostoria Free Press is an independent news outlet that also covers Seneca County.

Sources

• Kali Bomeli, “Ohio Midterms Prove ‘Pink Slime’ News Is Bipartisan,” Columbia Journalism Review, Nov. 12, 2026: https://www.cjr.org/tow_center/ohio-midterms-prove-pink-slime-news-is-bipartisan.php
• Miranda Green, “How ‘Pink Slime’ Publishers Are Weaponizing FOIA,” Columbia Journalism Review, Feb. 5, 2026: https://www.cjr.org/tow_center/pink-slime-networks-are-weaponizing-foia.php
• The Fostoria Free Press, “TIFFIN | Who Runs TiffinOhio.net? Popular Local News Page Is Operated by a Chicago-Based Company Whose Publisher Has Democratic Campaign Ties,” Oct. 16, 2026: https://thefostoriafreepress.com/tiffin-who-runs-tiffinohio-net-popular-local-news-page-is-operated-by-a-chicago-based-company-whose-publisher-has-democratic-campaign-ties/