On Wednesday, The Maine Monitor received 10 awards, including six first-place accolades, from the National Newspaper Association Foundation, one of the largest newspaper associations in the country.
The newsroom took home the first and second place awards in the investigative/in-depth reporting category. Rose Lundy took the category’s top spot for her investigation into residential care facilities, co-published with ProPublica, that found Maine’s health department rarely investigates when residents wander away. Alexa Foust and Kate Hapgood, meanwhile, earned second place for their reporting, which was supported by the Center for Public Integrity, on thousands of inspection records that showed years of safety violations at child care providers across the state.
An in-depth examination by Emmett Gartner that looked at how Norridgewock — isolated when rivers surged during a December 2023 flooding event — is preparing for the next natural disaster received first place in the local reporting category.
Emily Bader received three awards for her reporting: first place in the localized national story category for her piece that examined how a third of Maine towns still count ballots by hand; second place in a category recognizing newsrooms for coverage of the opioid crisis; and third place in the health category for her story on how a tenth of Maine’s pharmacies have closed in the past decade.
“Stories like this remind readers why newspapers continue to play an important role in their daily lives,” a contest judge wrote about the ballot counting story.
A Maine Monitor analysis by Murray Carpenter of community solar ownership earned first place in the environmental reporting category. Carpenter’s analysis found that developers have bundled community solar projects and then sold them to some of the world’s largest corporations and investment firms.
John O’Meara earned first and third place in the agricultural reporting category. His coverage of meat producers frustrated by backlogs at slaughterhouses received first place while his reporting on a strain of potato developed by the University of Maine earned third place.
A story by Joyce Kryszak that highlighted how Downeast Maine was working to maintain its wild character amid the growth of ecotourism earned first place in the business reporting category.
Established in 1885, the National Newspaper Association Foundation is the educational arm of the National Newspaper Association. Its mission is to promote news literacy, protect the First Amendment and enhance the quality and capabilities of community journalists.
This year’s competition saw more than 700 awards given to 102 newspapers from around the country.
