Three reporting projects published by The Maine Monitor were honored March 23 by the New England Newspaper & Press Association during the organization’s annual Better Newspaper Competition.
Journalists from Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine and Rhode Island vie for awards in the NENPA contest. The Monitor mostly competed the online-only division alongside newsrooms such as CT Mirror, VTDigger and Granite State News Collaborative, except in the investigative reporting category where it competed alongside online-only newsrooms and daily newspapers such as the Sun Journal, Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel.
“The Unstoppable Ocean”
An examination of how sea level rise is affecting 10 coastal Maine communities by Kate Cough and aerial photographer Alex McLean tied for first place in the climate change and weather reporting category.
The ocean has been slowly rising for centuries. But it is the pace that is now alarming, particularly when combined with storms that are more frequent and more intense. High tide flooding is between four and 10 times more frequent than 50 years ago.
A single foot of sea level rise (which scientists say will likely happen within the next three decades) will bring 10 times more frequent nuisance flooding and coastal storm impacts, according to the Maine Climate Council.
The project received support from the Pulitzer Center and was co-published by Down East.
“Maine’s Part-Time Court”
An investigation by Samantha Hogan into Maine’s probate court system earned second place in the investigative and enterprise reporting category.
Hogan spent a year investigating Maine’s probate courts and uncovered that eight incapacitated adults under public guardianship of the state died during the past three years, and that authorities don’t know exactly how.
That news prompted an immediate outcry from state lawmakers for better oversight of guardians and renewed calls for reform to the probate courts that have long been overlooked, despite serving thousands of Mainers.
Additionally, Hogan uncovered that millions of dollars in estates of aging or deceased Mainers are at risk of pilfering from shady lawyers and caretakers, and that young adults with intellectual or developmental disabilities are sometimes appointed guardians without a lawyer advocating on their behalf for less restrictive alternatives.
Hogan’s investigation revealed the probate courts set up to oversee guardianships and estates are so antiquated and understaffed they do not know how many guardianships the state has — much less how to institute a systematic approach that would prevent fraud and abuse.
The series received support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism, the Investigative Editing Corps, and Report for America.
“A Death of Choice”
A feature story on how a Maine woman, who believed people should control their own deaths, lived to define her own ending while facing terminal cancer earned second place in the health reporting category.
Karen Wentworth only expected to live for a few months, but she hung on for two more years, having a grandchild along the way — providing Caitlin Andrews and photojournalist Troy R. Bennett a window into her joys and struggles.
Wentworth was the second person in the state to get a prescription under Maine’s 2019 death with dignity law. The story was co-published with the Bangor Daily News.
