PRELIMINARY SPEAKERSSPEAKERS LISTLIST

Helena BengtssonBengtsson,, JenniferJennifer LaFleurLaFleur,, TheThe CenterCenter forfor PublicPublic IntegrityIntegrity TheThe DDallasallas MorningMorning NewsNews Robert BenincasaBenincasa,, GGannettannett NewsNews ServiceService Daniel LaLathropthrop,, SSeattleeattle Post-IntelligencerPost-Intelligencer Megan ClarkClarkee,, AndrewAndrew LehrenLehren,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes TheThe AtlantaAtlanta Journal-Journal-ConstitutionConstitution David MillironMilliron,, SarahSarah CohenCohen,, TheThe WWashingtonashington PostPost TheThe AtlantaAtlanta Journal-Journal-ConstitutionConstitution Chase DaDavisvis,, Houston ChrChronicleonicle Ron NixNixonon,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes Dave DavisDavis,, TheThe ((Cleveland)Cleveland) PlainPlain DDealerealer Paul OverbergOverberg,, UUSASA TodayToday SteveSteve DoigDoig,, ArizArizonaona StateState UniversityUniversity AronAron PilhoferPilhofer,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes David DonaldDonald,, IREIRE andand NICARNICAR JeffJeff PorterPorter,, IREIRE andand NICARNICAR JaimiJaimi DoDowdellwdell,, St.St. LLouisouis Post-DispatchPost-Dispatch AAdamdam ClaytonClayton PowellPowell IIIIII,, Carolyn EddsEdds,, St.St. PPetersburgetersburg (F(Fla.)la.) TTimesimes USCUSC AnnenberAnnenbergg SchoolSchool forfor CommunicationCommunication Alletta EmenoEmeno,, TheThe PhiladelphiaPhiladelphia InquirInquirerer JanetJanet RoberRobertsts,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes Matthew EricsonEricson,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes Adam SymsonSymson,, Robert GebeloffGebeloff ,, E.WE.W.. ScrippsScripps BroadcastBroadcast GroupGroup TheThe (Newark(Newark,, N.J.)N.J.) StarStar-Ledger-Ledger Maurice TammanTamman,, JasonJason GrGrottootto,, TheThe MMiamiiami HeraldHerald SSarasotaarasota (F(Fla.)la.) HerHerald-Tribuneald-Tribune Doug HaddixHaddix,, TheThe CColumbusolumbus DispatchDispatch TomTom TorokTorok,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes Brian HammanHamman,, CColumbiaolumbia MissourianMissourian JodiJodi UptUptonon,, UUSASA TodayToday David HerzogHerzog,, Matthew WaiteWaite,, St.St. PPetersburgetersburg (F(Fla.)la.) TiTimesmes MMissouriissouri SchoolSchool ofof JournalismJournalism MaryJo WebsterWebster,, AAdriandrian HolovatyHolovaty,, TheThe WWashingtonashington PostPost SSaintaint PaulPaul (M(Minn.)inn.) PioneerPioneer PressPress Brant HoustonHouston,, IREIRE andand NICARNICAR JamesJames WWilkersonilkerson,, TheThe NewNew YYorkork TimesTimes DaDavidvid KnoxKnox,, AkAkronron BeaconBeacon JournalJournal Derek WillisWillis,, TheThe WWashingtonashington PostPost

PRELIMINARY PANELPANEL LISTLIST Watch www.ire.orgwww.ire.org forfor updates.updates. (Please(Please notnotee thatthat titlestitles andand panelpanel ttopicsopics maymay bebe changedchanged inin thethe fifi nalnal programprogram schedule.)schedule.)

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ABOUT THE COVER NRG Energy Inc. of Princeton, N.J. received a $22 million property tax break in 2003 as a participant in New York’s Empire Zone program, which is designed to help businesses create new jobs. Cover Story Pages 20-33 Cover photo by Gary Walts, The Post-Standard

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 3 FEATURES

THE IRE JOURNAL FROM THE IRE OFFICES

VOLUME 30 ❘ NUMBER 1

MANAGING EDITOR Anita Bruzzese IRE promotes training PUBLICATIONS COORDINATOR Megan Means for ethnic media ART DIRECTOR BRANT HOUSTON Wendy Gray

SENIOR CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Steve Weinberg t’s estimated that they serve 50 million readers and viewers. Their journalists are passionate, I optimistic and deeply connected to the community. The issues they cover include injustice, CONTRIBUTING LEGAL EDITOR housing and fraud, and they are not afraid to advocate for change. Their circulation and markets David Smallman are increasing – sometimes exponentially. While we once might have assumed this to be only the description of the mainstream media EDITORIAL ASSOCIATES in the United States, it actually is the story of ethnic media newsrooms, both large and small, Kate Rainey, Shannon Burke in this country. Some 700 of these organizations belong to New America Media, (www.newamericamedia.org) a coalition envisioned and started by Sandy Close, the founder of Pacifi c Radio and winner of a IRE MacArthur Fellowship (also known as the “genius grant”) in the mid-1990s. New America Media, or NAM, is the country’s fi rst and largest national collaboration of IRE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR ethnic news organizations. Close founded NAM under her nonprofi t news service – Pacifi c News Brant Houston – in 1996 in California. BOARD OF DIRECTORS As NAM states on its Web site, its “goal is to promote the editorial visibility and economic viability of this critical sector of American journalism as a way to build inclusive public discourse PRESIDENT in our increasingly diverse, global society.” It also serves as a bridge to foundations and corpora- James V. Grimaldi, The Washington Post tions that are trying to fi gure out how to connect to communities of new citizens and immigrants who speak languages other than English. VICE PRESIDENT In its 10th year, NAM recently held a conference and its fi rst national awards ceremony in Cheryl Phillips, The Seattle Times Washington, D.C. Investigative reporting award winners included journalists from Tu Ciudad (Los Angeles, Calif.), India-West (San Leandro, Calif.), The Indian Express (New York, N.Y.), TREASURER El Diario/La Prensa (New York, N.Y.) and Chinese Media Net Inc./Duowei Times (Bayside, Dianna Hunt, Fort Worth Star-Telegram N.Y.). SECRETARY As part of the awards recognition, the organizers called all the fi nalists in all categories to the Stephen C. Miller, The New York Times stage, and it was an epiphany: There stood the diversity and connection to communities that the mainstream media has been seeking for decades. David Boardman, The Seattle Times At the conference, IRE conducted a watchdog journalism panel. More than 40 journalists attended, representing bilingual newsrooms serving communities speaking Korean, Mandarin, Wendell Cochran, American University Spanish and other languages. We talked about standards, methodology, resources and, of course, Renee Ferguson, WMAQ-Chicago investigative stories. We answered questions. We offered ideas, and we got ideas. It was the fi rst Manny Garcia, The Miami Herald time we had collaborated with NAM, and it was an indisputable success. Mark Katches, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel As IRE moves forward into 2007, we are about to launch a series of Watchdog Workshops in Duane Pohlman, WEWS-Cleveland collaboration with NAM. The fi rst will be Feb. 17-18 at the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum Lea Thompson, NBC in Chicago. These Watchdog Workshops will follow the long-time model of IRE with sessions ranging from cultivating sources to using the Freedom of Information Act to following document Nancy Stancill, The Charlotte Observer and database trails. We will make sure to cover relevant topics such as immigration, injustice Duff Wilson, The New York Times and housing. Helping us launch this program is the McCormick Tribune Foundation, which a decade ago The IRE Journal (ISSN0164-7016) is published supported our initiative in Mexico and the rest of Latin America. six times a year by Investigative Reporters and While some of NAM’s advocacy programs may diverge from the priorities and practices of Editors, Inc. 138 Neff Annex, Missouri School of mainstream media, the potential of this collaboration is limitless for both IRE and NAM. Journalism, Columbia, MO 65211, 573-882-2042. We have much to learn from each other. IRE can share skills and knowledge built up over E-mail: [email protected]. U.S. subscriptions are $70 for individuals, $85 for libraries and $125 the past three decades. NAM can provide gateways to communities and stories often missed by for institutions/businesses. International sub- mainstream media,and new colleagues who bring fresh ideas and a reminder of the crucial public scriptions are $90 for individuals and $150 for service role that newsrooms should play in society. all others. Periodical postage paid at Columbia, This collaboration will bring diversity and enthusiasm to IRE membership ranks that we know MO. Postmaster: Please send address changes to IRE. USPS #451-670 we need to continue to be a vibrant, valuable and forward-looking organization. Brant Houston is executive director of IRE and the National Institute for Computer-Assisted © 2007 Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. Reporting. He can be reached through e-mail at [email protected] or by calling 573-882-2042.

4 THE IRE JOURNAL IFEATURES R E N E W S

IRE Board vacancy Ethnic media workshop MEMBER NEWS fi lled by Thompson kicks off in Chicago The IRE Board of Directors voted unanimously IRE will hold its pilot Ethnic Media Workshop ert Dalmer has joined the state of Iowa’s to appoint Lea Thompson, NBC’s chief consumer Feb. 17-18 at the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum B Offi ce of Citizens’ Aide/Ombudsman, where correspondent, to serve out the remaining 2006-07 in Chicago. This will be the fi rst event in a new IRE he will investigate citizen complaints regarding term of departing board member Deborah Sher- training series for ethnic newsroom media. man. According to New America Media (NAM), ethnic state and local government and adverse actions Sherman, an investigative reporter at KUSA- media are the fastest growing part of American jour- taken against whistleblowers. He worked at The Denver, resigned in October for medical and family nalism. IRE will collaborate with NAM, an organiza- Des Moines Register. ■ Clif Dunn is now a seg- reasons. She was fi rst elected to the Board of Direc- tion of more than 700 ethnic news groups, to produce ment producer at “Dailies” on the ReelzChannel tors in 2004 and has been an active fundraiser and the workshops and will work with other minority advocate for IRE’s broadcast members. organizations, including the National Association of network. He worked for ESPN Hollywood and “While the board is saddened to see Deb step Hispanic Journalists and the National Association of Bauer Publications. ■ The Bangor (Maine) Daily down from the board, we certainly understand that Black Journalists. News team, including Misty Edgecomb and Greg family comes fi rst, and we wish her well,” said James The Ethnic Media series will cover how to do won fi rst place in the small market Grimaldi, IRE board president. investigative and enterprise reporting quickly and McManus, Thompson, a long-time IRE member, has worked effectively. It will take successful sessions from reporting division from the Society of Environ- in the NBC system throughout her professional IRE’s Watchdog training program and focus on mental Journalists for “Our Changing World.” career, starting at WRC-Washington, D.C., and specifi c issues relevant to ethnic newsrooms, such as ■ Aaron Kessler has joined The (Charlottesville, moving to Dateline and NBC News in 1992. She immigration, homeland security, social injustice and primarily covers consumer, environmental, health workplace safety. Va.) Daily Progress. He was deputy director at and safety issues. Her investigative work was the The fi rst workshop will include sessions on using the Virginia Public Access Project, a campaign driving force behind three acts of Congress and has open-records laws and computer-assisted reporting. finance watchdog group in Richmond, Va. initiated more than two dozen congressional and Professional journalists will demonstrate how to fi nd ■ Bill Marimow is the new editor at The Philadel- governmental agency hearings. relevant documents, data- Thompson has won two IRE Awards, along with bases and sources. phia Inquirer. He was a reporter at the Inquirer from numerous honors as a fi nalist in the IRE awards. The workshop is 1972 until 1993, winning two Pulitzer Prizes, and She also has received several Peabody, Polk, funded by the McCor- most recently worked at National Public Radio. Edward R. Murrow and Emmy awards, the Gerald mick Tribune Foundation. ■ , Kendall Cross and Shawn Quinlan Loeb Award from the UCLA Anderson School of For more information, Jim Parsons Management and an Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia visit www.ire.org/train- of WTAE-Pittsburgh won a television reporting University Award. ing/ethnicmediaws. award from the Society of Environmental Jour- “The board is delighted to have someone of the nalists for “Toxic Treatment.” ■ John Sherman caliber of Lea Thompson on the board,” Grimaldi Cleveland conference and Beau Kershaw of WBAL-Baltimore won a tele- said. “Always a popular speaker at our conferences, offers CAR training Lea has deep roots as a long-time IRE member and The leaders in the fi eld of computer-assisted vision reporting award from the Society of Envi- winner of IRE awards.” reporting will gather for IRE’s 2007 CAR Confer- ronmental Journalists for “Dirty Secret,” about a ence on March 8-11 in downtown Cleveland’s composting facility polluting Chesapeake Bay. IRE provides CAR training for Renaissance Cleveland Hotel. ■ Jeff South, an associate professor of journal- Chinese students, journalists Attendees should reserve a hotel room early to IRE and NICAR training director David Donald be guaranteed a spot in the conference room block. ism at Virginia Commonwealth University, was recently completed eight days of hands-on computer- The reservation deadline is February 9 to receive the awarded a Knight International Press Fellowship assisted reporting training for Chinese journalists at discounted rate of $119 per night, plus tax. Hotel infor- for 2007. He will spend six months in Ukraine Shantou University in Guangdong Province. mation, registration and preliminary program details teaching media skills, including computer- Donald gave a presentation on the uses of CAR to can be found at www.ire.org/ training/cleveland07. about 70 undergraduate students at Shantou. He held Panels and classes will emphasize the daily use assisted reporting, to journalists and educators. training classes for fi ve journalists and fi ve graduate of CAR for beginner, intermediate and advanced ■ Matt Waite and Craig Pittman of the St. Peters- students who received fellowships from the univer- users in every medium of journalism. burg (Fla.) Times won the Kevin Carmody Award sity and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund to pursue The program will include hands-on classes, spe- stories on environmental problems in China. cial sessions for editors and educators, in addition to for investigative reporting from the Society of He also attended an environmental reporting panels on the uses of wikis and blogs in investiga- Environmental Journalists for “Vanishing Wet- conference in Guangzhou, where he discussed how tions, how to present stories on the Web, interactive lands,” an investigation into Florida’s disappear- U.S. reporters have used CAR for in-depth reporting maps, newsroom intranets, social network analy- ing wetlands. ■ Henry Weinstein won the 2006 on pollution. sis and using open records Donald says Chinese reporters and students are laws to get data. IRE John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journal- eager to develop more analytical skills. Although will invite experts in ism, which recognizes long-term quality reporting. data acquisition can be more challenging than what social research meth- He has worked at the Los Angeles Times since 1978. Western journalists face, the reporters and students ods, surveys, statis- found a surprising amount of data already posted on tics, Census data and Send Member News items to Megan Means at the Web, he said. other topics, too. [email protected] and include a phone number for verifi cation.

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 5 BOOKSFEATURES

tors across the United States. That book, “Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids BOOKS OF 2006 Scandal That Rocked Professional Sports” (The IRE Journal July/Aug. 2006), is based on superb Investigative authors probe variety of issues reporting from public and private sources. The authors, Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance ranging from military operations to tainted food Williams of the San Francisco Chronicle, are facing incarceration ordered by a judge unless they BY STEVE WEINBERG reveal the source of grand jury information. IRE THE IRE JOURNAL and other journalism organizations have protested the judge’s ruling. The content of the book is important beyond its implications for Major League Baseball star espite marketplace demands and pressures for • Environmental degradation and energy deple- Barry Bonds. Performance-enhancing substances D higher profi ts by some publishers, there was tion are fi ltering down to high school athletics and an outpouring of books by investigative journalists • U.S. political campaigning and corruption perhaps even pre-high school competitions. Their appearing in stores. Unlike years past, however, • The failures of U.S. health care abuse raises moral, health and legal issues for these books tended to cluster into a relatively small • Corporate practices, especially those used by youngsters as well as professional athletes. Beyond number of categories, ranging from U.S. military Wal-Mart serving as a real-world textbook for investigative operations in Iraq and Afghanistan to China as • Flaws in the criminal justice system leading to reporting, “Game of Shadows” serves as a reminder a political and commercial power to tainted and wrongful convictions that journalists must be allowed to perform their unhealthy foods. Other subjects showing popularity • Continuing traumas from Hurricane Katrina jobs without interference from prosecutors and as investigative topics include: • Media criticism judges. • World and domestic religious fundamentalism While many of the books published during • Confl ict in the Middle East 2006 are important – and all those on the annual Steve Weinberg is senior contributing editor to • The failures of intelligence gathering at the CIA, IRE Journal list are worthy – one needs emphasis The IRE Journal and a former executive director NSA and FBI because of its implications for reporters and edi- of IRE. INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

very year, Steve Weinberg does his best to compile this exclusive list • Benson, Michael • Bianco, Anthony for The IRE Journal. It consists of books of investigative or explana- Betrayal in Blood: The Murder The Bully of Bentonville: How the E of Tabitha Bryant High Cost of Wal-Mart’s Everyday tory journalism, broadly defi ned, published for the fi rst time during (Pinnacle) Low Prices Is Hurting America 2006 in the United States in English. The list is limited to authors who (Doubleday) work as journalists for American media outlets, and who are trying to • Bergen, Peter L. The Osama bin Laden I Know: An • Biank, Tanya reach general audiences through retail bookstore sales. If you know of Oral History of al Qaeda’s Leader Under the Sabers: The Unwritten a book unintentionally omitted from this list, please send an e-mail to (Free Press) Code of Army Wives (St. Martin’s) [email protected]. • Berlinski, Claire • Black, Edwin Menace in Europe: A • Barnes, Fred Why the Continent’s Crisis Internal Combustion: How • Anderson, Chris Rebel in Chief: Inside the Bold is America’s, Too Corporations and Governments The Long Tail: Why the Future of and Controversial Presidency of (Crown) Addicted the World to Oil and Business Is Selling Less of More George W. Bush Derailed the Alternatives (Hyperion) (Crown) (St. Martin’s)

• Ashworth, William • Bawer, Bruce • Blehm, Eric Ogallala Blue: Water and Life While Europe Slept: The Last Season on the High Plains How Radical Islam Is Destroying (HarperCollins) (Norton) the West From Within • Bleifuss, Joel, and Steve Freeman (Doubleday) Was the 2004 Presidential Election B Stolen?: Exit Polls, Election Fraud • Ballard, Chris • Beaujon, Andrew and the Offi cial Count The Butterfl y Hunter: Adventures Body Piercing Changed My Life: (Seven Stories Press) of People Who Found Their True Inside the Phenomenon of Christian Calling Way Off the Beaten Path Rock • Blumenthal, Sidney (Broadway) (Da Capo/Perseus) How Bush Rules: Chronicles of a Radical Regime • Bamberger, Michael • Beinart, Peter (Princeton University Press) The Man Who Heard Voices: The Good Fight: Why Liberals – Or, How M. Night Shyamalan Risked and Only Liberals – Can Win the War • Boehlert, Eric His Career on a Fairy Tale on Terror and Make America Great Lapdogs: How the Press (Gotham) Again Rolled Over for Bush (HarperCollins) (Free Press)

6 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURESBOOKSBOOKS INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

• Boss, Shira • Connelly, Michael E • Farrell, Greg Green With Envy Crime Beat: A Decade of • Earley, Pete Corporate Crooks: How Rogue (Warner Business) Covering Cops and Killers Crazy: A Father’s Search Through Executives Ripped Off Americans … (Little, Brown) America’s Mental Health Madness and Congress Helped Them Do It • Bowden, Mark (Putnam) (Prometheus) Guests of the Ayatollah: • Continetti, Matthew The First Battle in America’s War The K Street Gang: • Finkbeiner, Ann With Militant Islam The Rise and Fall of the The Jasons: The Secret Society of (Atlantic Monthly Press) Republican Machine Science’s Postwar Elite (Doubleday) (Viking) • Briggs, Kenneth Double Crossed: Uncovering • Cooper, Anderson • Fischer, Mary A. the Catholic Church’s Betrayal Dispatches From the Edge: Stealing Love: Confessions of a of American Nuns A Memoir of War, Disasters, Dognapper – A Memoir (Doubleday) and Survival (Crown) (HarperCollins) • Burnett, John F. • Fishman, Charles Uncivilized Beasts and • Cooper, Christopher, and Robert The Wal-Mart Effect: How the Shameless Hellions: Travels Block World’s Most Powerful Company with an NPR Correspondent Disaster: Hurricane Katrina and Really Works – and How It’s Trans- (Rodale) the Failure of Homeland Security forming the American Economy (Times Books) (Penguin Press) C • Carlin, Peter Ames • Cuadros, Paul • Fitch, Robert Catch a Wave: The Rise, Fall A Home on the Field: How One Solidarity for Sale: How Corruption and Redemption of the Beach Championship Team Inspires Destroyed the Labor Movement Boys’ Brian Wilson Hope for the Revival of Small • Edsall, Thomas B. and Undermined America’s Promise (Rodale) Town America Building Red America: The New (Public Affairs) (Rayo) Conservative Coalition and the • Carlo, Philip Drive for Permanent Power • Fitzgerald, Randall The Iceman: Confessions • Cullen, Lisa Takeuchi (Basic Books) The Hundred-Year Lie: of a Mafia Contract Killer Remember Me: A Lively Tour of How Food and Medicine Are (St. Martin’s) the New American Way of Death • Eilperen, Juliet Destroying Your Health (Collins) Fight Club Politics: (Dutton) • Carpenter, Amanda B. How Partisanship Is Poisoning The Vast Right-Wing Conspira- D the House of Representatives • Fleeman, Michael cy’s Dossier on Hillary Clinton • Dadge, David (Rowman & Littlefi eld) The Offi cer’s Wife (Regnery) The War in Iraq and Why the (St. Martin’s) Media Failed Us • El-Faizy, Monique • Carr, Howie (Praeger) God and Country: • Fletcher, Connie The Brothers Bulger: How They How Evangelicals Have Become Every Contact Leaves a Trace: Terrorized and Corrupted Boston • Delsohn, Steve, and Mark Heisler America’s New Mainstream Crime Scene Investigators Talk for a Quarter Century Bob Knight: The Unauthorized (Bloomsbury) About Their Work, from Discovery (Warner) Biography through Verdict (Pocket) • Englert, Jonathan (St. Martin’s) • Carter, Bill The Collar: A Year of Striving and Desperate Networks: Starring • DeStefano, Anthony M. Faith Inside a Catholic Seminary • Fox, Cynthia Katie Couric, Les Moonves, The Last Godfather (Houghton Miffl in) Cell of Cells: The Global Race to Simon Cowell, Dan Rather, Jeff (Citadel) Capture and Control the Stem Cell Zucker, Teri Hatcher, Conan F (Norton) O’Brien, Donald Trump and a • DeYoung, Karen • Fagone, Jason Host of Other Movers and Shak- Soldier: The Life of Colin Powell Horsemen of the Esophagus: ers Who Changed the Face of (Knopf) Competitive Eating and the Primetime TV Big Fat American Dream (Doubleday) • Dornstein, Ken (Crown) The Boy Who Fell Out of the Sky: • Cassidy, Tina A True Story • Fainaru-Wada, Mark, and Lance Wil- Birth: The Surprising History (Random House) liams of How We Are Born (Atlantic Monthly Press) Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, • D’Orso, Michael BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal Eagle Blue: A Team, a Tribe, and a • Chandrasekaran, Rajiv That Rocked Professional Sports High School Basketball Season in (Gotham) Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Arctic Alaska Inside Iraq’s Green Zone (Bloomsbury) (Knopf) • Fallows, James Blind Into Baghdad: • Cheney, Annie • Dubose, Lou, and Jake Bernstein America’s War in Iraq Body Brokers: Inside America’s Vice: Dick Cheney and the Hijack- (Vintage) Underground Trade in Human ing of the American Presidency Remains (Random House) • Fanning, Diane (Broadway) Gone Forever: A True Story of Marriage, Betrayal, and Murder (St. Martin’s)

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 7 BOOKSFEATURES

• INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

• Frankel, Alison • Goodell, Jeff • Grunwald, Michael Double Eagle: The Epic Story of the Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind The Swamp: The Everglades, World’s Most Valuable Coin America’s Energy Future Florida, and the Politics of Paradise (Norton) (Houghton Miffl in) (Simon & Schuster) • Freedman, Samuel G. H Letters to a Young Journalist • Hall, Stephen S. (Basic Books) Size Matters: How Height Affects the Health, Happiness, and • Frenay, Robert Success of Boys – and the Men Pulse: The Coming Age of Systems They Become and Machines Inspired by Living (Houghton Miffl in) Things (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) • Hallman, J.C. The Devil Is a Gentleman: • Fromartz, Samuel Exploring America’s Religious Organic, Inc.: Natural Foods Fringe and How They Grew (Random House) (Harcourt) • Halperin, Mark, and John F. Harris • Frump, Robert R. The Way to Win: Taking the The Man-Eaters of Eden: Life and White House in 2008 • Horowitz, David, and Richard Poe Death in Kruger National Park (Random House) The Shadow Party: How George (Lyons) Soros, Hillary Clinton and Sixties • Hamburger, Tom, and Peter Wallsten Radicals Seized Control of the Democratic Party G • Goodman, Amy, and David Goodman One Party Country: • Gertz, Bill The Republican Plan for (Thomas Nelson) Static: Government Liars, Media Enemies: How America’s Foes Steal Dominance in the 21st Century Cheerleaders, and the People Who Our Vital Secrets – And How We Let (Wiley) • Hunter-Gault, Charlayne Fight Back New News Out of Africa: It Happen (Hyperion) (Crown) • Hamm, Steve Uncovering Africa’s Renaissance (Oxford University Press) • Greene, Melissa Fay Bangalore Tiger: How Indian Tech • Gibbons, Ann Upstart WIPRO is Rewriting the There Is No Me Without You: The First Human: The Race to Rules of Global Competition • Hurley, Dan One Woman’s Odyssey to Rescue Discover Our Earliest Ancestors (McGraw-Hill) Natural Causes: Death, Lies and (Doubleday) Africa’s Children Politics in America’s Vitamin and (Bloomsbury) • Haner, Jim Herbal Supplement Industry • Gibson, David (Broadway) • Greenfeld, Karl Taro Soccerhead: The Adventures of The Rule of Benedict: Pope Benedict a Reluctant Coach and His Seven China Syndrome: The True Story XVI and His Battle With the Modern Warriors in the Land of the I of the 21st Century’s First Great World Two-Tone Ball • Isikoff, Michael, and David Corn (Harper San Francisco) Epidemic (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, (HarperCollins) Scandal, and the Selling of the • Gilgoff, Dan • Hendricks, Steve Iraq War • Greenhill, Jim The Jesus Machine: How James The Unquiet Grave: The FBI (Crown) Someone Has to Die Tonight Dobson, Focus on the Family, and (Pinnacle) and the Struggle for the Soul Evangelical America Are Winning of Indian Country J (Thunder’s Mouth Press) • Jefferson, Margo the Culture War • Grey, Stephen (St. Martin’s) On Michael Jackson Ghost Plane: The True Story of the • Hessler, Peter (Pantheon) • Glatt, John CIA Torture Program (St. Martin’s) Oracle Bones: A Journey Between Never Leave Me China’s Past and Present • Johannsen, Kristin (St. Martin’s) (HarperCollins) Ginseng Dreams: The Secret World of America’s Most Valuable Plant • Goldberg, Jeffrey • Hirsch, James S. (University Press of Kentucky) Prisoners: A Muslim and a Jew Cheating Destiny: Life With Across the Middle East Divide Diabetes, America’s Biggest • Jones, Ann (Knopf) Epidemic Kabul in Winter: Life Without (Houghton Miffl in) Peace in Afghanistan • Goldberg, Michelle (Holt) Kingdom Coming: The Rise • Horne, Jed of Christian Nationalism Breach of Faith: Hurricane Katrina • Joshi, S.T. (Norton) and the Near Death of a Great The Angry Right: Why Conserva- American City tives Keep Getting It Wrong • Golden, Daniel (Random House) (Prometheus) The Price of Admission: How America’s Ruling Class Buys Its • Horowitz, David • Junger, Sebastian Way Into Elite Colleges – and Who The Professors: The 101 Most A Death in Belmont Gets Left Outside the Gates Dangerous Academics in America (Norton) (Crown) (Regnery)

8 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURESBOOKSBOOKS INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

K • Kosner, Edward • Lewis, Michael • Max, D.T. • Kahaner, Larry It’s News to Me: The Making and The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game The Family That Couldn’t Sleep: AK-47: The Weapon That Unmaking of an Editor (Norton) A Medical Mystery Changed the Face of War (Thunder’s Mouth Press) (Random House) (Wiley) • Lind, Michael • Kuczynski, Alex The American Way of Strategy: • McDonald, Brian • Kaiser, Robert Blair Beauty Junkies: Inside Our $15 U.S. Foreign Policy and the Safe Harbor: A Murder in Nantucket A Church in Search of Itself: Billion Obsession With Cosmetic American Way of Life (St. Martin’s) Benedict XVI and the Battle Surgery (Oxford University Press) for the Future (Doubleday) • McKiernan, Kevin (Knopf) • Linden, Eugene The Kurds: A People in Search The Winds of Change: Climate, of Their Homeland • Kamenetz, Anya Weather, and the Destruction of (St. Martin’s) Generation Debt: Why Now Is a Civilizations Terrible Time to Be Young (Simon & Schuster) • McMullan, Paul (Riverhead) Amazing Pace: The Story of • Long, Steven Olympic Champion Michael Phelps • Kamp, David Every Woman’s Nightmare From Sydney to Athens to Beijing The United States of Arugula: (St. Martin’s) (Rodale) How We Became a Gourmet Nation (Broadway) • Love, Dennis • McMurray, Kevin F. My City Was Gone: One American If You Really Loved Me • Kanipe, Jeff Town’s Toxic Secret, Its Angry Band (St. Martin’s) Chasing Hubble’s Shadows: of Locals, and a $700 Million Day in The Search for Galaxies at the Court • McPhee, John Edge of Time (Harper Collins) Uncommon Carriers (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) • Lowry, Richard S. • Kessler, Ronald Marines in the Garden of Eden: • Meisler, Stanley Laura Bush: An Intimate Portrait The Battle for An Nasiriyah Kofi Annan: A Man of Peace in of the First Lady (NAL/Caliber) a World of War (Doubleday) (Wiley) • Lueders, Bill • Kiernan, Stephen Cry Rape: The True Story of One • Mencimer, Stephanie Last Rights: Rescuing the End of Life • Kuipers, Dean Woman’s Harrowing Quest for Blocking the Courthouse Door: From the Medical System Burning Rainbow Farm: How a Justice How the Republican Party and Its (St. Martin’s) Stoner Utopia Went up in Smoke (University of Wisconsin Press) Corporate Allies Are Taking Away (Bloomsbury) Your Right to Sue • Kinzer, Stephen M (Free Press) Overthrow: America’s Century of L • Madsen, Wayne Regime Change From Hawaii to Iraq • Lapham, Lewis Jaded Tasks: Brass Plates, Black Ops • Miller, Joe (Times Books) Pretensions to Empire: Notes on and Big Oil – The Blood Politics of Cross-X: A Turbulent, Triumphant the Criminal Folly of the Bush George Bush & Co. Season With an Inner-City Debate • Kipnis, Laura Administration (Trine Day) Squad The Female Thing: Dirt, Sex, Envy, (New Press) (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) Vulnerability • Maguire, James (Knopf) • Larner, Jesse American Bee: The National • Miller, T. Christian Forgive Us Our Spins: Michael Spelling Bee and the Culture of Blood Money: Wasted Billions, Lost • Klein, Joe Moore and the Future of the Left Word Nerds Lives, and Corporate Greed in Iraq Politics Lost: How American (Wiley) (Rodale) (Little, Brown) Democracy Was Trivialized by People Who Think You’re Stupid • LaRosa, Paul • Mahar, Maggie (Doubleday) Tacoma Confi dential: A True Story Money-Driven Medicine: The Real of Murder, Suicide, and a Police Reason Health Care Costs So Much • Knecht, G. Bruce Chief’s Secret Life (Collins) Hooked: Pirates, Poaching and (Signet) the Perfect Fish • Mann, Brian (Rodale) • LeDuff, Charlie Welcome to the Homeland: Us Guys: The True and Twisted A Journey to the Rural Heart of • Kolbert, Elizabeth Mind of the American Man America’s Conservative Revolution Field Notes From a Catastrophe: (Penguin Press) (Steerforth) Man, Nature, and Climate Change (Bloomsbury) • Leopold, Jason • Masters, Brooke A. News Junkie Spoiling for a Fight: • Konik, Michael (Process) The Rise of Eliot Spitzer The Smart Money: How the World’s (Times Books) Best Sports Bettors Beat the • Levy, Steven Bookies Out of Millions The Perfect Thing: How the iPod • Mathews, Joe (Simon & Schuster) Shuffl es Commerce, Culture, and The People’s Machine: Arnold Coolness Schwarzenegger and the Rise of (Simon & Schuster) Blockbuster Democracy (Public Affairs)

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 9 FEATURESBOOKS INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

• Minutaglio, Bill • Pearce, Fred Q S The President’s Counselor: The Rise When the Rivers Run Dry: • Quart, Alissa • Sallah, Michael, and Mitch Weiss to Power of Alberto Gonzales Water – the Defi ning Crisis of (Rayo) Hothouse Kids: The Dilemma Tiger Force: A True Story of Men the Twenty-First Century of the Gifted Child and War (Beacon) (Penguin Press) (Little, Brown) • Mnookin, Seth Feeding the Monster: How Money, • Pearlman, Jeff • Sandler, Lauren Smarts, and Nerve Took a Team to R Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds • Remnick, David Righteous: Dispatches From the Top and the Making of an Antihero (Simon & Schuster) Reporting: Writings From the Evangelical Youth Movement (HarperCollins) The New Yorker (Viking) (Knopf) • Moir, John • Pelton, Robert Young • Sawyer, Kathy Return of the Condor: The Race Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the • Rhoden, William C. The Rock From Mars: A True to Save Our Largest Bird From War on Terror Forty Million Dollar Slaves: Detective Story on Two Planets Extinction (Crown) (Random House) (Lyons) The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Black Athlete • Perle, Liz (Crown) • Schou, Nick • Moore, James, and Wayne Slater Money, a Memoir: Women, Kill the Messenger: How the The Architect: Karl Rove and the Emotions, and Cash • Rich, Frank CIA’s Crack-Cocaine Controversy Master Plan for Absolute Power (Holt) (Crown) The Greatest Story Ever Sold: Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb The Decline and Fall of Truth from (Nation Books) • Phelps, M. William 9/11 to Katrina Murder in the Heartland (Penguin Press) • Schrag, Peter (Kensington) California: America’s High-Stakes • Ricks, Thomas E. Experiment • Phillips, Ty Fiasco: The American Military (University of California Press) Blacktop Cowboys: Riders on the Adventure in Iraq Run for Rodeo Gold (Penguin Press) • Seife, Charles (St. Martin’s) Decoding the Universe: • Risen, James How the New Science of • Pierce, Charles P. State of War: The Secret History of Information Is Explaining Moving the Chains: Tom Brady and the CIA and the Bush Administration Everything in the Cosmos, the Pursuit of Everything (Free Press) From Our Brains to Black Holes (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) (Viking) • Robbins, Alexandra • Pitluk, Adam The Overachievers: The Secret • Shachtman, Tom Standing Eight: The Inspiring Story Lives of Driven Kids Rumspringa: To Be or Not to Be of Jesus “El Matador” Chavez, Who (Hyperion) Amish Became Lightweight Champion of (North Point Press) the World • Roberts, Gene, and Hank Klibanoff (Da Capo) The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil • Shah, Sonia Rights Struggle, and the Awakening The Body Hunters: How the Drug N • Pollan, Michael of a Nation Industry Tests Its Products on the • Nazario, Sonia The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural (Knopf) World’s Poorest Patients Enrique’s Journey: The Story of History of Four Meals (New Press) a Boy’s Dangerous Odyssey to (Penguin Press) • Rosen, Nir Reunite with His Mother In the Belly of the Green Bird: • Shawn, Eric (Random House) • Pollitt, Katha The Triumph of the Martyrs in Iraq The U.N. Exposed: How the United Virginity or Death!: And Other Social (Free Press) Nations Sabotaged America’s • Newsham, Gavin and Political Issues of Our Time Security and Fails the World Once in a Lifetime: The Incredible (Random House) • Rosenberg, Scott (Sentinel) Story of the New York Cosmos Dreaming in Code: Two Dozen (Atlantic Monthly Press) • Pomfret, John Programmers, Three Years, • Sheler, Jeffery L. Chinese Lessons: Five Classmates 4,732 Bugs, and One Quest Believers: A Journey Into O and the Story of the New China for Transcendent Software Evangelical America • Oppenheimer, Jerry (Holt) (Crown) (Viking) House of Hilton: From Conrad to Paris, A Drama of Wealth, Power • Ponnuru, Ramesh • Rosencrance, Linda • Shepard, Alicia C. and Privilege The Party of Death: The Democrats, An Act of Murder Woodward and Bernstein: (Crown) the Media, the Courts, and the (Pinnacle) Life in the Shadow of Watergate Disregard for Human Life (Wiley) • Owen, Frank (Regnery) • Ruhlman, Michael No Speed Limit: Meth Across The Reach of a Chef: • Sherr, Lynn America • Press, Eyal Beyond the Kitchen Outside the Box: A Memoir (St. Martin’s) Absolute Convictions: My Father, a (Viking) (Rodale) City, and the Confl ict That Divided P America • Russo, Gus • Singular, Stephen • Palmer, Chris (Holt) Supermob: How Sidney Korshak Unholy Messenger: The Life and The Sixth Man: A Season Inside the and His Criminal Associates Became Crimes of the BTK Serial Killer NBA Playground America’s Hidden Power Brokers (Scribner) (ESPN Books) (Bloomsbury)

10 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURESBOOKSBOOKS INVESTIGATIVE BOOKS OF 2006

• Spinner, Jackie T • Traub, James • Werth, Barry Tell Them I Didn’t Cry: A Young • Talese, Gay The Best Intentions: Kofi Annan 31 Days: The Crisis That Gave Us Journalist’s Story of Joy, Loss, and A Writer’s Life and the United Nations in the Era the Government We Have Today Survival in Iraq (Knopf) of American World Power (Doubleday) (Scribner) (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) • Tayler, Jeffrey • Wilentz, Amy • Spitz, Marc River of No Reprieve: Descending • Trento, Susan B., and Joseph J. Trento I Feel Earthquakes More Often Than Nobody Likes You: Inside the Siberia’s Waterway of Exile, Death, Unsafe at Any Altitude: Failed Ter- They Happen: Coming to California Turbulent Life, Times, and Music and Destiny rorism Investigations, Scapegoating in the Age of Schwarzenegger of Green Day (Houghton Miffl in) 9/11, and the Shocking Truth About (Simon & Schuster) (Hyperion) Aviation Security Today • Thomas, Helen (Steerforth) • Williams, Juan • Stille, Alexander Watchdogs of Democracy?: The Enough: The Phony Leaders, The Sack of Rome: How a Beautiful Waning Washington Press Corps U Dead-End Movements, and Culture European Country with a Fabled and How It Has Failed the Public • Uchitelle, Louis of Failure That Are Undermining History and a Storied Culture Was (Scribner) The Disposable American: Layoffs Black America – and What We Can Taken Over by a Man Named Silvio and Their Consequences Do About It Berlusconi • Thompson, Tracy (Knopf) (Crown) (Penguin Press) The Ghost in the House: Motherhood, Raising Children, V • Williams, Pete • Stone, Peter H. and Struggling With Depression • Vincent, Lynn, and Robert Stacy The Draft: A Year Inside the NFL’s Heist: Superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, (HarperCollins) McCain Search for Talent His Republican Allies, and the Donkey Cons: Sex, Crime, and (St. Martin’s) Buying of Washington Corruption in the Democratic Party (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) (Nelson Current) • Wilson, Drew The Hole: Another Look at the • Stossel, John • Vincent, Norah Sinking of the Estonia Ferry Myths, Lies, and Downright Self-Made Man: One Woman’s Jour- (Exposure Publishing) Stupidity: Get Out the Shovel – Why ney Into Manhood and Back Again Everything You Know Is Wrong (Viking) • Woodward, Bob (Hyperion) State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III • Vitzthum, Virginia (Simon & Schuster) • Suarez, Ray I Love You, Let’s Meet: Adventures in The Holy Vote: The Politics of Faith Online Dating in America (Little, Brown) (Rayo) • Vollers, Maryanne • Sullivan, James Lone Wolf: Eric Rudolph – Murder, Jeans: A Cultural History of an Myth and the Pursuit of an Ameri- American Icon can Outlaw (Gotham) (HarperCollins) • Sutherland, Amy W Kicked, Bitten, and Scratched: Life • Wade, Nicholas and Lessons at the World’s Premier Before the Dawn: Recovering the School for Exotic Animal Trainers • Tolan, Sandy Lost History of Our Ancestors (Viking) The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew and (Penguin Press) the Heart of the Middle East • Svrluga, Barry (Bloomsbury) • Weinberger, Sharon National Pastime: Sports, Politics, Imaginary Weapons: A Journey and the Return of Baseball to Through the Pentagon’s Scientifi c Washington, D.C. Underworld (Doubleday) (Nation Books/Avalon Publishing)

• Sweet, William • Weisman, Alan • Wright, Lawrence Kicking the Carbon Habit: Lone Star: The Extraordinary Life The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda Global Warming and the Case for and Times of Dan Rather and the Road to 9/11 Renewable and Nuclear Energy (Wiley) (Knopf) (Columbia University Press) • Weiss, Gary Z • Szalavitz, Maia Wall Street Versus America: The • Zielenziger, Michael Help at Any Cost: How the Rampant Greed and Dishonesty Shutting Out the Sun: How Japan Troubled-Teen Industry Cons That Imperil Your Investments Created Its Own Lost Generation Parents and Hurts Kids (Portfolio) (Doubleday) (Riverhead) • Weisskopf, Michael • Zoellner, Tom • Suskind, Ron Blood Brothers: Among the The Heartless Stone: A Journey The One Percent Doctrine: Soldiers of Ward 57 Through the World of Diamonds, (Holt) Deep Inside America’s Pursuit of Its Deceit, and Desire Enemies Since 9/11 (St. Martin’s) (Simon & Schuster)

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 11 
 
 IRE Announces New Jennifer Leonard Scholarship Opportunity

At this year’s IRE Conference in Phoenix the fi rst Leonard also wrote what may be the fi rst published Jennifer Leonard Scholars will learn the skills that list of how grantors should apply the Golden Rule to Leonard said “will always be needed to dig into grant seekers. Later, hoping to stir better coverage of every important aspect of society to improve our nonprofi ts and their role in the quality of communities, democracy.” she and her husband co-wrote a piece for the Columbia Journalism Review on how to cover nonprofi ts as hard The scholarships will go to women of modest means news. The couple also wrote exposés of charities and who are journalism students or have less than three Hollywood fi lms that sold lies as truth. years of work experience. The funds will enable them to attend IRE conferences or NICAR training seminars. The Jennifer Leonard Scholarships are funded with IRE staff will select the recipients. a pledge being paid over 20 years, plus matching funds from friends and The New York Times Company IRE member David Cay Johnston of The New York Foundation – all of which were matched by the Knight Times created the scholarships to honor his wife, Foundation through a challenge grant awarded to IRE. Jennifer Leonard the president of the Rochester Area Community The number of scholars is expected to double once the Foundation and a national leader in promoting ethical pledge is fulfi lled. To apply for the Jennifer standards for endowments. Leonard Scholarships, please “Giving to the IRE Endowment can have a big visit IRE’s Fellowship Web In the early 1980s, Leonard exposed how corporations impact with a modest level of giving over time,” blackballed various charities in 16 cities. She tried to Johnston said. His gifts of $1,400 per year, before page, www.ire.org/training/ get the newspapers in these towns to pay attention, but the income tax deduction, and the matching funds fellowships, or contact John only two followed up on her article for a little magazine will eventually provide the IRE Endowment with more Green, IRE membership called The Grantsmanship Center News. than $100,000. coordinator, at 573-882-2772 If you would like to create a similar scholarship fund in honor of someone close to you, please contact IRE development or [email protected]. offi cer Jennifer Erickson at 573-884-2222 or [email protected]. COUNTDOWN TO DEADLINES!

IRE is currently in the middle of two separate challenge grants, and IRE members can assist in many ways, including: deadlines are quickly approaching. How can you help make sure IRE • donating or pledging to IRE’s endowment fund receives the full grant amounts? By acting now to support IRE’s mission • donating or pledging toward IRE programming and general operations of fostering excellence in investigative journalism. • sharing ideas with IRE staff for potential prospects in your region These grants will give IRE $1 for every $2 IRE raises. Currently, IRE has • recruiting new IRE members within your own newsrooms the opportunity to receive $1.2 million in matching funds. • asking co-workers to renew their lapsed IRE memberships John S. and James L. Knight Foundation • establishing funds within IRE’s endowment Challenge Grant Challenge Fund for Journalism III IRE must raise $2 million in endowment funds to release $1 million from the Knight Foundation. IRE is half way there because of the generous support of IRE is pleased to have been selected to take part in the Challenge Fund IRE members, media corporations and foundations and other individual donors. for Journalism III (CFJ), a program funded by the Ford Foundation, the Knight sends IRE $1 for every $2 pledged or donated to IRE’s endowment John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Ethics & Excellence fund. in Journalism Foundation. If you’ve been putting off your support of IRE until it is needed most, now is The CFJ program’s goal is to help journalism organizations strengthen the time to act. This challenge will end in December 2007, so we need your their leadership, organizational infrastructure and fi nancial resources so help today. And keep in mind that the Knight Foundation will match multi-year they can continue their programs well into the future. pledges in full. For instance, if you were to pledge $500 over fi ve years before All new IRE memberships will help us meet our $200,000 challenge December, the Knight Foundation would send IRE a match of $250. Make goal, which will release $100,000 in matching funds. How can you help? your philanthropic dollars grow immediately. Simply by recruiting new members from your own newsroom. The effort So far, nearly 1,000 IRE members have risen to the challenge. Please will cost you zero out-of-pocket expenses, help IRE meet its match AND join them and, in the process, help IRE ensure its uninterrupted support of introduce your colleagues to the many benefi ts of IRE membership. investigative journalists and editors and allow IRE to focus additional resources Again, time is of the essence. The deadline for raising the $200,000 on emerging programs. is May 31, 2007. Please act today. For more information on donating to IRE’s endowment fund, please see Please direct your work colleagues to www.ire.org/membership or call the form on the right or contact IRE development offi cer Jennifer Erickson at IRE membership coordinator John Green at 573-882-2772 for more 573-884-2222 or [email protected]. information. Please make your annual contribution to IRE! 2007 Annual IRE Endowment Appeal “There is nothing more important for a journalist than to seek the Help us ensure that IRE’s independent IRE depends on contributions to maintain and truth, speak for those who have voice, state-of-the art training, up-to-date improve its services and to create long-term no voice, and try to hold power resource library, and vast array of networking fi nancial stability. At present, more than one- accountable. possibilities for journalists continue into the third of IRE’s $1.4 million annual budget is future. Join the hundreds of IRE members funded through donations. Investigative journalists have who have donated and pledged to IRE’s always felt this was more than endowment fund. By achieving a $5-million endowment, IRE a career – it’s a trust, and a will ensure its uninterrupted support of duty. In the age of blogs and And, for a short time longer, the John S. and investigative journalists and editors and will be the instant assertions of the James L. Knight Foundation will give $1 for able to focus its efforts on emerging programs. internet, it is even more critical every $2 you donate or pledge under a $1 In short, a strong endowment will allow IRE to to have journalists who check and million partial matching program. See your continue to foster excellence in investigative philanthropic dollars immediately grow! journalism, a mission essential to a free and doublecheck and care. democratic society. Investigative Reporters and IRE seeks donations from all audiences Editors has always been a place that value quality investigative journalism All endowment gifts make a difference because, where journalists have learned and recognize its importance in keeping taken together, they form a strong foundation these skills. IRE has and will governments, businesses and individuals that continues to grow for years to come. always honor the mission and accountable. lead the way. Please join me in supporting IRE Make your dollars grow: Don’t forget to inquire… during this important time in our $500 pledge (over 5 years) history.” Don’t forget to inquire whether or not your employer will match your donation. For a list of + $500 match from employer = $1,000 – Diane Sawyer media companies that match gifts to IRE, see: + $500 Knight Foundation match ABC News www.ire.org/endowment/matchingcompanies = $1,500 endowment increase

To make a contribution, please use the form below, visit www.ire.org/endowment or phone IRE Development Offi cer Jennifer Erickson at 573-884-2222. All contributions are tax deductible to the fullest extent allowed by law.

YES! I would like to support IRE’s Endowment Fund I would like my gift to benefi t IRE in this way: Name ______❒ Endowment - general operations ❒ Endowment - specifi c program, Address ______services or resource area City ______State ______Zip ______Name area ______Company ______Amount of gift $______Company Address ______❒ My company will match my Wk Phone ______Hm Phone ______contribution ❒ CHECK BOX IF YOU DON’T ❒ I will pledge $______over ______years. WANT YOUR NAME DISCLOSED ❒ My check is enclosed and made payable to IRE. AS A DONOR. Please write “Endowment” in the memo line of your check. ❒ Please charge my credit card with the amount indicated ❒ VISA ❒ MasterCard ❒ American Express Mail or fax this form to: Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. Account Number ______Exp. Date ______138 Neff Annex, Columbia, MO 65211 PH 573-882-2042 • www.ire.org Signature ______FAX 573-882-5431 FEATURES

who would be less likely to complain and less likely to be believed if they did. ABUSIVE COPS Once the abusers are caught, investigators who dig into their police work, such as reviewing reports of Investigation uncovers nationwide problem car stops, typically turn up a trail of earlier victims and discounted warnings. of police offi cers sexually assaulting women We pored over records from civil and criminal trials from across the nation, tracked down victims BY CRAIG R. MCCOY AND NANCY PHILLIPS and contacted the accused cops and their bosses. We THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER were surprised to fi nd that police commanders often fail to recognize the problem. We discovered that few ou never know what someone will say until you force myself on anybody.” departments address the issue in training and most Y make that call. Focusing on both local and national cases, we don’t keep track of such incidents. So we were reminded when we phoned a dis- explored the locker-room mentality that sometimes In short, we tackled a problem that is underesti- graced former Philadelphia police offi cer on probation affl icts police departments, how some offi cers use mated and largely unstudied. for joining his partner in sexually assaulting a stripper their badges to extort sex and how their departments We did locate a few academics who had focused in the back of their squad car. too often ignore warning signs about their escalating on the issue, including two experts from the Uni- “Being honest with you, women do like cops,” misbehavior and fail to discipline abusive cops. That versity of Nebraska who completed a study called former cop Jimmy Fallon said. “Women love guys national review led to one of our most unsettling “Driving While Female.” While groundbreaking, in uniform.” fi ndings: In cities and towns large and small, the cases their report was wholly anecdotal. The interview with Fallon became one of the follow the same pattern. Another study by researchers at St. Louis Uni- most startling aspects of a two-part series in The versity was more limited in scope but somewhat Philadelphia Inquirer that explored fresh territory in Abuse studies more scientifi c. These researchers dug into police the otherwise well-trodden turf of police misconduct: Most assaults take place during the night shift, disciplinary records in Florida to determine that sexual abuse. when the hours are long and the supervision is thin. when police abused citizens, sexual abuse was the It turned out that Fallon was quite an interview Once abusers cross the line, they attack again and most common violation, exceeding such offenses – an unrepentant font of sexual braggadocio. Fallon again before they are caught. Unchecked, their mis- as beatings or theft. insisted that the dancer had consented to the sex. He behavior escalates. A cop might begin by picking up As we explained in our reporting, the academ- clung to this view even though he and his partner women while on the job, then move on to physical ics had to tease their fi nding out of the records. The had pleaded guilty to indecent assault and offi cial assaults. sexual nature of the abuse was often mislabeled; oppression. Helping to blind their chiefs to the phenomenon, a demand for sex often got reported as seeking a “Why would I have to threaten anybody?” Fallon rogue police shrewdly select their victims by targeting bribe. asked. “I have the looks. I always did. I don’t need to runaways, strippers, prostitutes, drug users and others To tell the story, investigations editor Joe Tan- fani helped us organize the material into a two-part series with multiple sidebars highlighting a mix of national and local misconduct. Photographers Barbara Johnston and Clem Murray took effectively ominous pictures for the project. The Web site at http://go.philly.com/predators was built by Jennifer Musser-Metz. Editor Amanda Bennett backed the project with generous space, including 2 1/2 inside pages for the fi rst day. On the news desk, editors Steve Glynn, Steve Kelly and Jim Seltzer designed the display. The resulting package explored wrongdoing in departments across the country. For example, in Eugene, Ore., we told how two uniformed predators, operating independently, sexu- ally assaulted a total of 20 women before they were each arrested in 2003. In an interview, Eugene Police Chief Robert Philadelphia Inquirer Lehner, who took offi ce after the scandal, told us The the two ex-cops were cunning in choosing victims who had been drunk or high and almost “impossible to believe.” Closer to home, we examined a sex scandal that enveloped the Pennsylvania State Police. A state trooper committed a string of sexual assaults despite warnings from fellow troopers that he was Images from a camera in New Britain Borrough police offi cer Darryl Allen’s patrol car show him after he pulled over a “hormonal sex freak” who was going to cause the a driver on New Year’s Day 2005 because he saw her vehicle weaving. He pleaded guilty to assaulting this woman, force “great embarrassment in the future,” court whose breath test indicated she was legally drunk. records show. The ex-trooper, Michael K. Evans, is

14 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES now serving fi ve to 10 years in state prison. In an warned his superiors that Fallon used the interview from prison, he detailed for us precisely job to prowl for sex. how he plotted his crimes. Our articles also disclosed that com- “I would see women that were vulnerable where manders in their local precinct had fi elded I could appear as a knight in shining armor,” he said. a complaint about Fallon, but he had

“I’m going to help this woman who is being abused by stayed on the street. Philadelphia Inquirer her boyfriend, and then I’ll ask for sexual favors.” The In another local case, we reported that an offi cer Unresolved contradictions on a tiny force in a small town outside Philadelphia Ruling in a lawsuit, a federal judge had harassed or attacked women after he pulled them ultimately found that the Philadelphia over when they were driving alone late at night. Police Department was “not very well There were warnings for years from victims and run” and said that many cops “visited Former Philadelphia police offi cers Timothy Carre and James Fallon their wives and girlfriends” while on duty. were accused of raping an exotic dancer in their patrol car in 2002. even a police chief before he was fi nally arrested and They pleaded guilty in 2003 to misdemeanor charges of indecent convicted of indecent assault, indecent exposure and But he said the lawsuit had not shown that assault, simple assault and offi cial oppression and were sentenced offi cial oppression. In the case that fi nally led to his “responsible offi cials” knew that Fallon to four years probation. As part of the plea deal, charges of rape conviction, prosecutors obtained a video the offi cer and Carre could be sexual predators. were dismissed. shot from his police cruiser as he pulled his victim In the second day of our project, we over in the pre-dawn darkness on New Year’s Day. told the story of two women who were swept up in would you allow something like that to happen?” We obtained a copy of the tape. Electronic lab a drug raid in a drug-ridden part of Philadelphia, As we talked with police and city prosecutors technician Michael Levin painstakingly captured locked in a cell and then ordered to put on a sex about the episode, our questioning broke a logjam chilling stills from that tape that provided vivid show as a price of release. that had stalled the Internal Affairs investigation. In real-time images for the project. Once again, a woman stepped up to tell her an interview shortly before we published, authorities story, agreeing to be identifi ed and photographed. revealed that they had a suspect in the case. Pressuring agencies We learned of Erica Hejnar’s ordeal though her civil As for Fallon and Carre, a federal jury recently To pry loose records, Michael Baughman, a suit, one that settled with a modest payment by the ordered them to pay $8.3 million to their victim, lawyer for The Inquirer, asked a federal judge to rule city. Before the case was closed, she obtained the though the woman’s lawyers conceded that the two that Internal Affairs’ reports into sex-abuse allega- complete documentary record of the Internal Affairs ex-cops, now on probation and working in construc- tions – released by the city to plaintiffs’ lawyers investigation of her complaint. tion, hardly have the money to pay up. – were public documents. The judge agreed. From those records, which included verbatim In one sidebar, the paper highlighted how the questions and answers from cops under investiga- Craig R. McCoy and Nancy Phillips are members city had sought to bar the public disclosure of the tion, we were also able to underscore unresolved of The Philadelphia Inquirer’s investigations team. information in apparent violation of a mayoral edict contradictions in the offi cers’ accounts. McCoy was part of a team whose work on the ordering their release. This was in keeping with To let readers see the evidence themselves, we Philadelphia police was a fi nalist for a public-ser- The Inquirer’s and Bennett’s focus on pressuring posted the reports on our Web site. vice Pulitzer Prize. The coverage won a Selden Ring public agencies to release records in Pennsylva- While a number of offi cers claimed they remem- Award and a Roy Howard Award. Phillips won a nia, a state notorious for its restrictions on public bered nothing about the incident, our detailed narra- special citation from IRE for her investigation into information. tive revealed a heroine, a cop who complained bitterly the murder of a New Jersey woman that ended when In Philadelphia, we painstakingly unraveled the once she heard about the sex show, shouting, “Why the killer confessed to her. allegations against James Fallon and his former partner, Timothy Carre. Although the offi cers were

arrested and convicted of the December 2002 attack Inquirer on the dancer, we learned that eight other women had leveled accusations against one or both offi cers, and Carre asserted that he had warned his bosses about his partner’s behavior. Philadelphia The

The department wouldn’t release anything about | those allegations, but using clues contained in a lawsuit against the offi cers and with help from public records and interviews, we were able to track down several of these women. A few were reluctant to John Costello talk, but others opened up to us, including a woman who quietly told us how Fallon had raped her. In each case, we approached the women in person, explained the larger context of our story and found that many were willing to share their experiences. In part, this was because they found our interest a welcome change from the chilly reaction they had often faced when they fi rst came forward. Like Fallon, Carre adamantly rejected all alle- gations of sexual misconduct. But that was about all the former partners seemed to agree on. Fallon Reporters used clues from lawsuits to track down sexual abuse victims. Here, Erica Hejnar stands outside the Philadelphia disparaged Carre while Carre said he had repeatedly Police 26th District Station, where she says police ordered her to perform a sex show in a jail cell.

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 15 FEATURES FALSE PLEDGE Telemarketing fi rm soliciting donations for troopers keeps more than half the money

BY AMY DAVIS KPRC-HOUSTON Shannon Taylor reads over the letter from the Texas hannon Taylor is a woman of her word, and state and legislative representation.” State Troopers Association. S when a Texas lobbying group posing as a police The 990 also specifically asks: “What is the charity tried to put words in her mouth, she became organization’s primary exempt purpose?” TSTA’s ers’ employment.” suspicious. Taylor contacted the KPRC-Houston answer: “Lobbying for improvement of troopers’ Hartley says he believes the most important dif- tip line after receiving a letter from the Texas State employment.” ference between the groups is that the 100 Club never Troopers Association stating: “You generously agreed solicits donations by phone. The telephone is TSTA’s to a pledge of $50.” Telephone solicitations only means of raising money. “The whole problem is, I never talked to anybody, My initial calls to TSTA were not returned, so I Taylor says she never remembers a phone call and I never agreed to anything,” Taylor told us. looked to the Texas attorney general for information from TSTA and maintains she never pledged money After we aired Taylor’s story and our investigation about the association. Under the Texas Law Enforce- to them. The whole experience, she says, has turned of the association, the state attorney general’s offi ce ment Solicitation Act, all groups that solicit donations her off to giving in general. began investigating Taylor’s complaint that she never by phone for law enforcement must register with the pledged any money to the organization. We also found attorney general. The act requires full disclosure of Agency complaints that although the association collected $3.5 million all telemarketing companies the group contracts with We encouraged Taylor and other viewers who dollars in 2005 from donors, it gave telemarketers and what percentage of the donations the solicitors received similar letters from TSTA to fi le a complaint more than half that amount. receive. with the attorney general’s offi ce. Through a faxed When we received Taylor’s initial phone call, my We found that TSTA contracts with two profes- statement, the association’s executive director told assignment was fairly simple: Find out exactly what sional solicitation companies and turns over 60 per- us his records show Taylor made the $50 pledge by the Texas State Troopers Association is and how it got cent of all donations to those telemarketers. In 2005, phone. Taylor’s name, phone number and address. when donors gave TSTA $3.5 million, the association “Most all of the calls are taped,” he wrote to us. A quick search on Guidestar, a free online database gave telemarketers $2.7 million, leaving the group “We did go back to look for the tape of that particular of non-profi t organizations, revealed that TSTA is a with less than $1 million. The association’s tax records call, however, since it was made almost four months non-profi t group, but it is not a 501(c)3, the Internal show $853,000 went for “services to members that ago, that tape has been reused for newer calls.” Revenue Service’s category for a charitable, religious will better their employment as troopers” – primarily TSTA declined both on-camera and telephone or educational organization. TSTA is categorized as a “lobbying” in Austin. interviews. The executive director answered three 501(c)5, the designation assigned to labor, agricultural I decided to compare the TSTA with the most of our eight questions, writing: “The remainder of and horticultural organizations. widely recognized agency in our viewing area that your questions will be taken before TSTA’s Board This told me two things. First, as a non-profi t, assists offi cers, called the Houston 100 Club. This of Directors at their next Board meeting.” Since that TSTA is required to fi le a Form-990 with the IRS. non-profi t charity was formed in 1953 to assist the time, he has not returned my phone calls to determine The form is fi led annually by all public charities and survivors of any federal, state or local offi cer who dies what, if anything, the board did. private foundations and lists assets, receipts, expen- in the line of duty within an 18-county area in Texas. The 100 Club’s Hartley spoke with us for our story ditures and compensation of offi cers. To date, more than $23.9 million has been collected because he says when letters and solicitations from Second, contributions made to 501(c)5’s are not and dispersed to surviving dependents, to provide agencies such as TSTA circulate, the 100 Club feels tax deductible. The letter Taylor received made no special equipment, to educate offi cers and to reward the effects. He says people get confused and may even mention of this. It did say that her support would be outstanding offi cers and fi refi ghters. donate to TSTA because they believe their money is used to provide programs such as “provisions for The 100 Club gives benefi ts to the survivors of any actually going to the 100 Club. families in the event of a death, insurance coverage for certifi ed law enforcement offi cers, regardless of the Our investigation originated from Taylor’s e-mail, accidental death or dismemberment, offi cer training, agency employing them. TSTA’s benefi ts only go to but you’ll likely fi nd people in your area who have legal defense, various youth activities throughout the its members, a number TSTA won’t release. been solicited by checking complaints with all of “It may sound on the phone like they are protecting the usual agencies, the Better Business Bureau, the and covering and helping everybody in a particular attorney general and the secretary of state. Start by agency,” said Rick Hartley, president of the 100 Club. getting a list of all groups claiming to raise money “But, people need to realize that when you get one of for police from your secretary of state, then check these calls from an employee group, it’s only for those complaints against those agencies. offi cers that are members of that particular group and not the entire agency.” Amy Davis is an investigative reporter at KPRC Further, the 100 Club does not endorse political in Houston. Her investigations have prompted the candidates, lobby the legislature or side with any Justice Department to close a Texas swim club partisan groups. TSTA hires two lobbyists to work discriminating against black children and sanctions at the state capital to persuade politicians to vote in against a North Carolina assisted-living facility for Rick Hartley, president of the Houston 100 Club. favor of what TSTA calls the “improvement of troop- neglecting its disabled patients.

16 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES

Justice Terrence O’Donnell in the court’s unanimous decision. “The Cincinnati Health Department and its RECORDS BATTLE commissioners have a clear legal duty to make the lead citations available.” Challenge to HIPAA over lead records That ruling resulted in the articles published in The Enquirer, but it also clarifi ed some of the new results in court’s groundbreaking ruling rules created by HIPAA. Our legal counsel, Jack Greiner, said the Supreme BY SHARON COOLIDGE Court’s decision is important because it gives agen- THE CINCINNATI ENQUIRER cies, like the health department, guidance. He said HIPAA was intended to protect personal records t started as a simple weekend story two and a police and fi re departments under HIPAA, we had – not to prevent media coverage of serious public I half years ago, but it stirred up a court battle never encountered one from a city health department. health issues such as lead paint contamination. that went all the way to the Ohio Supreme Court Health offi cials said the lead records we requested “The way the city was applying HIPAA I don’t think and resulted in a groundbreaking ruling that helped could not be released to the public because they was ever really intended by Congress,” Greiner said. defi ne how governments should interpret a new and contained the addresses of homes and businesses controversial law. ordered to remove lead paint. Behind the denial We challenged that law, the federal Health Insur- HIPAA applied in this case, city offi cials said, The story began a couple of years ago when ance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, or because lead citations are based in part on blood Hamilton County decided to start a housing court. HIPAA, after Cincinnati Health Department offi cials tests of children. The disclosure of addresses could Research showed other housing courts around the refused to release records for all property owners reveal the children who tested positive for high lead country handled nuisance complaints, building code with lead paint citations. levels, they said. violations and lead paint citations. But, in Hamilton “Many people think the ‘P’ in HIPAA has The Enquirer sued the Cincinnati Health County, there were no lead cases on the docket. something to do with privacy. That’s just not the Department in Ohio’s 1st District Court of Appeals I asked why, but court offi cials offered only case, and we need to help educate public offi cials and argued the records are public under Ohio law. vague answers. So, I went straight to the source: the and the public that HIPAA does not create a shroud In January 2005, we won a portion of the records Cincinnati Health Department. of secrecy over all things ‘medical,’” said Tom Cal- – those from apartment buildings where the children I asked for records for all property owners with linan, the Enquirer’s editor. could not be identifi ed. But, we wanted them all. lead paint citations. At the time, I wasn’t sure what The law is intended to protect personal medical The Ohio Supreme Court agreed to hear the case types of records the department kept. Because there records and allows fi nes as high as $50,000 against and ruled in March 2006 that the health depart- was a lead prevention division, I knew there must be any person or agency that violates the rules. HIPAA, ment should hand over the records. Specifi cally, some records, and I was sure citations were public which took effect in 2003, has been a source of con- the court concluded that Ohio’s open records law under Ohio law. troversy as government agencies and media organi- trumps HIPAA. When I received the denial citing HIPAA, I zations battle over how to interpret its requirements. “Ohio has a longstanding public policy commit- argued that offi cials could simply black out the Although we had been denied information from ted to open records,” wrote Ohio Supreme Court CONTINUED ON PAGE 19 From the IRE Resource Center Additional stories on lead pollution can be found in the IRE Resource Christensen, Marsha Low, Hugh McDiarmid, Jr., Dan Shine, Shawn Windsor, Center. IRE members can order copies by calling 573-882-3364 or Wendy Wendland-Bowyer, Detroit Free Press. (2003) e-mailing [email protected]. • Story No. 18919: Numerous cases of attention defi cit disorder-like behavior • Story No. 22615: Poor environmental protection in Chesapeake, Va., in kids were caused by lead poisoning. Some children’s jewelry contains lead allowed developers to build homes on severely polluted land. In one levels higher than what is admissible in household paint. These levels can subdivision, lead contamination is so high that homeowners are forbid- cause neurological damage. Ross McLaughlin, Shawn Hoder, KIRO-Seattle. den to grow vegetables or water their lawns with groundwater. Robert (2001) McCabe, The (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot. (2005) • Story No. 17937: Nearly 3,000 children are poisoned by lead each year in • Story No. 21762: After a 1-year-old suffered brain damage from lead Rhode Island, often from paint wearing off older homes. This six-part series poisoning, investigators tested the costume jewelry popular among kids. details the effects of lead poisoning on children, especially impaired mental All the jewelry tested contained lead, which prompted a voluntary recall development, and examines the lives of some children who suffer from lead of more than 150 million pieces of jewelry sold out of gumball machines. paint poisoning. Peter B. Lord, The Providence (R.I.) Journal. (2001) Tisha Thompson, Bill Fink, WMAR-Baltimore. (2004) • Story No. 17683: Ruth Ann Norton, executive director of The Coalition, has • Story No. 21406: Herculaneum, Mo., was built around the Doe Run plant worked tirelessly to prevent lead poisoning in kids. Children absorb lead more now the nation’s largest lead smelter. Despite offi cial claims of attempts easily than adults, and once it has affected the brain, the damage is irreversible. to limit pollution, the soil and air are both affected, and children who live Norton now has a budget of $2.6 million to examine older homes and repair near the plant test positive for too-high levels of lead. Chris Birk, Katie lead hazards. Kim Hitselberger Fernandez, Baltimore Magazine. (2001) Tiernan, Columbia (Mo.) Daily Tribune. (2002) • Story No. 17191: Database analysis and newly available records detail an • Story No. 20369: Lead cleanups in the United States are failing due to epidemic of lead poisoning among Baltimore’s children. Thousands of tod- poor strategy. About 2.5 million Americans suffered lead poisoning in dlers suffer brain damage in the city’s slums because of inadequate public the last decade, and an estimated 300,000 children , 22,000 of whom live health safeguards and a lack of housing-code enforcement. Jim Haner, The in Michigan, face long-term diffi culties. Emilia Askari, Tina Lam, Megan (Baltimore) Sun. (2000)

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 17 FEATURES BIG HIT Popularity of online mechanic fraud story proves effectiveness of Web investigations

BY JOEL GROVER KNBC-LA

The Jiffy Lube investigation turned into a national phenomenon as the story gained viewers on the n my 17 years of doing investigations on local for repairs that were never done. The story had Internet and boosted the station’s Web site to fi rst place I television, I never imagined that millions of good undercover tape, a revealing interview from in the Los Angeles market. people nationwide would be watching my stories. an insider and a compelling confrontation with a But, that’s exactly what’s happening now, thanks top manager who lied on camera. to the Internet. viewers. For example, the link was sent out on an e- Last May, we aired an investigation by producer Viewers have always mail list of 200 working moms and California state Matt Goldberg and me called “Is Your Mechanic employees, and it ended up on popular Web sites, Cheating?” When the investigation fi rst aired, it been hungry for investigative such as Consumerworld.org. This drove millions of was viewed by 578,000 people in the Los Angeles reporting,” said Bob Long, people to KNBC’s Web site, www.nbc4.tv. area. Since then, about fi ve million people across Currently, the story has had 2.3 million page the country have viewed our investigation on the KNBC news director. views on our Web site, making it the most watched Internet. Clearly, the Internet is delivering a huge “Now with the Web, they story ever on KNBC’s site. When we include unau- untapped audience for TV investigations. thorized circulation on numerous other sites, such “Viewers have always been hungry for inves- don’t have to sit through as YouTube.com, the number of viewers swells to tigative reporting,” said Bob Long, KNBC news an entire newscast to an estimated fi ve million. director. “Now, with the Web, they don’t have to Explaining its popularity, Bonnie Buck, man- sit through an entire newscast to get it.” get it.” aging editor of KNBC’s Web site, said: “The Jiffy In some ways, our mechanic investigation was Lube investigation potentially affects everyone a classic local consumer expose. It uncovered A few days after it aired, I realized something who has a car because it’s in almost every neigh- wrongdoing at Jiffy Lube, the nation’s largest lube big was happening: The story was being spread borhood in America.” and tune chain, which serves 30 million customers “virally” across the Internet, meaning the story’s per year. Acting on a tip from an insider, we caught link was being spread to e-mail distribution lists Treasure trove some L.A. Jiffy Lube locations charging customers and posted on other Web sites, drawing in more Before the story, the KNBC site had fallen to third among TV station Web sites in the L.A. market. Today it’s ranked number one. “Undoubtedly, the reason we got back on top is a direct result of the mechanic story,” Buck said. The Internet is a great venue for investigative reporters to showcase their work. It allows them to present their investigations in far greater detail than on the airwaves. “A Web site is the place for an investigative story to really shine,” Buck said. “A Web site isn’t going to tell a reporter to keep their story to three minutes. We’ll give you as much time and space to tell your story as you need.” Further, most stations’ sites will allow a longer Web version of the story with elements and infor- mation that couldn’t be included on air. When we realized there was such high interest in the mechanic investigation, we decided to offer viewers an entire page dedicated to the Jiffy Lube story (www.nbc4.tv/mechanicinvestigation/index). It contained the original investigation, plus mate- rial that normally would have ended up on the cutting room fl oor, such as a longer version of our insider interview and the complete statements When KNBC-Los Angeles fi rst asked whether local Jiffy Lube mechanics were cheating customers, the company’s we received from the Jiffy Lube corporation. We corporate leaders refused interview requests. After the Web exposure generated more news coverage, the president of Jiffy Lube International went on the record with Joel Grover and apologized for the wrongdoing discovered in also shot and added new elements, such as a back the investigation, although he declined an on-camera interview. story of Goldberg explaining how we wired our

18 THE IRE JOURNAL FEATURES test cars with hidden cameras and a discussion board where Jiffy Lube customers could share Lead on the Cincinnati Health Department’s failure to force their experiences. 300 property owners to clean up lead hazards. There We kept updating the investigation page with CONTINUED FROM PAGE 17 was the main story, a story about a family, two issue follow-up reports and new information, so it was child’s name, but the health department countered stories and a story about how we got the records. constantly changing. This kept viewers coming by saying an address could lead us to a child. What Reaction was swift. The mayor asked the City back to the Web site again and again. was behind the denial? Council’s Education, Health and Recreation Com- All of this exposure on the Web offers reporters Throughout the battle over the records, my editor, mittee to look at the issue. Two days after our story more than just turbocharged viewership. In this Joe Fenton, and I never knew what the records would ran, the health committee called on the health depart- case, it generated hundreds of e-mails to me from reveal. Lead projects in other newspapers led us to ment to answer why the problem had been allowed Jiffy Lube customers and employees in 17 states. think we would fi nd a group of errant landlords or to languish. The health department promised to clean Those e-mails were a treasure trove of tips and at least discover where the lead-tainted properties up all 300 properties by the end of the year. new information that allowed me to do important were located. While the council was in recess over the summer, follow-up stories. Many of these viewers told me It took another month to actually get the records. the health committee held three public hearings to that the same type of wrongdoing I’d uncovered What we got in return wasn’t so much a database as invite doctors, property owners and experts to give at the L.A. Jiffy Lube was occurring in other parts it was the kind of spreadsheet you’d expect to fi nd their views on what should be done. of the country. So, I asked NBC stations around when it’s used by someone who keeps the system The committee drew up a plan to eradicate lead the country to interview some of the people who in one’s head. The disposition of many closed cases poisoning. Three months after the story was pub- e-mailed me. Months after my fi rst Jiffy Lube wasn’t fully explained, the property’s ownership lished, the City Council enacted a nine-point plan report, I aired a follow-up showing that there wasn’t kept up-to-date, and some of the addresses that includes requiring the city’s legal department to might be wrongdoing at Jiffy Lube stores across didn’t exist. There were few uniform codes. develop an avenue to prosecute building owners who the country. After some cleaning by reporter Greg Korte, do not abate lead or disclose known lead hazards to Clearly the wide exposure our investigation we were able to map 98 percent of the addresses renters or buyers. was getting on the Web got the attention of Jiffy using Arcview 9.1. The reports were aggregated by It also lowers the level of lead poisoning at Lube executives. When our fi rst report aired, Jiffy census tract (to fi nd demographic data), and then by which the health department takes corrective action. Lube refused to do an interview responding to our neighborhood (because no one knows what census Currently, the health department takes action when fi ndings and stood fi rm in their refusal to talk for tract they live in). a child’s blood-test results indicate 14 micrograms months. They simply issued written statements to A day’s worth of analysis boiled down to just of lead per deciliter of blood or higher. The national respond to each report and follow-up. one sentence in the fi nal story: “Sixty-nine percent recommendation is to act at 10. The proposal before But, several months later, as we were about to of properties suspected as sources of lead poisoning the council lowers it to between fi ve and 10, making air a follow-up that was national in scope, Jiffy were in areas with a median household income of it among the lowest levels of action in the country. Lube did an about-face. A spokesperson admitted less than $27,000.” The health department continues to take action. to me that Jiffy Lube had no idea this story would The project, a fi ve-page special section, focused CONTINUED ON PAGE 34 spread like wildfi re across the Internet. The day before my September follow-up aired, the presi- dent of Jiffy Lube International, Luis Scoffone, THE Rosalynn Carter Fellowships FOR MENTAL HEALTH JOURNALISM got on a plane and fl ew from Houston to L.A. to do an interview with me. He began the interview “This program is an exciting component by “personally apologizing” for the wrongdoing KNBC had uncovered at his stores, and he laid out of our efforts to reduce stigma and steps the company was taking to prevent future discrimination against those with mental problems. illnesses. I look forward to working with Bright future each of our fellows to promote awareness Even though television’s share of news consum- of these important issues.” ers may continue to decline, executives at KNBC —Rosalynn Carter don’t foresee the demise of enterprise reporting. “The future for investigative reporting is bright,” he Carter Center in Atlanta, Ga., said Long. Tannounces six one-year journalism Still, he adds that more and more viewers fellowships of $10,000 each. Designed to will be getting their investigations in the digital The application deadline is April 23, enhance public understanding of mental health domain. 2007. To apply, e-mail: issues and combat stigma and discrimination “The future of investigative reporting is on Rebecca G. Palpant, M.S. the Web and other digital services, such as iPod The Carter Center against people with mental downloads,” he said. Mental Health Program illnesses, the fellowships Long says he even foresees a day when view- [email protected] begin in September ers, hungry for more investigative and enterprise www.cartercenter.org/health/mental_ 2007. Fellows will not reporting, will “pay per view” to see investigative health/fellowships/index.html reports. be required to leave their current employment. Joel Grover is an investigative reporter at KNBC- Los Angeles. For more information, see www.cartercenter.org

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 19 Patriot-News The |

MilletteChristopher

EnergyEnergy && UtilitiesUtilities ENERGY AND UTILITIES IN A COMMUNITY INVOLVE MORE THAN LIGHT BULBS AND TAP WATER. WHEN THE POWER SUPPLY FOR HOMES AND BUSINESSES IS INVOLVED, YOU ALSO CAN COUNT ON POLITICS, BUSINESS AND MONEY BEING PART OF THE EQUATION. THAT’S WHY INVES- TIGATIONS OF THE SUPPLY-AND-DEMAND TRAIL CAN BE SO CHALLENGING. C O V E R S T O R Y n the classic Saturday Night Live sketch “The Increasing IPepsi Syndrome,” comedian Richard Benjamin demand for explains to the world how the complicated process of nuclear fi ssion is used to boil water to make power requires electricity “so you can make toast.” The skit aired nine days after the March 28, closer look at 1979, accident that destroyed the Unit-2 reactor at Three Mile Island and gave a nervous nation a nuclear energy chance to laugh after a harrowing week. At the industry time, the worldʼs attention was focused on the nuclear plant and whether a hydrogen bubble inside the containment building would result in a BY GARRY LENTON release of deadly radiation. THE (HARRISBURG, PA.) PATRIOT-NEWS Up until then, few reporters were paying attention to nuclear energy. It was a trusted technology, an atoms-for-peace initiative that migrated out of the U.S. Navy’s nuclear program. Many of the nuclear engineers who helped get the nation’s commercial nuclear power plants up and running came from the Navy’s program. We were naive. The accident changed that. In the decades that fol- Nuclear Waste: Itʼs hard lowed, the nuclear industry came under scrutiny from government regulators, watchdog groups, the media to believe that an industry that has been and the public. Then, the Russian reactor at Cher- nobyl caught fi re seven years later. The two events around for more than 40 years still doesnʼt left the industry with two black eyes that lasted into the 21st century. No one was ordering new plants. The have a permanent place to store its waste, legal battles over new sites and fi nding investors to fi nance a project would be tough, if not impossible. but itʼs true. The U.S. Department of Energy Not anymore. Demand for electricity is rising; concerns about pollution from coal-fi red power plants is developing a site at Yucca Mountain in are escalating, and the public, which is fed up with rising oil prices and a sense that the U.S. is too dependent on Nevada, but it is a long way from completion. the goodwill of Middle Eastern despots for sweet crude, is beginning to soften its view. Operating licenses are Until it opens, the highly radioactive spent being renewed, new plants are being ordered and the time for journalists to start paying closer attention to this billion- dollar industry is now. fuel is stored in deep pools of water or Nuclear issues cut across several beats – environment, public safety, business and labor, to name a few. If you’re not covering in casks at the plants. nuclear, now is a good time to start. Here’s a look ahead at some issues worth exploring: Re-licensing: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission over- 3Reactor Two at the Three Mile Island nuclear power facility sees all aspects of the industry and licenses commercial nuclear was shut down 30 years ago following a partial meltdown plants. Licenses are good for 40 years, but 20-year extensions in the reactor core. That event, along with the Chernobyl disaster in the former Soviet Union, fueled public resistance are available. toJ expandingANUARY nuclear/FEBRUARY power resources, 2007 but today’s fossil fuel 2121 concerns have prompted a new look at this alternative. C O V E R S T O R Y

There are 103 operating reactors in the U.S. tion can be found at the Nuclear Energy Institute’s Government Accountability Offi ce, the investiga- at 64 sites in 31 states. More than half were built Web site, www.nei.org. The NEI is a Washington, tive arm of Congress, issued a report criticizing the before 1979, and their licenses will expire in the D.C.-based industry group. NRC for not setting the security bar high enough. next decade. It is expected that most owners will Aging: Nobody really knows how long a plant The GAO reported that the NRC appeared to have ask for an extension. Nuclear sources provide about can run before it is considered “old,” though there reduced its requirements after industry offi cials 20 percent of the nation’s electricity and 16 percent are debates and concerns. Congress settled on complained they would be too expensive. worldwide. Without it, the nation would have to fi nd the 40-year license based on economic and anti- Lawsuits also can shed light on security a way to replace the supply. Reliance on nuclear trust considerations, not technical specifi cations. strengths. Earlier this year, security offi cers at power is heaviest in the East, where most of the Still, it’s largely uncharted territory and worth Three Mile Island fi led a civil suit against their plants are located. In Vermont, 72 percent of the monitoring. employer, Wackenhut. The class action listed the electricity supply comes from nuclear power. In “We know that unless it’s managed properly, names of 78 plaintiffs, a number more than twice New Jersey and South Carolina, it’s 52 percent. aging can be a problem,” said Richard Barrett, the last known size of the security force. Companies start preparing to re-license about director of the NRC’s division of engineering in Public safety: There are many things that can 10 years before their current license expires. If the Offi ce of Nuclear Reactor Management, in a go wrong at a nuclear plant, but it’s the problems the owners aren’t ready to go public with their 2004 interview. The key, Barrett said, is strong that can result in a radiation release that concern plans, there is one strong indicator of their inten- oversight and maintenance. the public most. All plants are required to have tions – investment. Replacing a vessel head, or The media should play a role in monitoring emergency plans for dealing with a radiation release. steam generators, are $100 million projects, not the oversight by the NRC and the maintenance by Those plans extend for a radius of 10 miles around something a company would want to do in a plant the plant operators. To start, regularly review the each facility; the NRC calls this the Emergency it expects to retire in the next decade. NRC’s Event Notifi cation Reports, a daily listing Preparedness Zone, or EPZ. The licensing process The re-licensing process is described in detail of any reportable event at a plant. If a problem has requires it. on the NRC’s Web site, www.nrc.gov. been reported at a plant, it will show up here fi rst. These plans are public documents worth Information about each plant and how nuclear Keep an eye out for mechanical failures. The worst exploring. Crucial to each is how the surrounding energy compares to other forms of power genera- would be those that force the plant to shut down. communities would handle an evacuation. Check Sign up for e-mail notifi cation of NRC press on how local and state agencies plan to evacuate WEB SITESSITES releases through the link on the agency’s home so-called “special populations.” This category page. includes prisons, hospitals, nursing homes and •• U.S.U.S. NuclearNuclear RegulaRegulatorytory Commission:Commission: Get familiar with the NRC’s agency-wide Docu- schools. In Pennsylvania, questions have been www.nrc.gov www.nrc.gov ments Access and Management System, or ADAMS. raised about how children in day care centers and -- Daily eventevent reportsreports This online database allows you to quickly search nursery schools would be evacuated. The president -- PublicPublic readingreading roomroom and download documents. ADAMS also allows of the state’s day care association says she prays -- SubmitSubmit FOIAFOIA rrequestsequests you to see comments being fi led on proposed rule there is no need for an evacuation because her -- SubscribeSubscribe ttoo e-maile-mail newsnews rreleaseseleases changes. Visit www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/ industry isn’t ready. web-based.html, or follow the “Electronic Reading Sources to check with include: emergency man- INDUSTRYINDUSTRY GROUPSGROUPS Room” link from the NRC home page. agement offi cials at the federal, state, county and Brain Drain: The loss of experienced operators local levels; the Federal Emergency Management •• NuclearNuclear EnergyEnergy Institute:Institute: is a rising concern among regulators, watchdog Agency; and local emergency offi cials, police agen- www.nei.org.nei.org groups and the industry. Those nuclear Navy guys cies and elected leaders. Harrisburg’s long-time -- StatisticsStatistics are getting older and increasingly ready to leave mayor, Stephen R. Reed, has been openly skeptical -- Access toto expertsexperts insideinside thethe industrindustryy for a life of travel and golf. Many likely will be of emergency planning. -- NationalNational perspective able to continue working part time as consultants Nuclear Waste: It’s hard to believe that an unless nuclear engineering becomes more popular industry that has been around for more than 40 WATCHDOG GROUPSGROUPS among incoming college freshman. Talk to local years still doesn’t have a permanent place to store plant executives and ask how many seasoned its waste, but it’s true. The U.S. Department of •• NuclearNuclear ControlControl Institute:Institute: control room operators they expect to retire in the Energy is developing a site at Yucca Mountain in www.nci.org.nci.org next 10 years. Nevada, but it is a long way from completion. Until •• UnionUnion ofof CConcerned Scientists:Scientists: Security: Since the Sept. 11 terror attacks, it opens, the highly radioactive spent fuel is stored www.ucsusa.org.ucsusa.org companies such as Exelon, a U.S. electricity pro- in deep pools of water or in casks at the plants. How much storage space does your plant have •• ThreeThree MileMile IslandIsland AAlert:lert: vider with one of the largest commercial nuclear left? What do they plan to do to create more, and www.tmia.com.tmia.com operations, have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in security upgrades. The plants look more how much will it cost? Who will pay for the expan- •• PProjectroject onon GGovernment Oversight:Oversight: like prisons than utilities with miles of concrete bar- sion – ratepayers? www.pogo.org www.pogo.org riers, double layers of high-tech fencing, extensive These are just a few of the topics open for •• NuclearNuclear InfInformation andand ResourResourcece Service:Service: vehicle checks and guard towers. They have also, examination by any reporter whose community or www.nirs.org.nirs.org by most estimates, doubled the number of security state plays host to a nuclear power plant. •• EEyeye onon Wackenhut: offi cers whose job it is to repel terror attacks or www.eyeonwackenhut.com.eyeonwackenhut.com sabotage. Are the upgrades enough to protect an Garry Lenton is the computer-assisted reporting •• SiteSite maintainedmaintained byby thethe SServiceervice EmployeesEmployees industry that the Bush administration says has coordinator for The (Harrisburg, Pa.) Patriot- InInternationalternational UnionUnion ffocusesocuses onon thethe intinterna-erna- been targeted by terrorists? That’s an ongoing News. He has covered Three Mile Island and tionaltional securitsecurityy fifi rm,rm, Wackenhut,Wackenhut, whichwhich holdsholds debate because the NRC will no longer make public related issues since 1992. To read coverage of the ccontractsontracts toto guardguard severalseveral nuclearnuclear plantsplants.. information about security requirements. 25th Anniversary of the accident at TMI go to www. Information has dribbled out. Recently, the pennlive.com/news/tmi.shtml

22 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

The chief spokesman looked at me like I was from Mars (the authority FertileFertile groundground had never been asked for electronic data before), but he ultimately gave me a disk with 26,000 records in fi xed-width ASCII format along with an utterly pointless 500-page printout of the same data. My resulting story documented that demand on LIPA’s system, which then had a maximum capacity of 4,600 megawatts, had exceeded 4,000 forfor utilityutility megawatts during just 16 hours in the previous year. The data allowed me to explain to readers that new power plants, always unpopular with residents, wouldn’t be needed if the utility and its customers could fi nd ways to cut investigationsinvestigations electric usage during those few peak hours. Looking at trends Over the ensuing years on the beat, I would turn to databases and public documents from countless sources to fact-check industry offi cials and usingusing sources,sources, investigate a wide range of issues, from fuel costs and pollution to utility salaries and the impact of deregulation on the energy industry. In fact, few beats have more data and public documents readily available to the reporter who knows where to fi nd them and – this is the hard part – how to decipher the incredibly arcane terminology of the industry. databasesdatabases andand Untangling the inner workings of electric utilities got that much harder after the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) prodded many states to deregulate their utilities. Deregulation involved breaking up the electric monopolies that historically owned every piece of the systems FOIFOI lawslaws – the power plants, the high-voltage transmission lines that moved the juice over long distances and the low-voltage distribution circuits that feed kilowatts to users. In states where deregulation was enacted, including New York, utilities were typically forced to sell their power plants to independent fi rms and BY TOM MCGINTY open their wires to competitors who would purchase bulk power on newly established exchanges and try to sell it to utilities’ customers. Proponents of NEWSDAY deregulation said the newly competitive landscape would lead to effi cien- cies and lower rates that the stodgy monopolies of yesterday could never match. But as New York Times reporter David Cay Johnston noted in a recent series of articles, that promise has not been realized. “A decade after competition was introduced in their industries, long- distance phone rates had fallen by half, air fares by more than a fourth n July 2001, just a month after I was hired by Newsday and and trucking rates by a fourth,” Johnston wrote in October. “But, a decade after the federal government opened the business of generating electricity assigned to the utilities beat, the Long Island Power Authority, to competition, the market has produced no such decline.” I This is fertile ground for utility beat writers, and all the information they need to piece together what has happened in their states is readily or LIPA, announced that it had to build new power plants available. The fi rst stop should be the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration, which maintains dozens of databases with across the island because increasing demand by residents and thousands of measurements of every facet of the electric industry. For example, the annual database created from form EIA-826 contains monthly businesses would soon surpass the available supply. sales fi gures for most utilities in the nation. As of this writing, it is available from 1990 through July 2006 in dBASE format, which is easily imported into Access or Excel. Talking to experts about the issue, I learned that utilities in Using that data, a reporter could quickly piece together the cost-per- kilowatt trend for his local utility over a decade and also compare it to the Northeast typically have plenty of kilowatts to go around other trends for other utilities. Other EIA databases include one that tracks utilities’ conservation on all but the hottest days of the year when air conditioners efforts (known as “demand-side management” in industry parlance) and another that documents the cost and quality of fuel burned in certain power plants. cause huge spikes in demand. I was curious about changes in I used the latter database in March to examine whether LIPA’s soaring rates really could be blamed on the cost of power plant fuel, as the utility demand on LIPAʼs system over time, so I asked the utility for claimed. My analysis found that, “In 1999, the main KeySpan Corp. power plants under contract to LIPA generated 11.6 million megawatt hours of electricity, about 56 percent of LIPA’s total energy sales, and racked up a three yearsʼ worth of hourly readings in electronic format. fuel bill of $327 million, according to FERC data. Last year, the total from

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 23 C O V E R S T O R Y LINKS those same plants dropped to 10.7 million megawatt gross misuse of ratepayers’ money. • EnergyEnergy InformationInformation AdministrationAdministration databases:databases: hours, or 49 percent of LIPA’s total, but their fuel bill Although FOI laws can help reporters gather www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/data.html.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/data.html was $847 million– more than two and a half times as information about government-run utilities, • FERCFERC Dockets: high as in 1999.” they’re of no use to those who are writing about http://elibrary.ferc.gov/idmws/search/fercadvsearch.asp investor-owned utilities. Instead, they must turn • NationalNational AssociationAssociation ofof StateState UtilityUtility Advocates:Advocates: Asking questions to the numerous regulatory fi lings that utilities www.nasuca.org.nasuca.org Of course, databases alone won’t be enough to must submit even in the wake of deregulation. • EPA National-ScaleNational-Scale AirAir ToxicsToxics Assessment:Assessment: fully investigate your local utility or the impact of For example, if a utility wants to raise its www.epa.gov/ttn/atw/natamain.epa.gov/ttn/atw/natamain deregulation, but there is also a wealth of documents rates, it typically must fi le what is known as a • New YorkYork IndependentIndependent SystemSystem Operator:Operator: available at the state and federal levels. “rate case” with the state commission that regu- LIPA, the main utility I covered, is an entity of the lates utilities. The utility seeking the increase www.nyiso.org/public/index.jsp state and therefore not subject to oversight by federal must fi le a host of supporting documents and or state regulators. That means the authority doesn’t submit to questions and document requests from fi le many of the reports required of investor-owned interested parties. utilities, but it also means that LIPA is subject to the When it comes to rate cases in New York, my fi rst Mining data state’s Freedom of Information Law. stop for insights and tips is Gerald Norlander, executive Another source of information on utilities I made liberal use of FOI requests, and I obtained director of the Public Utility Law Project, or PULP, an are the so-called “system operators” that operate payroll data, contracts and other documents. In 2003, organization whose sole purpose is protecting the rights the energy markets created by deregulation and after learning that LIPA regularly conducted surveys of low-income and rural utility customers. oversee the reliable fl ow of electricity on their ter- of its customers, I fi led a FOI request for copies of Norlander said a rate case is “like a little window ritories’ high-voltage power lines. The New York the results. I can still see the funny look LIPA’s chief into large corporations that we don’t normally see. Independent System Operator maintains scores of spokesman had on his face as he reluctantly slid four They have to leave tracks, and they have to come public databases and documents everything from thick binders to me across a conference room table. in and justify what they’re doing. We get to ask utility-level power demand to bids and sales on the Their remarkable contents led to a cover story head- questions. electric market. lined, “Power and Politics; LIPA’s polls focused on Reporters looking for similar experts in their states The system operator’s Web site also allows access its performance – and politicians’.” can consult the Web site of the National Association to meeting materials of the various committees that The story noted that, “The Long Island Power of State Utility Advocates. oversee the system. Earlier this year, I used several Authority, a state-run utility whose board is controlled Another rich source of documents is the FERC’s presentations from one of those committees to docu- by appointees of Gov. George Pataki, commissioned docket-search Web site. If, for example, a reporter ment a fl aw in New York City’s energy market that opinion polls that included questions about the wanted to research the deregulation of his local utility, allowed three large generating fi rms to keep prices popularity of the governor, Sen. Hillary Rodham a process that must be approved by FERC, he or she artifi cially high. Clinton and more than a dozen other elected offi cials could probably fi nd a docket with dozens or hundreds Pollution, obviously, is another important issue to and politicians.” In all, a third of the questions were of documents submitted by all of the interested parties examine on the utility beat, and there is no shortage of political in nature, which critics said constituted a on this Web site. data to mine for stories on this topic. In 2002, I ana- lyzed state and federal emissions databases, including the Environmental Protection Agency’s “National- Scale Air Toxics Assessment,” for a story about local Announcing the power plants’ impact on the air Long Islanders breathe. 2007 PHILLIPS FOUNDATION The data showed that the much-maligned power plants lagged far behind cars and other sources when it came JOURNALISM FELLOWSHIPS to creating smog. They also contributed less than 1 percent of the deadly substances tracked by the EPA’s WORKING JOURNALISTS ELIGIBLE FOR $50,000 Toxics Assessment. If you are a working print journalist with less than five years of professional experience, As one offi cial from the New York Department a unique opportunity awaits – the chance to apply for year-long $50,000 full-time and of Environmental Conservation said, “I would say $25,000 part-time journalism fellowships. [power plants are] part of the problem, but they’re not as large a part of the problem as people perceive Founded in 1990, the Phillips Foundation is a non-profit organization whose purpose them to be, based on the numbers.” is to advance the cause of objective journalism. The Foundation’s fellowship program On Long Island, where power plants burn oil or serves to provide support for journalists who share the Foundation’s mission: to advance natural gas, the story was that power plants aren’t as constitutional principles, a democratic society and a vibrant free enterprise system. bad as everyone thinks. However, in the parts of the Winners undertake a one-year project of their choosing focusing on journalism support- country where coal is used to produce most of the ive of American culture and a free society. In addition, there are separate fellowships on electricity, the fi ndings could be quite a bit different. the environment, American history, and law enforcement. Applications are now being accepted for 2007. Applications must be postmarked by March 1, 2007. The winners Tom McGinty is a staff writer on Newsday’s investi- will be announced at an awards dinner in Washington, in the spring. The fellowships will gative team. As Newsday’s energy reporter, he was a begin on September 1, 2007. Applicants must be U.S. citizens. leader on the team that covered the 2003 blackout that darkened large swaths of the United States and For applications and more information, visit our website or write: Mr. John Farley Canada. The coverage was a fi nalist for the 2004 • The Phillips Foundation • One Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Suite 620, Washington, DC 20001 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news. He previously served • Telephone 202-250-3887, ext. 609 • Email: [email protected] • www.thephillipsfoundation.org as the training director for IRE and NICAR and as a Deadline: March 1, 2007 reporter for the Times of Trenton in New Jersey.

24 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

EnergyEnergy

andand UtilityUtility Past issues of The IRE Journal have stories by journalists exploring their investigations into energy and utility issues. Those include: • “Blackout: Power Shortages, Interruptions Could ResourcesResources Become More Common Story,” The IRE Journal staff. This article summarizes resources for jour- nalists covering blackouts, the energy industry and related regulation. (July/Aug. 2004) • “More daunting tests ahead pitting ‘right to know’ against ‘need to know,’” Charles Davis, f youʼre interested in doing an and its results, and how companies bid on lucra- The Freedom of Information Center. Davis, asso- tive energy deals behind closed doors. David ciate professor at the Missouri School of Journal- investigation on utilities or energy, Lazarus, Bernadette Tansey, Susan Sward, Chris- ism, discusses the balance between secrecy and I tian Berthelsen, Scott Winokur, Carla Marinucci, open information regarding energy in post-9/11 Patrick Hoge, Stacey Finz, Carolyn Said, Kevin America. (Jan/Feb 2004) check out these stories, tipsheets and Fagan, San Francisco Chronicle. (2000) • “Federal commission changing access rules to • Story No. 17584: Utility cutbacks of overnight avoid FOIA guidelines,” Charles Davis, The personnel increase emergency response times. Freedom of Information Center and Missouri resources available from the IRE Resource Emergency services are frequently delayed while School of Journalism. Davis examines a new waiting for utility crews to shut off power or gas, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rule Center (www.ire.org/resourcecenter): and in several cases, fi re chiefs attributed losses that could restrict access to information about to the utilities’ actions. Jean Kessner, Marty the infrastructure of the energy industry and • Story No. 22241: An investigation into the pro- Sicilia, WIXT-Syracuse. (2000) predicts that other agencies will adopt similar posed sale of Portland General Electric revealed rules. (Jan/Feb 2003) inside information that sank the deal. Internal Tipsheets • “Radioactive Waste,” Lisa Davis, San Francisco’s documents showed the Texas Pacific Group, • No. 2706: “Sexier Than You Think: Investigat- SF Weekly. Davis and John Mecklin discuss which planned to buy PGE, intended to resell the ing Electric Utilities,” Nigel Jaquiss, Willamette mishandling of radioactive material at the Naval utility. Nigel Jaquiss, Willamette Week (Portland, Week. This tipsheet offers tips for reporters Radiological Defense Laboratory. They discov- Ore.). (2005) covering utilities on how to fi nd sources and ered that radioactive material had been dumped • Story No. 22240: The Department of Water and relevant documents. It also includes information in San Francisco Bay, radioactive fuel had been Power in Los Angeles is beset by price gouging, on possible confl icts between consumers and burned and radioactive scrap metal was sold to dysfunctional management, extortion and poor shareholders. private companies. (July/Aug 2002) worksmanship. This series follows a previous • No. 1631: “Energy and Environment,” Mike report about racial discrimination at the utility Taugher, Contra Costa Times (Walnut Creek, Finally, these databases are available through company. Jeffrey Anderson, LA Weekly. (2005) Calif.). This tipsheet lists 13 Web sites with the National Institute for Computer-Assisted • Story No. 22051: In the 1970s, a Texas company information on energy, environmental issues and Reporting (www.ire.org/datalibrary/): installed 750 miles of faulty gas pipes. Thirty energy companies. • Nuclear Materials Events Database: NMED years later, the pipes exploded, killing five • No. 1630: “Energy and the Environment – Mining provides records of all non-commercial power people. Questions were asked about why the for Coal Stories,” Ken Ward, Jr., The Charleston reactor incidents involving radioactive byprod- faulty pipes were initially installed and why no (W. Va.) Gazette. This tipsheet offers advice on ucts. This database has 15 tables with entries one repaired them earlier. R. A. Dyer, Fort Worth investigating coal, emphasizing environmental from 1990 to 2005, including the basic record of Star-Telegram. (2004) impact. It also includes a list of useful Web sites events, abnormal occurences and what radioac- • Story No. 18257: After examining energy with energy-related information. tive materials were involved. defi ciencies in Illinois, Ohio and New York, • No. 1620: “Useful Web Sites for Energy Infor- • OSHA Workplace Safety Data: This Occupa- the reporter concludes that the energy crisis in mation and Electric and Gas Business News,” tional Safety and Health Administration database California isn’t unique. Electricity doesn’t obey Arthur O’Donnell, California Energy Markets. contains inspection records for all U.S. states supply and demand laws, so deregulation leads This tipsheet lists Web sites related to numerous and territories from 1972 until February 2006. to unnecessarily complex and ineffi cient energy aspects of energy investigations, such as regula- It also offers information on workers injured in markets. Merrill Goozner, American Prospect. tory data, legal information and restructuring on-the-job accidents. (2001) status around the U.S. • Toxics Release Inventory: The TRI is a good • Story No. 18185: A 10-month examination • No. 1369: “Environmental CAR: 10 Great database for investigating polluters in the com- of California’s energy crisis reveals political Sources of Data,” Ken Ward, Jr., The Charleston munity. It provides information on a variety of manipulations during talks between energy (W. Va.) Gazette. This tipsheet provides 10 sources topics, including toxic chemical identity, waste companies and state and federal regulators. The of data useful for reporters investigating water and treatment and recycling activities, among other reporters also study deregulation in other states air quality, pollution and energy usage. things.

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 25 C O V E R S T O R Y WATER WORRIES adison, Wis., has long been known for its M progressive politics and its environmental Aging waterwater systemsystem fl owsows awareness. The city regularly makes top 10 lists of the best places in the country to live and is noted for with contamination;contamination; everything from schools to bike trails to the lakes that shine from just about any vantage point. little ofoffi cialcial oversight That reputation is largely deserved. I’ve lived in the city for 30 years and know that Madison is a beautiful place to live, work and raise a family. And water defi nes the landscape from the chain of lakes on which the city is built to the trout streams that beckon of costs,costs, maintenancemaintenance anglers just a 10-minute drive from downtown. So, it was a shock when, after just a couple weeks of nosing around for a story on the Madison Water Utility and the manage- ment of the city’s drinking water supply, I started turning up information that seemed very much at odds with the community’s squeaky clean resume. A story that started with residents complaining about discol- BY RON SEELY ored water fl owing from their faucets would eventually turn into WISCONSIN STATE JOURNAL a four-part series called “Water Worries’’ that found numerous contaminants, including viruses, in the deep aquifer from which the city draws its drinking water. My investigation revealed an aging and decrepit water system that increased the perils of contamination, a renegade public utility that received little or no oversight from the city and managers who were less than forthright about everything from carcinogens and bacteria in the water to the security of wells and water towers. I had plenty to report. But, in addition to revealing the results of my digging, I also wanted to explain to Madison residents where their drinking water comes from, how it gets to their homes and how the utility that manages the water oper- Journal After the fi rst story on manganese, I ates. Such a foundation seemed started hearing from residents – dozens and necessary if readers were to fully understand our fi ndings. So, the series turned into a unique blend

State Wisconsin dozens of them. Young parents called to tell me

|

of investigative and explanatory

III reporting complete with graph- they worried about their children drinking the water ics, interactive maps and charts

Jackson that brought to life the workings and had stopped using tap water completely. of a public utility that operates, like most utilities, with little or no W. Joseph Others called with stories about how poorly they attention from the public. Although they are rich repositories of stories, had been treated by those working for the such utilities are about as visible as the buried water pipes they oversee. water utility. Calls came from workers within Until the spring of 2005, in fact, the Madison Water Utility operated in near the water utility who wanted to provide obscurity. Then, residents from one of the city’s neighborhoods started complaining me information about long-standing about dirty water coming from their taps. The discolored water, it turned out, was from the problems within the agency. mineral manganese, a naturally occurring metal The State Journal fi ndings led some Madison residents, that can cause health problems if ingested in large including Wendy Ward, left, her husband Anders Svanoe, and their son, Jan-Erik, to switch to fi ltered drinking enough amounts over a long period of time. Especially water. at risk are babies and people with liver problems.

26 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

QUICK LOOK Journal Name of series or story, and when it was published: “Water Worries,” April 30-May 3, 2006

State Wisconsin

| How the story got started (tip, assign-

ment, etc.):

Jones We received calls from Madison residents L. saying their water was running black Leah because of the mineral manganese.

Length of time taken to report, write and edit the story: About fi ve months, though I reported on other stories during that time.

Major types of documents used and if FOI requests were needed: Documents included unreleased con- sultant studies from the utility, fi ve years’ worth of test data on spreadsheets, dozens of internal reports and memorandums, spreadsheets with three years of public Madison Water Utility employees spent long hours fl ushing the city’s water mains after residents reported manganese in the water-quality complaint records and water supply. A four-part investigative series found additional contaminants, including viruses, in the deep aquifer from which various national reports on urban water the city draws its drinking water. systems. Most material from the utility was Resident frustrations During my conversations with the utility’s chief engineer, obtained through several open record As the newspaper’s science and environment reporter, I heard him refer several times to an infrastructure study requests. I was assigned to do a story about manganese and what that had been completed the year before for the utility by the city’s water utility was doing to combat the problem. a national consultant. The study had never been released Major types of human sources used: What I discovered in that fi rst story set off alarm bells. publicly, so I asked for a copy of the report and spent several Utility and city offi cials, utility employ- Although it was turning up water nearly blackened by days reading the fat report. ees, residents with water problems and manganese, and although dozens of residents were fi nding After the fi rst story on manganese, I started hearing from national experts on drinking water quality. black chunks of the mineral in their water, the Madison residents – dozens and dozens of them. Young parents Water Utility was doing little at that early stage to alert its customers to the potential dangers of manganese. Instead, the utility told callers that there was no danger and that, climate change even if tap water was cloudy, it was all right to use. Great I spent some time talking to engineers and looking population growth at maps at the water utility’s offi ces. When I asked one resource consumption engineer to explain the city’s system of pumps and wells Global and how water reached homes, he insisted that the system with its pressure zones and 24 wells was too complicated energy to easily explain. I insisted that he try to help me under- Crises public health stand. Over two or three sessions, I developed a thorough understanding of which neighborhoods were served by vanishing water supply which wells, how water pumped from the deep aquifer Boot Camp fl owed through the city and how the water was stored, March 19–23, 2007 • MIT treated and tested for contaminants. Solving the world’s most difficult problems requires But, those early interviews only piqued my interest. After doing a December 2005 story about the utility’s a comprehensive understanding of relevant science response to manganese, I proposed a project in which we and technology. So does covering those problems. would take a hard look at the city’s drinking water and Experts from MIT, Harvard and elsewhere will teach how it was being managed. I started fi ling open record the basics of these interlinked global crises. requests, seeking water-testing data for the previous fi ve Apply by January 15 years for all 24 of the city’s wells and all the records for boot camp fellowships covering regarding public water quality complaints for the previous hotel, most meals, and up to $500 of travel costs. three years. To make the work manageable, we chose four specifi c contaminants we knew had been a problem and then compared the levels detected over the years to the health standards set by the EPA. http://web.mit.edu/knight-science/ • 617-253-3442 • [email protected] JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 27 C O V E R S T O R Y

Performance problems Journal Journal Journal I spent hours interview-

State ing the water-quality spe- cialist with the state Depart- ment of Natural Resources State Wisconsin State Wisconsin Wisconsin

| | |

who was responsible for

regulation of the Madi- III son Water Utility and who Schreiner also had a computer full Jackson

Schreiner Craig of tests and other data that proved invaluable because it allowed me to check W. Joseph utility data against data gathered by the regulatory agency. In addition to investigating contaminants in drinking water, stories This is what I found: explained how the local water system works. Here, hydrologist David • Although contaminants Hart demonstrates how a piece of the Mount Simon sandstone aquifer rarely reach levels beyond soaks up and stores water. health standards, the aquifer is contaminated by numerous pollutants, shelling out closer to $6.5 million. many of them carcinogens. • Based on documents obtained through open record • In four wells, manganese was above requests, as well as interviews with sources inside the health standards recommended by the utility and state regulators, we were able to the EPA. In one well, which serves a confi rm that utility offi cials had failed to track water major city high school, the levels of quality complaints for two years (a violation of state carbon tetrachloride detected during one law), had quarreled with the Department of Natural quarterly test in the year 2000 exceeded Resources about issuing a boil order because of bac- the EPA health standard. teria showing up in tests, had not reported a break-in • I found a study that had identifi ed viruses at a water tower, and failed to report levels of carbon in the city’s wells, which was something tetrachloride that exceeded federal health standards few people knew about. The viruses in one city well. Utility offi cials blamed a typo in detected can cause everything from stom- the water quality report in which the test result was ach problems to the common cold. supposed to appear. • Using spreadsheets, I analyzed fi ve- Within three weeks after the series ran, Madison years worth of test data for fi ve con- Mayor David Cieslewicz announced a 10-point plan taminants, including three industrial to reorganize the city’s water utility and protect the Complaints about tap water darkened by manganese, a potential health carcinogens, manganese and iron, for city’s drinking water. The plan set performance stan- hazard, prompted a look at problems in the Madison Water Utility. all 24 of the city’s wells. Using this data, dards for the utility’s general manager and directed Madison is known as a progressive, environmentally friendly city built along with information from the utility more spending on replacing pipes and wells. Still, around a network of lakes and streams. engineers about which wells serve which the story continues to unfold. The water utility, for neighborhoods, our graphic artist created example, has announced plans to shut down two of called to tell me they worried about their children an interactive map and a chart that allowed readers to the problem wells identifi ed in the series. And the city drinking the water and had stopped using tap water click on the well closest to their home and fi nd out council has approved spending nearly $3 million more completely. Others called with stories about how what levels of the selected contaminants were found in the coming year on replacement of aging pipes. The poorly they had been treated by those working for in it. It was the fi rst time many readers were able to city’s public health director has sought help from the the water utility. Calls came from workers within the identify the well that serves their home, let alone fi nd federal government in studying potential connections water utility who wanted to provide me information out what was in the water. between pollutants such as manganese and illnesses about long-standing problems within the agency. One • The unreleased infrastructure report proved a gold- in the city. especially important source was a resident who fi rst mine of information. We found that the utility’s own Most important, residents in Madison have become brought the manganese problem to the city’s atten- consultant had warned the utility was neglecting to very aware of not only where their drinking water tion and ended up taking on the utility practically spend enough on replacing aging pipes and wells comes from but how it is managed. Hundreds have single-handed. and other infrastructure – problems plaguing utilities turned up for neighborhood meetings on the city’s water All told, I spent nearly five months sorting across the country. In Madison, those aging pipes, problems and city offi cials, in the midst of an election through all of this material, interviewing sources some dating to the late 1800s, were, in fact, partly season, were peppered with questions about water. and traipsing around the city with fl ushing crews and responsible for the manganese, which was building engineers to learn about water and pipes and wells. up inside of them. Ron Seely has been a reporter at the Wisconsin State I sat at many kitchen tables listening to residents • The utility, according to its own consultants, was Journal, the state’s second largest daily, for 28 years talk about their frustrations with their water and the spending only about $200,000 per year to reinvest and has covered science and environment for the news- utility. One elderly woman showed me her laundry, in facilities such as wells, when it should have been paper for nearly 15 years. Seely has won numerous turned brown by the water and said, “If I wanted tan spending closer to $2.5 million. It was spending $2.8 state and national awards for his reporting on water underclothes, I’d buy them that way!” million on pipe replacement when it should have been issues.

28 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y QUICK LOOK We were launching a series of investigative stories on New York’s Empire Zone program, Name of the series or story, and when it was POWER PLAY which rewards businesses creating new jobs published: with incentives, such as full reimbursement “The Great Empire Zone Giveaway” series began of 10 years of the property taxes they pay to Sept. 17 with “Money for Nothing,” the story local governments. Although other states offer about tax breaks awarded to two power compa- Undeserving powerpower similar tax incentives for corporations, the nies. Other stories in the series were published cost of New York’s program had skyrocketed Sept. 24, Oct. 1, Oct. 8, Oct. 22 and Nov. 19.

to a projected $546 million in 2006 from $30 million in 2001. How the story got started (tip, assignment, Even so, New York officials refused to etc.): companies nabnab taxtax Projects Editor John Lammers suggested a series disclose the value of the tax breaks being on the state’s Empire Zone program. Reporter awarded to each of the more than 8,000 busi- Michelle Breidenbach and I analyzed records nesses certifi ed to participate in the Empire and discovered the power companies were get- Zone program. ting the biggest Empire Zone tax breaks. breaks intendedintended toto Doing the homework Length of time taken to report, write and Post-Standard reporter Michelle Breiden- edit the story: bach and I used the Freedom of Information The fi rst FOI request for the series was fi led in reward businessesbusinesses Law to obtain state records that detailed the late August 2005. It took seven or eight months jobs created and tax credits claimed by each to get the records. I spent two to three months Empire Zone business. reporting for this story and others in the series. Using those electronic records, as well as Writing and editing the “Money for Nothing” creating jobsjobs other records, such as property tax payments story on the power companies took about and fi lings with the SEC, we determined that two weeks. two power companies – NRG Energy Inc. of Princeton, N.J., and Reliant Energy Inc. of Major types of documents used and if FOI requests were needed: BY MIKE MCANDREW Houston – had claimed the largest Empire Zone tax credits in 2003. Excel spreadsheets were obtained through THE (SYRACUSE, N.Y.) POST-STANDARD Specifi cally, New York had refunded $22 FOI from the New York State Department of million in local property taxes that NRG had Economic Development. The spreadsheets paid that year for three power plants. To qualify contained 2003 and 2004 data about jobs cre- for that windfall, NRG had added one-half of ated, capital investments made, and tax credits one new full-time equivalent employee. (There claimed by each of the more than 8,000 busi- admit I might have a hard time explaining was no explanation of how this would be done, nesses in the state’s Empire Zones. whether it was a part-time employee or full-time Major type of human sources used: how electricity is made and how it gets to my worker employed part of the year.) Empire Zone offi cials, state tax department offi - I Reliant Energy was not far behind NRG in cials, experts involved in the power industry and terms of a refund. environmental health, state legislature energy computer. While these two electric generators were committee chairmen, accountants. feasting on Empire Zone goodies, New York When I look at my monthly electric bill, I do not have a clue what the assorted fees are for. Post-Standard The | But I could not let those shortcomings stop me from writing a story about how New York is Walts Gary giving one power generator a $22 million-per- year tax break because it created one job.

NRG Energy Inc. of Princeton, N.J. received a $22 million property tax break in 2003 as a participant in New York’s Empire Zone program, designed to promote new jobs.

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 29 C O V E R S T O R Y families were paying the third-highest electric rates in the country. These facts alone promised to give our series a sizzling start, but editor John Lammers pushed me to fi nd out more about these out-of-state power Post-Standard The | companies and their facilities. “We wanted to do more than an audit,” Lammers said. “We wanted to show vividly what New Yorkers were getting for their millions in tax money, to turn Walts Gary facts into a story with color.” As a general assignment reporter, my experience covering power companies consisted of the occasional story on a storm-related power outage. Clearly, I needed to educate myself about the issue. One of our business desk reporters was kind enough to steer me to an offi cial at the state’s power grid so I could learn how the grid works and how the market price is set for kilowatts. I tapped our paper’s environment reporter for the names of offi cials who could give me a quick primer on pollution caused by the companies’ power plants. Using LexisNexis, I researched what other Power-generating companies reaped millions in tax benefi ts under the state’s Empire Zone program while New papers had published about NRG and Reliant Energy. York’s citizens paid the third-highest utility rates in the country. I discovered that Reliant Energy was awaiting trial on federal criminal charges that alleged it conspired the type of fuel each burned and the kilowatts each e-mailed questions to the communications staffs to manipulate the price of electricity in California by unit produced. This helped confi rm that Reliant at both companies. Both companies declined to creating a phony power shortage. I also found out Energy was getting Empire Zone tax credits for answer any of those questions. My requests to tour that Reliant had paid $300 million for the naming some hydropower stations that were 100 years the generating facilities with a photographer also rights of the Houston Astrodome complex, including old. were rejected. Reliant Stadium, where the NFL’s Houston Texans • The Environmental Integrity Project (www. Despite that, I learned a lot about power in play. So, while Reliant was telling New York offi cials environmentalintegrity.org), which included the about one month. By the time I started interview- that it could not make capital improvements to its organization’s annual report that identifi es the ing state offi cials, I could confi dently challenge facilities unless it got the tax breaks, it was spending nation’s dirtiest power plants and those with the one senator’s assertion that giving NRG these tax a fortune on stadium-naming rights. worst emissions. Two of the NRG plants receiving credits benefi ted all New Yorkers because it helped In addition to LexisNexis, I visited the NRG Empire Zone tax breaks were the dirtiest in New NRG generate cheaper kilowatts. (Other sources and Reliant Energy corporate Web sites and numer- York. already had explained to me how the market price ous other Web sites for reliable information about I checked sources that had nothing to do with for electricity was set.) these power companies and the electric market, power, such as New York’s Temporary Lobbying After my story was published in September, I including: Commission (www.nylobby.state.ny.us) and state received phone calls from readers statewide who • The Energy Information Administration (www.eia. Board of Elections (www.elections.state.ny.us). I expressed outrage about the tax breaks being given gov/fuelelectric.html), where I found government found records documenting the companies spend- to the power companies. statistics, including state-by-state comparisons of ing several hundred thousand dollars lobbying state The story also caught the attention of candidates the cost of electricity for residential and commer- offi cials on Empire Zone issues. campaigning for state offi ces. Gubernatorial candi- cial customers. I also discovered that the companies were con- dates discussed their plans for reforming the Empire • The New York Independent System Operator tributing thousands of dollars to state legislators. Zone program and the department that oversees it. (www.nyiso.com), which operates New York’s Some of those same legislators were instrumental A candidate for lieutenant governor recited some power grid. I found the dates when each electric- in blocking proposals to limit the value of Empire of my story’s fi ndings during a radio interview. generating unit in the state was put into service, Zone tax breaks that NRG and Reliant Energy After the elections, it seems likely New York’s could claim. next governor and the legislature will address the Also, NRG Energy and Reliant Energy Empire Zone program’s shortcomings. are both publicly traded companies that A fi nal piece of advice to reporters writing about “We wanted to do more than an file quarterly and annual financial power companies, kilowatts and tax breaks: Keep reports with the U.S. Securities and the writing simple. Your readers will include folks audit,” said editor John Lammers. Exchange Commission. In the SEC fi l- like me who didn’t pay attention in science class. ings, I found information about the “We wanted to show vividly what New companies’ 2005 profi ts and executive Mike McAndrew is a general assignment reporter compensation. at The (Syracuse, N.Y.) Post-Standard. The series Yorkers were getting for their millions on the Empire Zone program can be read at www. Program shortcomings syracuse.com/specialreports. In the July-August in tax money, to turn facts into a story Trying to get NRG and Reliant to issue, Michelle Breidenbach wrote “Lights Out,” answer my questions proved frustrating. detailing The Post-Standard’s investigation of the with color.” Weeks before the story was published, I New York Power Authority.

30 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

The story might have ended there. QUICK LOOK But imagine my surprise when I learned HOOP PERKS Name of the series or story and when it from a brief mention in a colleague’s story that was published: other major businesses in talks with the Kings for “SMUD teamed up on ads; perks defended sponsorship renewals included the Sacramento for county workers,” May 15, 2006 Utility sponsorshipsponsorship Municipal Utility District, or SMUD. The ratepayer-owned utility generates and How the story got started (tip, assign- distributes power to people and businesses in a ment, etc.): 900-square-mile territory in Sacramento County Party of m job is to identify how public and a small portion of Placer County in Northern records research efforts can further of NBANBA teamteam California. It operates a monopoly in the region. enhance our breaking-news coverage. With its $83 million profi t on $1.23 billion in When sports writer Clint Swett reported operating revenue during 2005, SMUD might be that the Sacramento Kings, the city’s a logical target for a professional sports team’s professional basketball team, had lost nets fewfew rewardsrewards sponsorship marketing pitch. But why was the Southwest Airlines as a major sponsor, public utility actually spending ratepayer money Tom Negrete, assistant managing editor on deals with an NBA team? How much had it for sports, and Cathie Anderson, executive already spent and since when? What did it get business editor, wondered about the deals for ratepayersratepayers for the money? involved and why they were not being Internal SMUD documents, obtained through renewed. Were they getting too expensive? the California Public Records Act, soon offered Swett mentioned talks were continuing our readers a look at the Sacramento Kings with the Sacramento Municipal Utility sponsorship agreements. I requested copies of District to renew its sponsorship. Negrete all sponsorship deals the utility had signed with BY ANDREW MCINTOSH and Anderson approved my proposal to go Maloof Sports and Entertainment Inc., the owner after previous SMUD agreements with the THE SACRAMENTO BEE of the Kings, as well as related staff memos. Kings to see how much public money was Within 10 days, the SMUD documents helped spent on such deals and what ratepayers us discover that since 2002 the utility had spent were getting for it. more than $1 million in ratepayers’ money on sponsorship deals with the Kings and its sister Length of time taken to report, write and hen Southwest Airlines dropped its team, the WNBA’s Sacramento Monarchs. edit the story: SMUD paid Maloof Sports and Entertain- About 12 days spread over four months ment $428,532 during the 2002-03 season and an sponsorship deal with the NBAʼs Sacra- additional $497,816 during the 2003-04 season. W Major types of documents used and if The sum dropped to $119,605 during the 2004-05 FOI requests were needed: mento Kings, Sacramento Bee editors wondered season, according to contracts the utility signed. Copies of three separate sponsorship Such numbers were surprising enough, but contracts signed between SMUD and what such deals included, how much they cost and details of the contracts also offered a rare glimpse Maloof Sports and Entertainment Inc. into the NBA team’s advertising and sponsorship between 2002 and 2005 were obtained dealings and the hospitality perks that go with under the California Public Records Act. whether they possibly were getting too pricey even such agreements, which usually are not disclosed SMUD also provided staff reports and other publicly. PowerPoint presentations and memos for major corporations. The fi rst two years of the deals gave SMUD the about what the utility called its “partnership exclusive rights to Kings receptions, suite nights deals.” for several regular-season games and four tickets The Kings billionaire owners, infamously tight- for all Monarchs regular-season home games. Major types of human sources used: Furthermore, there was radio, print and Internet Senior offi cials in the Sacramento County lipped about much of their off-court business advertising that promoted SMUD’s energy conser- Department of Human Assistance vation and renewable energy programs. confi rmed that their employees received dealings, sidestepped most questions about their We learned that Sacramento County Depart- Kings game tickets and hospitality perks ment of Human Assistance (DHA) employees from SMUD as an “incentive” to sign up enjoyed one of the suite nights and several recep- low-income people for SMUD’s discount sponsorship deals, saying they were confi dential. tions. The utility company gave game tickets, food programs. Sports marketing experts, an and free parking at Arco Arena as an incentive for industry group, a university ethicist and Besides, they were still negotiating renewals with DHA workers to recruit low-income people for ordinary SMUD ratepayers discussed SMUD’s discount power programs, which allow whether these deals were appropriate. eligible customers a discount of more than 30 several other fi rms. percent on their monthly bill. Our investigation also found that no other public utility in the United States has had a similar deal with an NBA basketball team, a fact

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 31 C O V E R S T O R Y confi rmed by James Santomier, a sports manage- efforts and strategic policies intended to “promote for 30 guests. The outings included a pre-game talk ment professor at Sacred Heart University. He local economic development.” with an assistant Kings coach and Kings tickets. closely follows marketing deals and trends in the She initially said no SMUD executives or The utility’s 2004-05 agreement included none pro-sports world. employees attended Kings games on the utility’s of those perks and no extra playoff charges, and The utility’s documents also revealed some tab and that SMUD traded back its suite privileges the sticker price declined from almost $500,000 fascinating financial inequities in men’s and for more advertising. She also said SMUD traded to $119,605. women’s pro basketball. SMUD’s association with back the four Monarchs tickets it received for each the Kings cost $340,000 in 2003-04, while it cost home game in exchange for more advertising. Serious scrutiny the utility just $64,800 for the same association In a second interview, Siewert acknowledged Future incentives are unlikely to involve Kings with the Monarchs. that SMUD did keep at least one suite night, and game tickets. When we started asking questions The contracts had some odd terms. They called the utility gave the suite to 20 workers from a about SMUD’s plans for future sponsorship deals for SMUD to make extra per-game payments, rang- county DHA offi ce in nearby Galt, Calif. The with the Sacramento Kings, the utility quietly ing from $1,700 to $3,611, if either team made its Kings game was their prize for enrolling the most zapped those plans and said it planned to spend league’s playoffs, though total amounts included participants in the energy assistance program. only $20,000 on advertising with the Sacramento a playoff cap for both teams between $65,000 and Asked why the utility company gave county Monarchs in 2006. $70,200. What benefi t any of that offered SMUD workers incentives to sign up recruits for the Any examination of spending by a public ratepayers was questionable. energy assistance program when their job is to utility, big or small, should include some serious help low-income earners, Siewert replied that it scrutiny of how it spends its money on sponsor- Series of perks seemed odd to SMUD as well. ships and advertising by identifying recipients and SMUD customers, who read copies of the deals “DHA workers already have a large workload,” dollar amounts. A few tips: we posted on our Web site, also said the utility Siewert said. “We found if we weren’t offering • Learn their lingo. Utility executives and manag- was wrong for spending public money on deals incentives, they just weren’t going to do it.” ers, like professional athletes and coaches, often with wealthy owners of professional sports teams, For energy program participants, the average speak a different language. Learn their insider especially when the power company is a monopoly savings can top $280 a year. SMUD had been jargon. Find out what they call something; don’t provider in the area. criticized for signing up far fewer low-income ask for documents based on what you think it’s SMUD representative Monica Siewert defended customers than other utilities its size, Siewert called. In this case, SMUD called its deals “part- the utility’s deals with Maloof Sports and its deci- said. By tapping the DHA offi ces with incentives, nerships,” insisting they were not sponsorships, sion to offer Kings tickets and hospitality perks to SMUD had the potential to reach 114,000 low- though one letter from Maloof Sports welcomed county workers as incentives. She said the utility income customers, she said. DHA normally enrolls the utility “to our family of sponsors.” received good advertising value for its money. between 100 and 200 low-income people a month, • Think documents, documents, documents. Siewert said the deals were approved by but the two- month-long contests in 2004 resulted Meetings equal minutes. Sponsorships equal con- SMUD’s board in 2002 and were signed as part of in 2,178 new program participants. tracts. Keep copies of all your record requests. The initial sponsor- Ask for a written acknowledgment of your Free- ship contracts revealed dom of Information or public records requests. Bee that SMUD obtained Watch legal deadlines and hound offi cials to a series of perks from respect them. Don’t accept less than what you’ve Maloof Sports for each asked to see. season, including two • Ask offi cials to scan and e-mail documents to

Sacramento The receptions at Arco Arena you when possible to save time. When you get | for Kings games, a “chalk the records, read them at least twice. talk” before each game • Banging out a quick chronology can help Dorrell with a member of the organize complex material and generate good Kings coaching staff, questions when you see the facts on top of each Robert game tickets, parking other. for 30 people and com- • Look for resignation letters. When utility execu- plimentary arena food tives leave or quit and won’t talk, their letters and beverages. SMUD (sometimes lengthy, sometimes angry) often also got a private suite speak for them. Request copies from sources or night for 20 guests at fi le a public record request. Request and examine a regular-season Kings their offi ce e-mail traffi c for three weeks before game, including tickets their departure. and parking for 20 people • Internal audits can be roadmaps. Utilities often and complimentary food bend their governing rules. Internal auditors and beverages. often discover who’s doing the bending, how During the 2003-04 it’s being done and then call them on it. Ask for NBA season, workers a year’s worth of internal audits to see what has from two other county caught their attention. DHA offi ces also shared three pre-game recep- Andrew McIntosh is assistant city editor, investiga- tions with food and drink tions, at The Sacramento Bee.

32 THE IRE JOURNAL C O V E R S T O R Y

News We began our investiga- tion with a quick search on the

Morning PUMP CHECK state’s Web site (www.utah. gov), which showed us that

Deseret the Division of Weights and | Measures in the Department Motorists havehave 1-in-251-in-25 of Agriculture and Food had the data we needed. The Web site mentioned that the divi- Michael Brandy sion tests “all gasoline pumps chance ofof buyingbuying gasgas fromfrom for accurate measurement.” (I also could have found that by simply looking more closely at the inspection stickers that the division places on each a pumppump thatthat failsfails toto givegive gasoline pump in the state.) The state provided me a full copy of its Access database on a CD, and it already had some amounts withinwithin legallegal limitlimit state-designed queries saved on An inspector from the Utah Department of it, such as “total pumps failed Agriculture and Food checks the pumps for with location and count,” which accuracy at a service station, but state records do not specify how much each pump is over or BY LEE DAVIDSON made my life far too easy. I had under the stated gasoline output. most of the numbers and infor- THE (SALT LAKE CITY) DESERET MORNING NEWS mation that I needed from the database in about an hour. Some simple division of the number of pumps that failed (1,898) by the total pumps inspected (44,796) gave the overall failure rate (4.2 percent). Division of the number of stations with at least one failed pump (92) by the number of total stations (1,140) gave the f youʼre looking for a quick, fairly easy failure rate for stations (8 percent). I did some sorting by station and inspection date to discover investigation that will grab the interest of that many stations had all their pumps fail repeatedly in up to fi ve I inspections over two years. Sorting by city, I also found that some of the state’s biggest cities did not have any failing pumps, while readers, then checking out the accuracy of gaso- some smaller cities had numerous failures. Finally, sorting and counting by date showed that virtually all line pumps is the one for you. known stations had been inspected in 2005, but inspections appeared to be way down in 2006. The project, which took me only about a week to do (and I spent Once I had my information from the database, I interviewed most of that negotiating and waiting for a copy of a state database) state offi cials and industry representatives. A photographer and I came about after a string of stories about how gasoline prices had went with a state inspector to a local gas station to see and describe dropped signifi cantly nearly everywhere except Utah. While the how inspections occur. governor launched another investigation of the high prices, we We also found some interesting tidbits along the way. The inspec- decided to look at whether customers really receive what they pay tor told us that pumps always give a little bit more gasoline when for at the pump it is pumped quickly instead of slowly, so now I am sure that all of Some of our fi ndings: our readers pump gas as quickly as possible. • Customers in Utah have a 1-in-25 chance of buying gasoline at a State offi cials also say pumps are designed so that as they wear pump that fails to give amounts within legal ranges. out they should err in favor of consumers. I also suspect that readers • About half of the pumps give too little gasoline, and half give too started looking for older pumps. much. So, motorists have about a 1-in-50 chance of getting more A major drawback with the Utah database is that it did not include than they paid for, and 1-in-50 odds of getting less. whether a “volume failure” occurred because a pump gave too much • About 8 percent of gas stations in Utah had at least one pump that gasoline or too little. However, the inspection supervisor and other failed from January 2005 through August 2006. They were scattered inspectors agreed that nearly half of the time the failed pumps gave among 92 stations in 43 communities. too much, and half the time they gave too little. • Some stations had all of their pumps fail repeatedly in multiple We put a list online of all stations that had at least one pump inspections. However, the state issued no fi nes and closed no pumps fail. It showed the dates of inspections and how many pumps failed or stations at that time. each time. We arranged that by city to make it easier for readers to • The state inspected all of the state’s gasoline stations in 2005 but identify nearby stations. now has decided to inspect only about one-third of them each year. It has only eight inspectors, and they do a variety of other work, Lee Davidson is a special projects reporter for The (Salt Lake including checking scales and price scanners at stores statewide. City) Deseret Morning News. The story can be found online at The state said that other work had been suffering. www.deseretnews.com. JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2007 33 FEATURES IRE SERVICES Lead

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 19 INVESTIGATIVE REPORTERS AND EDITORS, INC. is a grassroots nonprofi t organization dedicated to improving the quality of investigative reporting within the fi eld of journal- As of this writing, 53 cases have been cleaned up. ism. IRE was formed in 1975 with the intent of creating a networking tool and a forum in Twenty-one cases have been brought to court, and which journalists from across the country could raise questions and exchange ideas. IRE 121 property owners have received updated orders. provides educational services to reporters, editors and others interested in investigative Non-compliance can result in legal action. reporting and works to maintain high professional standards. One of the greatest challenges of the project was keeping the scope narrow. Lead is a huge topic. It Programs and Services: can be looked at from dozens of perspectives. My IRE RESOURCE CENTER – A rich reserve of print and broadcast stories, tipsheets and guides to help editor, Fenton, and I decided we had to stay focused you start and complete the best work of your career. This unique library is the starting point of any on the records we had won. It was a diffi cult decision. piece you’re working on. You can search through abstracts of more than 20,000 investigative reporting There are six other major counties in our coverage stories through our Web site. area. Cincinnati is just one health department in its own county. Contact: Beth Kopine, [email protected], 573-882-3364 The most time-consuming aspect was track- DATABASE LIBRARY – Administered by IRE and the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting. ing the properties. We wanted to know how many The library has copies of many government databases, and makes them available to news organizations children lived in the lead-tainted properties. The at or below actual cost. Analysis services are available on these databases, as is help in deciphering health department didn’t know. With the help of records you obtain yourself. two clerks, I went to all 300 properties. It was a Contact: Jeff Porter, [email protected], 573-882-1982 huge undertaking and took two and a half months, but it was worth it. CAMPAIGN FINANCE INFORMATION CENTER – Administered by IRE and the National Institute for Fifty children lived in those homes. There was Computer-Assisted Reporting. It’s dedicated to helping journalists uncover the campaign money no better reason to write the story. trail. State campaign fi nance data is collected from across the nation, cleaned and made available to journalists. A search engine allows reporters to track political cash fl ow across several states in federal Sharon Coolidge joined The Cincinnati Enquirer in and state races. 2002 to cover state courts. In 2006, the Associated Contact: Brant Houston, [email protected], 573-882-2042 Press Society of Ohio named Coolidge best news writer in the state, and that year she was also chosen ON-THE-ROAD TRAINING – As a top promoter of journalism education, IRE offers loads of train- by the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists as ing opportunities throughout the year. Possibilities range from national conferences and regional best Ohio reporter. workshops to weeklong boot camps and on-site newsroom training. Costs are on a sliding scale and fellowships are available to many of the events. Contact: David Donald, [email protected], 573-882-2042 The Reporters Committee for Publications Freedom of the Press THE IRE JOURNAL – Published six times a year. Contains journalist profi les, how-to stories, reviews, is seeking an experienced investigative ideas and backgrounding tips. The Journal also provides members with the latest news reporter/editor to serve on upcoming events and training opportunities from IRE and NICAR. as its Journalism Fellow. Contact: Megan Means, [email protected], 573-884-2360 UPLINK – Newsletter by IRE and NICAR on computer-assisted reporting. Published six times a year. Description:The recipient of the one-year Often, Uplink stories are written after reporters have had particular success using data to investigate fellowship will have the opportunity to learn stories. The columns include valuable information on advanced database techniques as well as success about free press issues first hand. The fellow stories written by newly trained CAR reporters. will write, edit and design for the Contact: David Herzog, [email protected], 573-884-7711 Committee’s publications andWeb site. REPORTER.ORG – A collection of Web-based resources for journalists, journalism educators and others. Minimum requirements:Three years Discounted Web hosting and services such as mailing list management and site development are journalism experience and a strong interest provided to other nonprofi t journalism organizations. in free press issues. Contact: Brant Houston, [email protected], 573-882-2042

Benefits: $40,000 plus full health benefits For information on: for a one-year fellowship beginning in ADVERTISING – Megan Means, [email protected], 573-884-2360 September 2007.The fellow also will audit MEMBERSHIP AND SUBSCRIPTIONS – John Green, [email protected], 573-882-2772 a course on First Amendment /media law. CONFERENCES AND BOOT CAMPS – Ev Ruch-Graham, [email protected], 573-882-8969 LISTSERVS – Amy Johnston, [email protected], 573-884-1444 Application deadline: March 1, 2007 See http://www.rcfp.org/fellowships Mailing Address: for more information IRE, 138 Neff Annex, Missouri School of Journalism, Columbia, MO 65211

34 THE IRE JOURNAL 2007 IRE Conference • June 7-10 • HOST: The Arizona Republic

Join the best in the business as IRE honors Don Bolles and the 30th anniversary of the Arizona Project at its annual conference.

The Arizona Project was the historic effort by journalists to continue the investigation that led to the killing of Arizona Republic reporter Don Bolles, a 47-year-old husband and father. Bolles and many of those 38 journalists, known as the Desert Rats, were founding members of IRE and were instrumental in shaping its future.

For IRE, the resulting Arizona Project brought national attention and stature. A tiny organization with little money flourished to become what it is today. Thanks to those who have gone before, IRE now has an organization strong enough to take on today’s threats to investigative reporting.

Join us in Phoenix for: • Panels with tips and techniques from top reporters, producers, editors, news directors and writers • Hands-on training in computer-assisted reporting from the best practitioners • Networking and mentoring opportunities

SPECIAL NOTE: You have until Thursday, March 1, to register for the conference and reserve your hotel room at the Biltmore to be entered into a drawing for an upgrade to a Villa Suite. Five lucky people will be upgraded. We’ll announce the winners in March. Register NOW!

Visit www.ire.org/training/phoenix07 for more details, conference registration and hotel reservations. Introducing the Barlett and Steele Awards for Investigative Business Journalism

Presented by the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University

To be awarded annually, beginning Fall 2007:

First place $5,000 Runner-up $2,000

Named for the widely acclaimed investigative business journalist team of Don Barlett and Jim Steele, these awards funded by the Reynolds Center celebrate the best in print and online investigative business journalism. Barlett and Steele, winners of two Pulitzers at The Philadelphia Inquirer and two National Magazine Awards at Time, have worked together for more than three decades. They are contributing editors to Vanity Fair.

Submission deadline August 1, 2007. Entries must have appeared between July 1, 2006 and June 30, 2007. More details about the awards and Barlett and Steele at www.BusinessJournalism.org. Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication Arizona State University PO Box 874702 Tempe, Ariz. 85287-4702 http://www.BusinessJournalism.org Andrew Leckey, Director [email protected], 480-727-9186 Funded by a grant from the Las Vegas, Nevada- based Donald W. Reynolds Foundation