High food prices and the end of extra food-stamp allotments mean hard choices around the country for lower-income people: “You’re having to make the decision between ‘am I paying my mortgage, or my medical bills or my medication or buying food?’” said Stacey Andernacht with hunger relief organization Feeding South Dakota. But in her state, […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity staff share insights on investigating inequality
Journalists from the Center for Public Integrity will offer advice and training on investigative reporting and data journalism that confronts inequality at the annual Investigative Reporters & Editors conference June 22-25 in Orlando. In addition to its own national investigations, one of the organization’s priorities is to build investigative reporting capacity and expertise at local […]
Posted inHealth
GAO report: nursing homes staffing is a priority to curb COVID spread
Three years ago as the pandemic began to spread, U.S. nursing homes were among the prime targets of COVID-19, which infected over a million residents. About 166,000 of those residents died as a result. The coronavirus also killed nearly 3,100 nursing home workers, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). Even today, […]
Posted inUnequal Risk
Three families vowed to stop a killer chemical. Here’s how they did it.
A bathtub. A floor. A bike. The items Kevin Hartley, Drew Wynne and Joshua Atkins had been working on at the time of their deaths less than 10 months apart varied, but what cut their lives short was the same: a chemical in paint strippers and other products sold in stores nationwide. This story also […]
Posted inCriminalizing kids
Disentangling the debate over school police
DeMarcus Jenkins has seen the presence of law enforcement in schools from different angles — as a student, high school teacher and education researcher. As districts around the country reexamine their relationships with school police, Jenkins is studying how cutting ties with law enforcement can lead to more equitable approaches to ensure students are safe […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity voting inequity investigation wins National Headliner Award
Public Integrity’s investigation into inequality in access to voting and political representation ahead of the 2022 elections has won a National Headliner Award. “Who Counts?” won first place for best beat coverage in the annual awards program, sponsored by the Press Club of Atlantic City. Judges called the project “a detailed report on voting issues, […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity report wins award for mental health coverage
The Center for Public Integrity was recognized Tuesday with a Mental Health America 2023 media award for Christine Herman’s reporting about the challenges families face accessing mental health care. The story was published in partnership with Side Effects Public Media as part of the national Mental Health Parity Collaborative led by the Carter Center’s Rosalynn […]
Posted inLabor
Forcing more people to work for food stamps is harmful
The GOP-controlled House is refusing to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agree to a long list of controversial policies. They want President Joe Biden to cancel his student loan forgiveness plan, for example, and repeal extra funding for IRS audits. One item in the House bill that Republicans passed last week stands out not […]
Posted inInequality
Pondering state reparations for tribes, a council documents history of harms
It started with a formal apology. “California Native American peoples suffered violence, discrimination and exploitation sanctioned by state government throughout its history,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a 2019 statement. “We can never undo the wrongs inflicted on the peoples who have lived on this land that we now call California since time immemorial, […]
Posted inUnequal Risk
The EPA wants to broaden a ban on a deadly chemical on store shelves
Many toxic substances harm people slowly, causing serious illnesses years after repeated exposure. But methylene chloride’s fumes are so dangerous, the chemical can kill you in a matter of minutes. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency banned consumer sales of paint strippers with this ingredient in 2019 after an investigation by the Center for Public Integrity […]
Posted inEnvironment
Protecting people’s health in the era of global warming
As the nation’s most populous state, California has long influenced environmental-health protections outside its own borders. And its environmental challenges sound all too familiar in other states, from extreme heat and flooding to lead contamination and air pollution. Now its environmental-protection agency has a secretary with a history of advocating on behalf of vulnerable communities […]
Posted inWatchdog newsletter
How drag bans fit into larger attacks on transgender rights
At least 14 state legislatures have proposed bills targeting drag performances, part of the record number of anti-LGBTQ+ bills filed this year. Tennessee and Arkansas have both enacted laws placing strict limits on drag shows. They share similar language, restricting “adult-oriented” performances — sometimes explicitly including “male or female impersonators” in the definition. The bulk […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity podcast nominated for a Peabody Award
A Center for Public Integrity podcast about one woman’s quest to chip away at an enduring American injustice has been nominated for a Peabody Award. “The Wealth Vortex” season of The Heist podcast, in partnership with Transmitter Media, is among 60 nominees selected from nearly 1,300 entries across broadcasting and digital media. Thirty winners will […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity’s Yvette Cabrera wins 2023 Paul Tobenkin Award
Yvette Cabrera has won the 2023 Paul Tobenkin Memorial Award for a powerful Center for Public Integrity narrative she wrote last year about the personal battle a Navajo activist faced as he sought accountability for federal government uranium mining that has sickened generations of his people. The award, administered by Columbia University and honoring the […]
Posted inDemocracy
‘What the court misunderstood is just how fragile our democracy is’
It was a crowning achievement of the civil rights movement: the Voting Rights Act of 1965. For decades, it gave the federal government the power to shut down potentially discriminatory voting changes before they took effect. And on June 25, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court gutted it. The court ruled that the formula behind the […]
Posted inThe Heist
Revisiting a journey to open a Black-owned bank and battle the wealth gap
A year after being the subject of an award-winning Center for Public Integrity podcast, ReShonda Young said she “definitely” feels closer to her goal of opening the only Black-owned bank in her state. Young was featured in “The Wealth Vortex,” Public Integrity’s second season of The Heist podcast. The series followed her efforts to confront […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity board member, contributor receive 2022 Vernon Jarrett Medal
Center for Public Integrity board member Wesley Lowery and contributor Yanick Rice Lamb received the 2022 Vernon Jarrett Medal for Journalistic Excellence.
Posted inImmigration
How U.S. policy drives child migrants into dangerous jobs
Recent stories of migrant children working long hours and under dangerous conditions in the United States have shed light on how pervasive migrant child labor has become in this country. In December, Reuters published the third part of a year-long investigation about migrant children as young as 12 working in Alabama chicken plants and in […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity ‘Attacked Behind the Wheel’ investigation wins Gracie Award
An investigation the Center for Public Integrity produced with Scripps News has won a Gracie Award in recognition of the country’s best work “created by women, for women and about women in all facets of media and entertainment.” “Attacked Behind the Wheel” found a “disturbing pattern of workplace violence in an industry that has tried […]
Posted inThe Heist
A new tool to find and stop discrimination in small-business lending
It took an act of Congress, at least one lawsuit and a very long wait. But today — decades after lenders were required to disclose mortgage-application information that brings hidden patterns of discrimination to light — the federal government enacted a rule to mandate that type of reporting about small-business lending, too. “Many local businesses […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Two Public Integrity projects honored by Shaufler Prize
Center for Public Integrity journalists accepted awards at Arizona State University on Thursday night for two projects that illuminated the impacts of — and the fight against — discrimination. “The Wealth Vortex” — about one woman’s efforts to combat the racial wealth gap in her community — and “Cheated at Work” — about wage theft […]
Posted inUnequal Burden
If you’re Black, saying ‘I do’ can increase your taxes
While race intersects with every aspect of American life, hard data on that is limited when it comes to taxation. The IRS does not collect taxpayers’ racial or ethnic identity. New research using novel methodology — starting with Survey of Consumer Finances household survey data, creating tax units and running a tax calculator against it […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
Lead keeps poisoning children. It doesn’t have to.
Read the Spanish version here. Lea la versión en español aquí. SANTA ANA, California — The news came as a shock: Lead, lurking somewhere in Nalleli Garrido’s home, was poisoning her 1-year-old son. His pediatrician instructed her to clean all the toys of her toddler, Ruben, keep the home dust-free and prevent him from playing […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
Eight ways to take action on lead contaminating your community’s soil
Read the Spanish version here. Lea la versión en español aquí. Is lead lurking in the soil around you? Dangerous lead contamination continues to plague the soil of urban centers, particularly in high-traffic, older neighborhoods where particles and airborne dust from leaded gasoline and lead paint accumulated during the 20th century. Industrial areas where both […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
El plomo sigue envenenando a los niños. No tiene que ser así.
Lea la versión en inglés aquí. Read the English version here. La noticia fue un shock: el plomo, escondido en la casa de Nalleli Garrido, estaba envenenando a su hijo de un año. Su pediatra le dijo que limpiara todos los juguetes del pequeño Rubén, mantuviera la casa libre de polvo y evitara que jugara en […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
Ocho medidas que puedes tomar cuando el plomo contamina los suelos de tu comunidad
Lea la versión en inglés aquí. Read the English version here. ¿Hay plomo acechando en los suelos que te rodean? La peligrosa contaminación con plomo sigue plagando el suelo de centros urbanos, particularmente en vecindarios antiguos y de alto tráfico, donde durante el siglo XX se acumularon partículas y polvo transportado por el aire proveniente de […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
Toxic churn: The legacy of long-gone industry pollutes U.S. cities
On a crisp, fall day in Santa Ana, California, Mary Acosta Rodriguez Martinez Garcia steps forward gingerly, leaning on her cane as she walks to the spot along the railroad tracks that intersect with Santa Ana Boulevard. This is where her grandfather’s house once stood, before it was swallowed whole by the expansion of the […]
Posted inGhosts of Polluters Past
Ghosts of polluters past
The hot, dry Santa Ana winds that whip through Orange County’s Logan barrio are fierce and temperamental. In the mid-20th century, they’d deliver gusts forceful enough to wreak havoc throughout the Southern California region, destroying orange crops, uprooting trees, downing power lines and upending lives. But in the Logan neighborhood, one of the city of Santa Ana’s […]
Posted inInside Public Integrity
Public Integrity reporters’ work honored among best data journalism in world
Investigative reporting by Center for Public Integrity journalists about student homelessness and the legacy of pollution in communities of color was recognized among the best data journalism in the world on Friday at the 2023 Sigma Awards. Senior reporter Yvette Cabrera’s work on the toxic legacy of lead contamination in American cities while a journalist […]
Posted inDemocracy
Chicago’s FOIA Fest celebrates open government
Dozens of public records enthusiasts gathered Saturday to kick-off an annual Chicago tradition: FOIA Fest, a public records conference created to celebrate Sunshine Week, which ends today. FOIA — short for Freedom of Information Act — is a federal law that requires the full or partial disclosure of unreleased documents and information controlled by the […]