The winter storm that paralyzed Texas highlights how extreme weather events are exacerbated by the climate crisis.
February 2021
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** Spanning Beats, Environmental Justice Reporting Influences Every Story ([link removed])
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By connecting systemic inequities to environmental harms, environmental justice reporting covers everything from race and housing to healthcare and immigration. Read the story ([link removed]) .
** From the editor
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Last week, a writer working on a piece for Nieman Reports sent me an email explaining why her story would not be arriving on time. “I wanted to drop a note while I have Wi-Fi to let you know this is going to be delayed due to the ongoing power outage here in Texas,” she wrote. “Currently day three without power over here!”
She was one of millions of Texans without electricity as an intense winter storm knocked out power stations, coated roads in ice, and burst water pipes throughout the state, where February temperatures rarely approach freezing, much less plunge below it. Our writer is safe and well, but the storm that paralyzed Texas highlights yet again how extreme weather events are exacerbated by the climate crisis.
Which makes our piece on environmental justice reporting ([link removed]) even more timely.
As Rachel Ramirez argues in her story, coverage of the environment has to be about more than brutal winter freezes, more destructive hurricanes, and longer wildfire seasons. It must also be about how these climate catastrophes add to underlying environmental health hazards that disproportionately impact communities of color. Environmental justice reporting, she writes, is “journalism that holds polluting industries to account and reports on vulnerable communities impacted by climate or environmental disasters and policies.”
Environmental justice reporting is becoming more mainstream in part as a response to the coronavirus pandemic and renewed calls for racial justice in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd. As journalists work through how these issues impact our industry, we’ve added two new essays to our ongoing series "The Newsrooms We Need Now ([link removed]) ." Sara Luterman argues for more and better representation of disabled people ([link removed]) , in newsrooms and on the pages of major outlets, and The Boston Globe’s Jason Tuohey explains the motives and method behind the paper’s “Fresh Start” initiative ([link removed]) , which allows people named in older stories to appeal The Globe's coverage.
Tuohey acknowledges the unease felt by some about the precedent the Globe might be setting with “Fresh Start.” But he also states a truth that’s relevant to so many of the challenges journalism faces: “We can’t dogmatically hold on to outdated practices and standards … in the face of changing circumstances.”
Sincerely,
James Geary
Editor, Nieman Reports
Nieman Reports is looking for a senior editor to help shape our coverage of thought leadership in journalism. If you or someone you know is interested, you can find more information and apply here ([link removed]) .
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** The Complexity of Reporting on Age, Race, and the Covid-19 Vaccine ([link removed])
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When it comes to Covid vaccinations, journalists must understand and convey the complicated interplay of age and race. Read more ([link removed])
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** Criminal Justice Reporter Wesley Lowery Asks, What if the Process Itself is Unfair? ([link removed])
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“In some ways, our job as journalists is to monitor and referee not just the people but the process.”
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** The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos: “Approach Washington with a Healthy Degree of Alarm” ([link removed])
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The Biden biographer on the state of the political press and covering Trump and the far-right.
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** More from Nieman Foundation publications:
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Jumpstart your writing routine: coffee, journals, sketches and postcards ([link removed])
A science freelancer works her way out of COVID malaise with morning writing rituals.
Read more from Nieman Storyboard ([link removed]) .
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In Australia, Facebook’s ban on sharing news stories has sent publishers’ traffic tumbling ([link removed])
Audience declines of 20 percent or more have followed Facebook taking its traffic ball and going home.
Read more from Nieman Lab ([link removed]) .
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