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IRE Executive Director Diana Fuentes and IRE Board President Brian M. Rosenthal will lead the annual membership meeting for all IRE members in Marquis Center at the Anaheim Marriott on Saturday, June 22, at 5:30 p.m. PDT. As part of the meeting, there will be votes on several proposed amendments to the IRE Articles of Incorporation.
These six proposed amendments, which are summarized directly below and listed in full at the end of this post, are designed to make IRE more inclusive, more accessible and more relevant, particularly amid industry upheaval:
The IRE Board has unanimously approved all of these amendments. In order to be enacted, they must also be approved by 2/3 of IRE Members present at a membership meeting.
In-person voting will initially be conducted by a show of hands; if it is unclear whether a proposal passes or fails, paper ballots will be used. In addition, for the first time, members who cannot attend in-person may register to attend and vote virtually using an online poll. Only eligible professional, academic, retiree and student members may vote.
If you have any questions, or if you would like to share feedback before the meeting, please contact the IRE Board at board@ire.org.
Here are the proposed amendments, in full:
Investigative Reporters and Editors has named its finalists for the 2024 Golden Padlock Award honoring the most secretive public agency or official in the U.S.
The 2024 award celebrates the best of government opaqueness with five finalists chosen from a competitive field of nominees. Together, their secrecy techniques include hiding vital public records of public interest, ordering a police raid on a newsroom and fighting journalists in court to block public access to records.
"This group of finalists have exhibited unique ingenuity in their attempts to ensure the public is left in the dark about important issues impacting their communities," said Golden Padlock committee chair Robert Cribb. "Their commitment to secrecy is matched only by the impassioned work of journalists fighting to make it public.”
The finalists for the 2024 Golden Padlock Award are:
Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto for a pattern of secrecy including suing a journalist for the return of public records that her own office gave out. The records included headshots of roughly 9,000 Los Angeles police officers released to journalist Ben Camacho in response to a public records request. Feldstein Soto later turned to the courts to demand the images not be published, claiming undercover officer images were included. Then, in a second suit, her office argued Camacho is liable for legal costs related to the release. Feldstein Soto failed to convince a judge that any undercover officers were included in the cache of images released. But the lawsuit remains before the courts amid vocal criticism from a coalition of media groups alleging her actions are an attack on First Amendment rights.
The Georgia Department of Corrections for shielding details about deaths, riots and drug overdoses in the state's prisons from the public, journalists, legislators and even investigators from the Department of Justice. Last year, a record 37 homicides occurred in Georgia’s prisons, yet the department issued only one news release between 2021 and 2023 about inmate deaths. The department increased secrecy by heavily redacting incident reports, rarely announcing worker arrests linked to contraband and withholding video footage — information it used to provide — after The Atlanta Journal-Constitution began exposing failures in the correctional system and the DOJ opened an investigation. The state agency even failed to comply with a federal subpoena for incident reports, internal investigations and audits until the court intervened.
Marion County Kansas police chief Gideon Cody for leading a raid on the office of the Marion County Record and the home of its co-publisher, Eric Meyer. Police bodycam video shows Meyer’s 98-year-old mother and co-publisher, Joan Meyer, shouting down police officers as they rifled through the family’s personal belongings. She died the next day of a heart attack. The newspaper had been chasing a tip it had received about Cody but had not published the information. The raid has been widely condemned as an illegal abuse of power designed to silence small town journalists seeking to hold powerful figures in their community to account. Cody later resigned after released images of the raid showed him reviewing newspaper documents about himself. But there was other fallout, including the resignation of a senior journalist on the story, who cited anxiety about being a reporter in Marion County.
The Hawaii Department of Human Services for stonewalling a review of its own actions in the death of a 6-year-old girl. Federal law and state regulations require the state to disclose details of cases in which a child dies or nearly dies of abuse or neglect. It took a public interest law firm's petition to open the girl's case file to reveal why she was placed with adoptive parents who are accused of murdering her. Further reporting by Honolulu Civil Beat found that Hawaii reports far less than some other states about abuse and neglect deaths and near-deaths.
The Michigan State Police for refusing to release the names and employment histories of police officers. The data is crucial for reporters, citizens and researchers to identify "wandering cops" who find new law enforcement jobs following disciplinary actions, criminal misconduct or quiet firings. Michigan is among at least a dozen states where journalists have hit walls trying to access records that have helped identify officers that have changed jobs undetected after committing such offenses as planting evidence, beating suspects, taking kickbacks or making false arrests. Even Michigan’s attorney general — the state's chief law enforcement officer — is supporting reporters at the Invisible Institute and the Detroit Metro Times in a current lawsuit seeking to make the records public.
The winner of the 2024 Golden Padlock Award will be announced during the awards luncheon at the IRE Conference on Saturday, June 22, in Anaheim, Calif.
With Pride Month coming up in June, IRE members are excited to celebrate and reflect at IRE24.
Over the years, IRE has expanded programming on covering LGBTQ+ issues and historically marginalized communities, and this year is no exception. With more than a dozen IRE24 sessions — such as "Getting trans issues right in the 2024 elections" and "Investigating hate crimes and bias incidents" — journalists across the country will get top-notch training and guidance on how to responsibly and accurately cover these topics.
Some sessions were planned in partnership with LGBTQ+ members of IRE and the Trans Journalists Association; others were the result of listening sessions held to hear members' ideas and concerns.
Another panel, called "Authenticity in Investigations: Covering Your Own Communities," will help journalists navigate identity. Reporters who are members of minority groups, whether it be the LGBTQ+ community or a racial group, often face challenges and sometimes criticism when they cover their own communities. Especially on issues of objectivity and transparency.
At IRE24, Josh Hinkle of KXAN-TV, Barbara Rodriguez of The 19th and Kat Stafford of Reuters will share their experiences and how they ensure trust among their audiences.
This session was partly inspired by Hinkle's work at KXAN-TV, where he explored the nuances of this topic on an investigative podcast called "Catalyst." Francisco Vara-Orta, IRE's Director of Diversity and Inclusion, was a guest on this episode. (You can listen here before you head to IRE24).
Along with learning how to report, we're proud that the IRE Conference offers a friendly space for LGBTQ+ members and allies to meet and mingle. This year, the LGBTQ+ networking session will take place on Thursday, June 20, at 11:30 a.m.
Always a lively event, the networking session builds on others that have been hosted at conferences in recent years, including at NICAR24 in Baltimore.
"There was plenty of queer joy and connection among LGBTQ+ members and allies at NICAR24, and we’re expecting a similar spirit of camaraderie in Anaheim," said Olivia Sanchez, chair of IRE's LGBTQ+ subcommittee.
Sanchez and Hinkle, IRE Board Vice President and chair of IRE's Member Services Committee, hosted the two-part networking event in Baltimore. Vara-Orta and Training Director Adam Rhodes also were hosts. The listening part of the gathering led to a broad-based discussion on ideas for possible conference and workshop sessions, which bore fruit at IRE24 and will help shape conferences in the future.
At the NICAR24 event, members showed interested in increasing resources that could lead to stronger coverage of LGBTQ+ issues and finding ways to fill gaps for incomplete or inaccurate data related to queer and trans communities. These conversations are essential in helping IRE provide relevant and culturally competent training for its global membership.
If you have ideas or would like to contribute to this work, reach out to Vara-Orta at francisco@ire.org. Committees for 2024-25 will be appointed in July and August, and volunteers are welcome!
Francisco Vara-Orta is IRE's Director of Diversity and Inclusion. Josh Hinkle, of KXAN-TV in Austin, is IRE Board Vice President and chair of IRE’s member services committee. Olivia Sanchez, of The Hechinger Report, based in Portland, Oregon, is chair of the LGBTQ+ subcommittee.
IRE24 will take place June 20-23 in Anaheim, California. Learn more about the conference here.
(May 21, 2024) — The IRE Conference has some key moments each year: classes taught by the best and brightest in journalism, the Thursday night Welcome Reception, and of course, the inspirational IRE Awards Luncheon.
It’s a decades-old tradition, but we’re always looking for ways to improve our programming and keep up with trends in the industry.
Here are some new things we’re looking forward to at IRE24!
The IRE Conference hasn’t been to California since 2014. A decade later, we’re excited to bring the world’s largest gathering of investigative journalists to the west coast!
The new “FYI Forum” will feature conversations centered on journalists’ advice and lessons learned. Whether you’re looking for project funding, ways to fight news fatigue or hoping to start an investigative team in your newsroom, stop by an FYI Forum and get practical tips to navigate the industry and your career.
This year’s conference will have a track focused on “gender and reproductive rights” for the first time. With growing news coverage of changing abortion laws, trans rights and gender identity, journalists can get guidance on these topics at IRE24.
Sessions on this track include:
*planned in partnership with Trans Journalists Association
Join the ongoing debate on AI at IRE24. We’ll have sessions on the broader concerns on AI — from copyright issues to audio deepfakes — and how to report on them. Plus, helpful ways these emerging technologies can make your job easier.
Sessions on this track include:
Master Classes are a conference staple. IRE24 will have the usual favorites, as well as new classes focused on FOI denials and storytelling.
“FOI Frenzy: Psychological Strategies For Getting Records Out Of Their Grubbies” will give you tactics for eliminating copy fees, effective wording for request letters, principled negotiation strategies and more. Dave Cuillier, of the Brechner Center, will teach this class.
Ken Armstrong, of Propublica, is back at IRE24 to teach “Reporting and writing for scene.” This class will look at ways to gather dialogue and detail — while being emotionally and factually correct.
These classes have limited seating and require pre-registration. See the full list of Master Classes here.
In six different "Deep Dive" sessions, the country’s top journalists will have in-depth, candid conversations on the biggest topics in investigative journalism today. No PowerPoints. No frills. Just talking. The sessions are:
IRE partnered with Alaska Airlines, Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines this year, thanks to the IRE Board’s Affordability Task Force. Conference attendees can now get discounts on air travel, as well as ground transportation discounts.
IRE members can also find a roommate to save money on hotel costs.
We received hundreds of brilliant pitches from IRE members on panel ideas. Here are (just a few) new sessions that are being taught in person for the first time.
Check out the full conference schedule here.
If you want to hang out after conference sessions, away from happy hours, we’ll have a room dedicated to board games on Thursday! Similar to NICAR24, we’ll have some games on site, but feel free to bring your own, too. All are welcome.
IRE24 will take place June 20-23 in Anaheim, California. Learn more about the conference here.
(May 15, 2024) — Journalists wear many hats in the newsroom these days, but it’s not often that they’re international diplomats, too.
John Bones was a rare global ambassador in the field, advocating for cultural exchange and cross-country collaborations in journalism.
Bones died May 13 in Oslo, Norway, at the age of 69.
“John brought Norwegian journalism to the world - and took the world home with him,” SKUP, the Norwegian Foundation for Investigative Journalism, wrote in memoriam.
Bones, who served as general manager at SKUP, was a pioneer in the industry and a longtime champion of IRE. He taught classes at many IRE and NICAR conferences over the last two decades, and regularly brought groups of journalists from Norway to train at NICAR.
The IRE community is saddened by the news of his passing.
“A huge loss for journalists from many nations,” longtime IRE speaker Paul Overberg shared online.
“A lovely human and terrific investigative journalist. I will miss seeing him at IRE,” former IRE Board President Cheryl W. Thompson wrote.
IRE Executive Director Diana Fuentes remembers exchanging emails with Bones just last month. After being diagnosed with cancer last year, he said he had hoped to be back at work this summer.
“John was one of the finest gentlemen I have ever known,” Fuentes said. “A kind and welcoming person who enjoyed helping others, he embodied the very spirit of IRE.”
Doug Haddix, IRE’s former Executive Director, got to see that hospitality on display in Bones’ home country. When he and his family visited Norway in 2012, Bones led them on a walking tour of Oslo, including a visit to the Verdens Gang AS newspaper.
“John was just beaming the whole time because I'm not sure how many of his IRE friends were ever able to visit him in Oslo,” Haddix said. “But he was very proud and very gracious to be hosting us there.”
That cultural exchange was at the heart of Bones’ work as a journalism leader and mentor. He was passionate about engaging IRE’s global membership, often organizing groups of 10-15 journalists and bringing them to NICAR conferences.
He acted almost like a “tour guide,” Haddix remembers, setting up meetings and visits for them at news organizations in New York and Washington, D.C.
“He wanted to make sure that they experienced more than a conference,” Haddix said. “He wanted them to see what working journalists in the United States were dealing with and what they might learn from them, and vice versa. It was always mutual.”
Today, as the industry and the world around us evolve, journalists have plenty to take away from his example.
Bones worked in different types of media and recognized the power of technology. He was generous with his time and wisdom, helping to grow IRE, GIJN and others.
“One of John's main legacies will be for people to always adapt, and to never be comfortable and get into a rut,” Haddix said. “He loved learning new things.”
Beyond his excellence in journalism, Bones was a true ambassador for cross-border collaboration. He was “a man of the world,” his colleagues at SKUP write, with “friends on every continent.”
“John brought out the best in people, celebrating all kinds of cultures and putting everyone at ease with his ready smile,” Fuentes said. “He will be missed very much.”
Bones is survived by five children. Details about services are pending.
IRE professional members can now get free access to FOIAengine, a database for researching FOIA requests. The tool, created last year by PoliScio Analytics, contains more than 230,000 FOIA record requests from 2021 to the present.
PoliScio co-founders Randy Miller, an attorney, and John Jenkins, a journalist, created FOIAengine in part to replace the public record request database on FOIAonline.gov, which the federal government maintained until shutting it down in October 2023.
To get a free one-year subscription, please email Amy Eaton at amy@ire.org. Free access to FOIAengine is available only to professional members of IRE. This special subscription is the only way an individual can access the database, and IRE is the only media association authorized to access this resource.
Like the FOIAonline database, FOIAengine provides data about the record requests only, not the results of the requests. The new tool has more robust searching capabilities and standardizes data from different agencies to make it easier to work with.
You can search and filter records by the agency the request was submitted to, the requester's organization and type (news media, law firm, financial institution, etc.), the requester’s name, date and the text of the request. You can also copy or export 100 records at a time to analyze in other tools.
Jenkins points out that journalists are not the only ones using FOIA. Knowing who is asking for what information can mean that something of interest is going on – or is about to.
“It’s a set of signals,” he said. “Nobody does this for the hell of it. They always have an agenda.”
You can also see examples of stories that came from FOIAengine research on the PoliScio website and Law Street Media.
If you have questions about FOIAengine, please contact David Meyers at david@poliscio.com.
Learn more about becoming a member of IRE and member benefits.
IRE is adding a new membership category to benefit early-career journalists beginning this summer.
Beginning July 1, early-career journalists can join IRE for $50/year. Along with paying less in membership dues, these members will also have lower registration fees for some events. This category is open to journalists who have five years of experience or fewer.
The IRE Board voted unanimously to create this new pricing structure at its last meeting in April. There will be no refunds for early-career journalists who paid their dues before July 1, 2024 but you'll have the option to renew at the early-career rate next time if still applicable.
"I and the rest of the Board believe that these changes represent a major step forward for IRE and will help us to fulfill our mission to serve the investigative journalism industry," IRE Board President Brian Rosenthal said. "As our business continues to evolve, I am proud of our organization for keeping up."
In July, the professional membership rate will also increase by $5 to $75/year. This is the organization's first increase since 2011. The student membership rate will stay the same at $25/year.
Other membership changes to the Articles of Incorporation will be presented to IRE members at IRE24 in Anaheim next month. The proposals include:
These amendments aim to open IRE membership to more people and give young journalists greater flexibility as they start their careers. IRE members will vote on the proposed changes to the Articles of Incorporation at the annual meeting of the membership at the IRE24 Conference in Anaheim this June. The membership meeting is at 5:30 p.m. PDT Saturday, June 22. Only eligible professional, academic, retiree and student members may vote.
Learn more about the IRE membership tiers here. Read the minutes from the IRE Board of Directors' last meeting here.
The IRE Radio Podcast is back after a four-year hiatus. Check out these three new episodes on education-related topics:
You can find the podcast on Soundcloud, Spotify for Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and other streaming platforms.
Graduate editorial assistant Nakylah Carter reported and hosted the episodes. Doug Meigs edits the podcast. We are recorded in the studios of KBIA at the University of Missouri School of Journalism.
Read on for more information about each of the new episodes and additional resources and links to topics discussed.
On this episode, we recap “Separate and unequal: 5 must-have stories from the K-12 education beat,” a panel from IRE’s inaugural AccessFest Conference in 2023, featuring two veteran journalists who cover education.
Melissa Barragán Taboada is the editor of the Globe’s “Great Divide” education team, which examines inequities in education. Prior to coming to the Globe in 2021, Taboada was a reporter and editor for 20 years at the Austin American-Statesman, where she led the paper’s education coverage. Taboada taught a "Reporting on Education" course in the School of Journalism at the University of Texas at Austin, her alma mater.
Chastity Pratt is the education bureau chief responsible for leading The Wall Street Journal's coverage of pre-kindergarten through higher education, including managing education reporters based in bureaus across the country. She previously covered education at Bridge Magazine, the Detroit Free Press, Newsday and The Oregonian.
In the spring of 2022, an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas was victim of a mass shooting, resulting in 21 lives lost – a massive tragedy for the community. The ABC News Investigative Unit, lead by Cindy Galli, decided it was time to stay. Uvalde: 365 was a yearlong project where the ABC News team stayed in Uvalde for more than a year to report the aftermath of this tragedy.
You can watch the ABC News team’s new documentary, “21: Loyal and True,” streaming on ESPN+ and Hulu. Members of the Uvalde 365 team also have a new book coming out, “One Year in Uvalde,” a story of hope and resilience that will be released in May 2024.
On this special episode of the IRE Radio Podcast, we pull from 2023 and 2024 NICAR Conference recordings to explore how Phil Meyer inspired countless reporters, students and colleagues. This episode also includes excerpts from an interview with Meyer by Charles Lewis from a decade prior.
Meyer pioneered the field of computer-assisted reporting and introduced social sciences methods to newsrooms. His groundbreaking book, “Precision Journalism,” turned 50 years old in 2023. He died on Nov. 4, 2023, due to complications from Parkinson’s disease.
If you have a story you think we should feature on the show, drop us a note at web@ire.org. We would love to hear from you.
Journalists come to IRE conferences to sharpen their data analysis and investigative reporting skills, getting training on how to ask the toughest questions and pursue stories relentlessly.
That creates a great reporter in the field but often poses a dilemma for their editors and executive producers. How do you manage someone who’s trained to challenge authority?
Train the manager.
In 2022, IRE launched a new initiative to focus on investigative management, from story reviews and legal guidance to difficult conversations and safety concerns. We also sought to supercharge a community of support that continues to thrive today.
Our next management training will be at the IRE Conference, June 20-23, at the Anaheim Marriott in California. It’s an updated Master Class featuring a new segment on navigating union shops as well as other front-burner topics. The session includes instructors who are tops in their fields including Emma Carew Grovum of the Marshall Project, Cindy Galli of ABC News, Josh Hinkle of KXAN-TV, Gonzalo Magana of ABC10 Sacramento and Mc Nelly Torres of the Center for Public Integrity.
“Managing investigators is different than managing other groups, and that means managing not as a one-size-fits-all approach but managing people individually,” said Cody Lillich, a senior investigative producer at Arizona’s Family in Phoenix, who attended the Master Class at IRE23 in Orlando. “I would also say this group has helped to continue the conversation — I know if I have a management question, there's a group I can turn to for advice.”
So far, more than 180 managers and aspiring managers have trained at IRE online and in-person through these investigative management courses and associated webinars, creating a shared contact network of like-minded professionals with unique responsibilities.
The first “Managing Investigators” Master Class in 2022 was online, and it focused on pervasive management challenges of that specific leadership role. Hinkle and Torres joined Jodie Fleischer of Cox Media Group and Jennifer Forsyth of the Wall Street Journal to guide the class through more than three hours of discussion, advice and more.
“I love that I always learn something new from those attending while we open this space and try to teach this class,” Torres said.
It soon became an in-person course at both NICAR and IRE conferences, adding more top instructors to the lineup — including Carew Grovum, Nicole Vap of the CBS Innovation Lab and Jamie Grey of Gray’s InvestigateTV.
Outside of conferences, IRE has hosted webinars to make management training accessible to all our members. The latest webinars taught editors how to protect their teams from threats and bring more "people" skills to the newsroom. The online training is the work of a board subcommittee comprised of Grey, Vap and Kat Stafford of Reuters. It’s a subcommittee of IRE’s Member Services Committee, chaired by Hinkle.
If you’re a current (or aspiring) investigative manager, your colleagues want you to join IRE's next management training in June. Sign up for this Master Class now while spots are still available.
IRE24 will take place June 20-23 in Anaheim, California. Learn more about the conference here.
Sign-ups are closed for the mentorship networking program at IRE24 in Anaheim!
If you’ll be joining us for the conference, you can sign up by filling out this form. If you can’t make it to Anaheim this year but still want to find a mentor, please check out the IRE page at JournalismMentors.com, where you can set up a time to meet virtually with an IRE member mentor.
IRE will match mentors with mentees and arrange for them to meet at a breakfast during the conference. The IRE24 mentorship breakfast will be held from 7:30 - 8:45 a.m. on Friday, June 21, at the conference hotel.
Space is limited in this popular program, and the deadline to apply is midnight CT on Sunday, June 2. If the slots are filled before then, your application will be added to a waitlist.
Please also note that you must register for the conference by June 3 to participate.
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