Released: 02/12/2009

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Robust public service reporting that shined a spotlight on wrongdoing and government failures topped the eight winners of McClatchy's President's Awards for the second half of 2008.

A team of independent judges also honored a wide-ranging body of other work by McClatchy journalists: a re-creation of an Air Force One visit by the Kansas family of a slain soldier; great deadline reporting on Sarah Palin's selection as a vice-presidential nominee and on a wildfire in Idaho; an innovative project to rate growth strategies in California; and a small newspaper's entrepreneurial teamwork to chronicle a Little League tournament -- and make money in the process.

The watchdog reporting by The Charlotte Observer, The Miami Herald and The News & Observer in Raleigh had game-changing impact in all three locales. Miami's reporting on the shocking number of Florida mortgage brokers who had been convicted of finance-related felonies prompted state officials to take strong corrective action. Charlotte’s unveiling of the lavish pension plan given the local United Way director resulted in the director’s firing and the resignation of the board chairman. Raleigh’s penetrating account of lax oversight given North Carolina probationers resulted in a state crackdown and a vow of transparency from state officials.

The Island Packet in Hilton Head, S.C., won for an interactive plan created by a newspaper-wide committee to chronicle the local Dixie Junior Boys World Series -- a project that produced both readership and revenue. The Anchorage Daily News, already swamped with corruption investigations in Alaska, rose to the occasion with its authoritative and much-quoted work on the surprise nomination of Gov. Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate. Similar quick action and smart thinking by the staff of the Idaho Statesman produced vivid coverage of the Oregon Trail fire. The Modesto Bee won by thinking outside the box with its rating system for growth and development policies in California’s Central Valley, a risk-taking project with payoff for readers. And The Wichita Eagle was honored for its riveting narrative of the Kansas family who lost a son in Iraq and of its successful attempt to give President Bush a piece of their mind.

The judging team included David Westphal, executive in residence at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and former McClatchy Washington editor; David Yepsen, director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale and former political columnist at The Des Moines Register; and Mary Lou Fulton, vice president of audience development at The Bakersfield Californian.

Internet links to the winning projects and a compilation of judges’ comments follow:

Anchorage Daily News
Sarah Palin Announcement
Team

It can be a newspaper’s worst headache -- and the reason so many got into the news trade: the excitement of a big breaking story smack in your backyard. That’s what happened to the Anchorage Daily News when John McCain surprised the world by picking Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his running mate. The Daily News’ reporting team produced a comprehensive, in-depth package on the selection that revealed a great deal about Palin in the first 24 hours. It was striking how much other media relied on the Daily News as their guide to Palin, on the first day and beyond. Good art. Good copy. Good hustle. Noteworthy, too, is how the Daily News managed to own the Palin story and retain ownership of the Ted Stevens corruption saga -- with national and international competitors breathing down its neck.

The Charlotte Observer
United Way
Reporters Kerry Hall, Eric Frazier and Mark Price; project editor Michael Gordon

When the United Way decided to pay its director a huge salary and sweet compensation package, The Charlotte Observer dug in and wouldn’t let go. It’s journalism that had an impact. This reporting, by Hall, Frazier and Price, is work other newspapers can look to in covering nonprofits. A wrong would not have been rectified had it not been for the Observer’s tenacity. The paper also realized its stories had the unfortunate effect of drying up contributions to the charities supported by United Way. In subsequent stories the Observer made it clear that the actions of a few shouldn't undermine the needs of the community. Noteworthy: The national United Way sent the Observer's coverage to its 1,300 affiliates.

The Wichita Eagle
For Alex
Reporter Roy Wenzl

"For Alex" was a highly personal portrait of the life and family of Alex Funcheon, a teenage "screw-up" who was finally growing up after enlisting in the Army. Alex was killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq and as part of their grieving process, the Funcheon family pursued and were granted an unusual private audience with President Bush. Wenzl provided a compelling reconstruction of that meeting on Air Force One, during which the parents gave the president their son’s dog tags and their younger daughter asked Bush pointed questions about American foreign policy. Through online extras including e-mail correspondence and a video showing Alex practicing his new German language skills, Wenzl gave readers a moving and intimate view of Alex and life in the Funcheon family.

Idaho Statesman
Oregon Trail Fire
Team

When word of Idaho's Oregon Trail fire first surfaced on a police scanner, the newsroom of the Idaho Statesman sprang into action. From reporters to photographers to the business editor and even the publisher, the staff pitched in to tell the story in words, pictures and videos that documented the fire that killed one woman, destroyed 10 homes and damaged dozens more. Within days of the blaze, the newspaper began looking at fire code changes that could have saved some houses with cedar-shake roofs, and also explained who might end up liable for the fire that was caused by a power pole bracket that broke in the wind. The newspaper also reported on how sections of the Oregon Trail long obscured by sagebrush were now visible and being marked by local historians for the benefit of hikers and others. The judges were impressed by both the thoroughness of the paper’s breaking news coverage as well as the aggressiveness in pursuing stories about government oversight along with the human dimensions of the event.

The Island Packet
Dixie Junior Boys World Series
Team

Meetings to discuss budget cuts are generally not that inspiring, but the staff of The Island Packet used an interdepartmental meeting as an opportunity to discuss how to grow online traffic and revenue through coverage of the Dixie Junior Boys World Series. Led by sports editor Jeff Kidd, staff from editorial, marketing, sales and circulation combined to create a special website along with aggressive promotion to make sure every parent and every coach would turn to islandpacket.com for the brackets, scores, maps, photos and more. Online features included large photo galleries, with pictures available for purchase, as well as “virtual baseball cards” created for every player and coach with thumbnail bios and video. Advertising sold out for the special print edition, and complimentary print editions made their way to the ballparks and hotels. This special website succeeded in attracting the attention of its target -- out-of-towners who generated tens of thousand of page views -- and photo purchases representing 25 percent of 2008 revenue from all photo sales. The Packet replicated this model for high school football coverage, generating even more traffic and revenue.

The Miami Herald
Borrowers Betrayed
Reporters Jack Dolan, Matthew Haggman and Rob Barry; investigations editor Michael D. Sallah

The nation's financial and housing mess was caused by Bernie Madoff and all the other unscrupulous types on Wall Street, right? Well, not completely. The Miami Herald found problems much, much closer to home -- in the state regulatory machinery that governs mortgage broker licensing. Regulators allowed 10,000-plus people with criminal histories to market home loans. And thousands of these criminal histories involved financial crimes. As a group, they committed hundreds of frauds (more than $85 million worth), burglaries, forgeries and robberies, the Herald found. The upshot? The financial regulation commissioner was fired and the state ordered that any felon convicted of a financial crime would have a lifetime ban on getting a broker’s license.

The News & Observer
Losing Track
Team

Carolinians had trouble believing the shocking numbers The News & Observer reported on the state’s probation system: 14,000 probationers couldn’t be found; 580 probationers were convicted of killing in North Carolina since 2000; and 17 percent of all murder/manslaughter convictions were of people on probation. A five-person reporting team tracked all this down and found out why the state had done such a lousy job of keeping an eye on North Carolina’s probation population. One answer: The state’s probation chief had shut down a program that might have alerted probation officers about high-risk probationers. Former Gov. Mike Easley accused the N&O of a hatchet job. But state officials have already begun to take remedial action, agreeing to make public key evaluations of probation officers. This work, by Joseph Neff, Sarah Ovaska, Anne Blythe, Jason Arthurs and David Raynor, might have application in other states.

The Modesto Bee
Framing Our Future
Reporter Garth Stapley and Team

In California’s Central Valley, growth is a huge issue. It’s a boom-and-bust place (now in the bust stage), and how the growth occurs, and at what pace, is of critical importance to citizens. The Modesto Bee tried something way out of the box to address the issue of growth. Led by Stapley, it rated the growth policies of 60 cities and eight counties in the region, and assigned scores to each. The premise of the project, "Framing Our Future," was this: Some places are much better than others in addressing growth, and it’s instructive for all to see how the differences affect quality of life. Noteworthy, too, was The Modesto Bee’s involvement of reporting partners, including students at California State University, Stanislaus and Modesto’s Great Valley Center. This was risk-taking and hard work that had a big payoff.

About McClatchy

The McClatchy Company is the third largest newspaper company in the United States, with 30 daily newspapers, approximately 50 non-dailies, and direct marketing and direct mail operations. McClatchy also operates leading local websites in each of its markets which extend its audience reach. The websites offer users comprehensive news and information, advertising, e-commerce and other services. Together with its newspapers and direct marketing products, these interactive operations make McClatchy the leading local media company in each of its premium high growth markets. McClatchy-owned newspapers include The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, The Kansas City Star, The Charlotte Observer, and The (Raleigh) News & Observer.

McClatchy also owns a portfolio of premium digital assets, including 14.4% of CareerBuilder, the nation's largest online job site, and 25.6% of Classified Ventures, a newspaper industry partnership that offers two of the nation's premier classified websites: the auto website, cars.com, and the rental site, apartments.com. McClatchy is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol MNI.

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