AILSA CHANG, HOST:
The winners of this year's Pulitzer Prizes for journalism were announced just yesterday, and among the winners were some familiar names, like The Washington Post, Reuters, ProPublica. But the local reporting award went to three journalists from The Baltimore Banner, a relatively new publication. They won for their coverage of the overdose crisis in Baltimore, stories that were done in conjunction with The New York Times. Kimi Yoshino is editor-in-chief of The Baltimore Banner and joins us now. Congratulations.
KIMI YOSHINO: Thank you so much.
CHANG: Thank you for being here. So I understand The Banner only started in 2022, right?
YOSHINO: That's right.
CHANG: That's remarkable.
YOSHINO: We're not even 3 years old.
CHANG: Right? After only three years, what does it feel like to now be Pulitzer winners?
YOSHINO: It's incredible. I said yesterday to the staff, never in my wildest dreams did I think that we would be here, less than 3 years old, winning a Pulitzer.
CHANG: Yeah. Well, I want to give a shout-out to the team 'cause this prize was awarded to three journalists - reporter Alissa Zhu, photojournalist Jessica Gallagher and data specialist Nick Thieme. They did a deep dive on the impact of the opioid crisis in the city, in particular on an older generation of Black men. Can you just talk a little bit about the process of reporting out the sprawling story, how long it took, the data they excavated?
YOSHINO: Yeah, this was definitely not an easy project. We knew that we wanted to do it because the numbers that we were hearing of the people dying was just extraordinary. Six thousand people died in six years. The average number of people dying every year was triple the number of homicides. But the only issue that the city seemed to be talking about was the murder rate, even though...
CHANG: Yeah.
YOSHINO: ...Many more people were dying of overdoses. In order to fully report this story, we needed to get a handle on the data. And that proved to be surprisingly difficult. The information that we were requesting was basic public information from autopsy reports, but they rejected our request, so we had to sue them. And this lawsuit, this legal battle, went on for almost two years.
CHANG: Wow. Well, it was worth it. You know, there is so much to be said about reporters who are part of the very community that they are reporting on. That's why local journalism is so incredibly important in this country. Though I understand you are not originally from Baltimore, right? And I understand that not all of your staff are originally from Baltimore. How much do you think residents there have accepted you as one of their local newsrooms?
YOSHINO: This has actually been one of the joys of The Baltimore Banner. The community was eager to have more local news here. And even though we aren't all local, we have many reporters who are from here, who were born here, who went to college here, who - some of them worked at The Baltimore Sun. I think that the mix of outsiders and insiders is actually what the community needs. It needs people who know and understand the community, and it needs reporters who are coming in with a fresh eye and seeing things that maybe others didn't.
CHANG: And also, I don't have to tell you, that it is a very difficult time to be a local journalist, right? Like, newsrooms are closing across the country. You guys are about 3 years old now. You've received one of the most prestigious awards for journalism. As a newsroom, what do you feel you need to do to ensure that The Baltimore Banner can keep doing great journalism?
YOSHINO: Yeah, this is a depressing time to be in local news. My former newsroom, The Los Angeles Times, has had numerous rounds of layoffs...
CHANG: Yeah.
YOSHINO: ...Since I left. It's depressing out there. We - you know, one of the reasons why I took this job to lead The Baltimore Banner and get it launched is because I believed that there is a way forward. There is hope for local news, and I think we're proving that. The community wants news. It hungers for it. It's pulling for us. I think that we - you know, when we published a story about our win, we were flooded with dozens of emails, dozens of comments from people rooting for us. And I think this is coming at a time when the longtime newspaper here is weakening and people want information that is credible, that's factual and that they can trust.
CHANG: That is Kimi Yoshino, editor-in-chief of The Baltimore Banner. Thank you so much and congrats again to you and your team.
YOSHINO: Thank you so much for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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