Welcome to the August RN&R!
Some of our hardworking reporters were recognized for a job well done over the past year. The Association of Alternative Newsmedia (AAN) announced the results of its 2024 awards at the organization’s annual conference in July. (RN&R publisher Jimmy Boegle is the AAN board president, but he did not have any involvement in the award decisions.)
In the Explanatory Journalism category, editor-at-large Frank X. Mullen and Lucy Birmingham won third place for their August 2023 article, “Museums and federal agencies stockpiled the remains of Indigenous people as their descendants protested. That’s slowly changing.”
In the Music Writing category, the RN&R’s Matt Bieker won third place, and Matt King, who covers music for both the RN&R and our sister paper, the Coachella Valley Independent, won first place for his coverage in the Independent.
Finally, our 2023 Best of Northern Nevada issue took third place in the Special Section category.
This newspaper’s strong points have always included producing in-depth news features you’re not likely to find elsewhere, and insightful conversations about local arts. Excellent job keeping the torch lit for yet another year, Frank, Lucy, Matt and Matt. Congratulations, team!
In other news: Last month’s cover story, “After 22 years in solitary,” told the story of Frank De Palma, a Reno man who spent 22 years in solitary confinement and is now a prison reform advocate; in the piece, we mentioned that plans were in the works for De Palma to appear at an August event, but we didn’t yet have the details.
The organizers have since let us know that the event will be a panel discussion, “The States of Solitary,” taking place from 5 to 7 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 10, at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Northern Nevada, at 780 Del Monte Lane, in Reno. Organizers hadn’t released a full list of panelists as of this writing, but they confirmed that James Dzurenda, director of the Nevada Department of Corrections, is slated to appear, along with prison-reform advocates Mary Buser and Nick Shepack, both of whom spoke with the RN&R for the article.