Virg Hill Journalist of the Year

Virg Hill Journalist of the Year

AMY SILVERMAN
Phoenix New Times

Phoenix New Times staff writer Amy Silverman, 33, is the 1999 Virg Hill Journalist of the Year.

"This reporter gets high marks for writing lots of stories, taking contrarian angles and hitting the topics hard," wrote judge Ren Holding of the San Francisco Chronicle. "There obviously isn't much this reporter doesn't know about Arizona politics."

Silverman, a former reporter with the Scottsdale Progress, joined New Times in 1993 where she writes in-depth magazine-style news features and investigative pieces, as well as "Wonk," a political column. Silverman's work has appeared in George, Salon, The New York Times Magazine, Playboy, New York Press and New York Observer.

Silverman has won multiple awards from the Arizona Press Club, an honorable mention from the National Association of Secondary School Principals' Benjamin Fine Award for Excellence in Education Writing and was a finalist for a Penney-Missouri Lifestyle Award.

The judges for this year's Virg Hill Journalist of the Year contest praised Silverman's versatility and combination of good writing and hard reporting. Of special note to judges was a story about how the actions of Arizona lobbyists affect state residents and "The Terminator," a profile of trash-talking abortionist Dr. Brian Finkel.

Patrick Dougherty, editor of the Anchorage Daily News who edited the paper's 1989 Pulitzer-Prize winning series, wrote that "great profiles of interesting people are central to any great journalistic enterprise. I've never read anything quite like the 'Terminator.' I'm glad I had the opportunity."

Silverman is a proud product of the Scottsdale public school system: Hopi Elementary, Ingleside Middle School and Arcadia High School. She holds a bachelor's degree in American Studies from Scripps College in Claremont, Calif., and a master's from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism in New York City.

Silverman lives in Tempe with her husband, Ray Stern - a reporter for The Tribune - two mutts, Rosy and Elliot, and three cats: Tigger, Izzy and Ernie.

First Runner Up (tie)

JOHN DOUGHERTY
Phoenix New Times

MARK FLATTEN
The Tribune

John Dougherty, 43, has been a New Times writer since 1993. He previously worked as a staff writer for the Phoenix Gazette, the Mesa Tribune and the Dayton Daily News, and was editor and publisher of the now-defunct Flagstaff weekly, The Southwest Sage. His freelance work has appeared in the Washington Post.

Dougherty has been The Arizona Press Club's journalist of the year three times and runner-up once. He's won numerous local, regional and national reporting awards in Ohio, California and Arizona. His reporting on the collapse of Lincoln Savings and Loan was credited during U.S. Senate testimony as being a catalyst for investigations of what became known as the Keating Five.

Judges made special note of Dougherty's authoritative, yet non-editorializing voice. "This writer displayed incredible versatility and a dedication to mastering subjects that most reporters would shy away from," wrote Thomas Zambito, a reporter with the New York Daily News andwinner of an IRE Tom Renner Award. "Each story is told with authority. This writer is a pro."

Patrick Dougherty, editor of the Anchorage Daily News (and no relation to John), heralded Dougherty's ability to "uncover, dissect and chronicle the efforts of private schemers, with the complicity of public officials, to convert public resources into private assets. Here, in the land of Charles Keating and Co., that seems a paramount journalistic service." In short, Dougherty wrote, "any news organization would be proud to have published this body of work."

John Dougherty has bachelor's degrees in journalism and economics from Arizona State University. He is a former treasurer and president of the Arizona Press Club.

Mark Flatten, 40, has covered state politics and government in Arizona since 1986, first for the Scottsdale Progress and since 1992 for The Tribune.

He has provided award-winning coverage of some of the most volatile times in the state's history, from the tenure and impeachment of former Gov. Evan Mecham to the criminal trial and ouster of former Gov. Fife Symington. He also has produced several investigative projects that have won numerous national and state awards, including the Molly Livingston Award and the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award, as well as honors in the National Headliner and Best of the West competitions. Flatten is a prior recipient of the Arizona Press Club's Virg Hill Journalist of the Year Award.

Judges offered particular praise for Flatten's stories about the price Arizona Indians pay for casino gaming on their reservations. "I felt the series pierced the veil of secrecy into that world and strongly made the reporter's case that Indian gaming puts at risk the thing held most precious by Indians - the sovereignty that defines their identity and protects their culture," wrote Josh Meyer, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times who has shared in two Pulitzer Prizes. "The pervasive impact of gaming and casinos on communities is not a new story, nor is it a unique investigative subject for a reporter to tackle. But this one tackled the subject with tenacity, clarity and grace."

Patrick Dougherty, who edited the Anchorage Daily News' Pulitzer Prize-winning series about alcoholism among Alaska's Native Americans, wrote: "I have some idea how hard it must have been to build the trust necessary to convince people to talk and to bring these stories to light. I was impressed that the stories were built on named sources, when the easiest course would have been to do otherwise."

Flatten is a 1981 graduate of Arizona State University.

The judges:

Patrick Dougherty, editor of the Anchorage Daily News. Dougherty, a former Nieman fellow, edited "A People In Peril," a series about alcoholism among Alaska's Native Americans, which won the 1989 Pulitzer Prize Gold Medal for Public Service.
Thomas Zambito, reporter, New York Daily News. Zambito won the Investigative Reporters and Editors' 1998 Tom Renner Award for "Dirty Money," a series documenting New Jersey's emergence as a haven forlaunderers of $2 billion a year in drug and crime money.
Ren Holding, reporter with the San Francisco Chronicle. Holding was a finalist for the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for his series on unsafe needle use.
Josh Meyer, staff writer, Los Angeles Times. Meyer has shared in two Pultizers for coverage of the Los Angeles riots and the Northridge earthquake, and has been nominated for three other Pulitzers.