Michigan Radio was recognized this past weekend with two awards from the Public Radio News Directors Incorporated (PRNDI). The station received a First Place award in the Large Newsroom-Nationally Edited Continuing Coverage category for the station’s on-going reporting about the Flint water crisis. Michigan Radio was among the first news organizations to report about contaminated drinking water in Flint and has been bringing this story to listeners across the state and the nation from the very beginning. This included the city's 2014 water supply switch to the Flint River and the first reports of lead in the drinking water in July, 2015.
“The reporters at Michigan Radio took our commitment to keep the story of the Flint water crisis in front of a national audience very seriously,” said Michigan Radio News Director Vincent Duffy. “This award is really a credit to the whole Flint team and our entire newsroom for their work that aired on NPR. I’m really pleased that the fantastic work done by Michigan Radio reporters has been recognized in this way.”
The station also received a Second Place award in the Long Documentary category for “Out From The Shadows: Living Undocumented.” The hour long documentary by reporter Dustin Dwyer of Michigan Radio’s State of Opportunity team looked at what life is like for illegal immigrant families in the Grand Rapids area facing the prospect of deportation.
Public Radio News Directors Incorporated is a non-profit professional association that exists to improve local news and information programming by serving public radio journalists across the United States. The organization educates and advocates to promote high standards, ethical principles, and significant public service among public radio stations. The awards were presented to the station on June 24 at PRNDI's annual conference in Miami.
