Bloomberg, ProPublica and Fortune among NYSSCPA winners

The winners of the 32nd annual Excellence in Financial Journalism Awards were announced Wednesday by the New York State Society of CPAs.

The awards are presented to journalists, reporters and authors on the recommendation of the Society’s board ofjJudges, which consists of select members of the NYSSCPA and New York Financial Writers’ Association.

The awards recognize outstanding national and local media whose work, published or broadcast in 2014, contributed to a better understanding of business and financial topics.

Here’s a list of the winners, who will be honored during a May 1, 2015 awards luncheon in New York City:

BEAT NEWS REPORTING: “Wireless Companies Fight for their Futures”

Awarded to Allan Holmes and the Center for Public Integrity for its complex series of articles – produced by the creation of this new topic beat – that exposed how telecommunications companies use lobbying and hired experts to stifle competition, and protect their own interests and profits, not the public’s.

BEST COMMENTARY: “Positively Un-American Tax Dodges”

Awarded to Allan Sloan of Fortune for his persuasive narrative in a cover story that raised public awareness of corporate tax inversions. The story explained this extremely complicated issue in a clear way and took a rarely noticed aspect of the corporate tax code and helped make it a national issue prompting action by President Obama and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.

BEST EXPLANATORY: “How Wall Street Tobacco Deals Left States with Billions in Toxic Debt”

Awarded to Cezary Podkul of ProPublica for his reporting and writing about a little understood financial debacle created by state and local governments who borrowed against their share of the Big Tobacco legal settlement turning a multi-generational windfall into a multi-generational legacy of debt.

BEST INVESTIGATIVE: “The Lure of Forex”

Awarded to David Evans of Bloomberg for his meticulous research, reporting and writing about a sophisticated international “get rich” investing scheme, involving people from 140 countries, that lost or stole more than $1 billion.

BEST INDEPENDENT OR AFFILIATED ONLINE STORY (Medium to Small Media; circulation or daily online visitors of less than 200,000): “Medicare Advantage Money Grab”

Awarded to Fred Schulte, David Donald, Erin Durkin and Chris Zubak-Skees of the Center for Public Integrity for their year-long reporting and six-article analysis of how Medicare Advantage plans, which were created by Congress to offer the elderly a low-cost private alternative to Medicare, have become waste behemoths due to billions of dollars in overcharges and suspect billings.

BEST INDEPENDENT OR AFFILIATED ONLINE STORY  (Large Media: circulation or daily online visitors of more than 200,000): “How to Lose a Billion”

Awarded to Steve Weiss for his story, published in takepart.com, about the loss of $1 billion by the largest Jewish non-profit organization in the U.S., due to the mix of risky investment and spending behaviors of a new brash administration. 

BEST PERSONAL FINANCE STORY: “Florida’s Foreclosure Crisis“

Awarded to Center for Public Integrity’s Alison Fitzgerald and Jared Bennett for a series of stories that explained how Florida’s judicial foreclosure system is broken and has denied homeowners any negotiating means or rights to save their homes and given lenders all the advantages. 

BEST RADIO OR ONLINE DIGITAL AUDIO: “Fall Down, Turnaround: Pivotal Moments in American Business”

Awarded to Carole Zimmer of Bloomberg News for a two-part series that examined how companies handle crises that damage their brands or bottom lines; and reported on how key transitional moments and decisions made the difference between sinking fortune or  painful recovery.

BEST TV OR ONLINE VIDEO NEWS: “Time is Money”

Awarded to Eleanor Bell and Daniel Wagner of the Center for Public Integrity for an enlightening documentary that explains how financial companies have become central players  in a multi-billion dollar economy that shifts the costs of mass incarceration onto the families of prison inmates and thus boosting  the private companies profits.

 EXCELLENCE IN FINANCIAL JOURNALISM BOOK:  Law of the Jungle

Awarded to Paul Barrett for Law of the Jungle (Crown Publishing Group) which recounts the 20-year journey and courtroom battle of Steven Donziger, a former journalist and self-styled social activist, and his relentless fight to defeat oil giant Chevron to win the largest environmental damages award in legal history.