MOUNT DESERT, Dec. 18, 2022 - The Quietside Journal received an unexpected gift this holiday season.
On Friday I received news that I was awarded the 2022 Yankee Quill, the “highest individual honor awarded by fellow journalists in the region,” for my body of work which includes the Quietside Journal.
The Yankee Quill Award was formed in the 1950s to recognize “the region’s most extraordinary journalists for their contributions to a free press and their efforts to improve the communities they serve.”
In the judging, one of the panelists drew attention to the QSJ, which I started in April 2020 shortly after I retired from Hearst Corp., and took note of how I spanned a career in media only to arrive at where I started - covering local news.
“I am very pleased to inform you that the Academy of New England Journalists has named you to receive the prestigious Yankee Quill Award for your contributions to the betterment of New England journalism and your community,” wrote Linda Conway, executive director of the New England Newspaper & Press Association, in an email yesterday.
“Other journalism associations bestow awards for individual and team accomplishments, but the Yankee Quill recognizes the lifetime achievement of those who have had a broad influence for good, both inside and outside the newsroom,” the academy stated.
I am humbled and honored by this recognition. It validates my conviction that investigative journalism should not reside only within the purview of national and regional news outlets.
The award also recognized my contributions at the Hartford Courant, Boston Globe, New York Times and Hearst Newspapers.
The Academy, which is composed of all Quill winners and representatives of various New England journalism organizations, gathers annually under the auspices of the New England Society of News Editors Foundation to select the honorees. It will announce in January details of the awards ceremony.
Previous winners include several of my former bosses: Boston Globe editors Tom Winship, Jack Driscoll and Matt Storin; Hartford Courant managing editors Irving Kravsow and Bill Clew, and former Globe colleagues Eileen McNamara and Walter Robinson, who led the Spotlight investigation of the grotesque action of the Catholic Church to hide repeated abuse by its priests.
Mainers who have won include Russell Wiggins, editor and publisher of the Ellsworth American, Guy P. Gannett, of the Guy P. Gannett Newspapers, David Offer of the Kennebec Journal and Thomas Kearney of the Sentinel Journal.
I started writing the QSJ during the early weeks of the pandemic, as confusion reigned and reliable information was scarce. It stirred a desire to probe deeper into stories about the declining quality of life on MDI wrought by outside forces, especially the insatiable appetite of the tourism trade and its ruinous activities.
I wrote about that industry’s influence on municipal governments, some of which behaved more like agencies of the same industries they had a responsibility to oversee.
I wrote more articles on the cruise ship industry’s economic, environmental and aesthetic impact on the island than any other journalist the last three years. An informed citizenry will make better decisions for the community than wayward “elected” officials under outside influence, I believe. The 1,780-1,273 Nov. 8 vote in Bar Harbor to limit cruise ship visits drastically was a case in point.
I wrote more articles on American Aquafarms’s attempt to site two massive salmon farms in Frenchman Bay than any other journalist. I reported on how the state, through its quasi public marketing arm, Maine & Co., was giving AA’s CEO, a convicted felon, a white glove treatment and special access.
I wrote about how the state’s Department of Environmental Protection was down to one enforcement officer.
I wrote more articles on Municipal Review Committee’s calamitous management of the waste-to-energy plant in Hampden than any other journalist. I wrote about how the MRC failed to perform even the lightest due diligence on Delta Thermo Energy, which left a trail of unkept promises elsewhere. DTE was the MRC’s preferred operator of the plant until it couldn’t raise the money it promised.
I broke the story about the proposal for 154 camping sites in rural Tremont, including 72 VRs, and called out the bias of the town attorney. I took no joy in the final settlement for only 45 sites.
I published a list of island businesses which received the largest grants under the payroll protection program, including Islesford Dock, co-owned by billionaire Mitchell Rales and yet accepted $300,000 of taxpayer’s money.
I exposed the sloppy management of employee “housing” in Bar Harbor which led to the current effort to regulate employee housing.
I reported on the chairman of two Bar Harbor committees working to effect policy at the same time he was resident of Mount Desert, a violation of the 2019 ordinance barring non residents from holding such positions.
I shined a light on the backdoor workings of too many boards and committees on this island to list in detail, including the abuse of power by Southwest Harbor select chair George Jellison, who ignored calls for his recusal as he pushed the police and the select members to heed his sister’s complaints about parking across the street at a lobster pound.
I bore witness to the unanimous repudiation of Jellison and fellow select members at the extraordinary June 2021 town meeting when citizens voted 104-0 to approve seeking grants to improve the town’s popular skating pond and the harbor area. Despite that, Jellison still refused to seek the grants.
Then there were the singles: the clear-cutting of woods by Hammond Lumber, the mismanagement of the harbormaster in Southwest Harbor, the conflict of interest on Mount Desert’s Land Use advisory committee, the state legislator on the Marine Resource Committee who took money from the aquaculture industry, the Mount Desert Planning Board’s lawyer holding secret negotiations with the Hall Quarry operator without informing the board and the failure by the Bar Harbor Town Council to account for the performance of its new town manager in his previous job as city administrator in Saco.
I am grateful to the public officials - elected or otherwise - who continued to do their duty to talk to the press, and therefore to their constituency. These are people who return my calls, even though I have singed them multiple times with either caustic comments or reporting. They understand their roles serving the “public.”
They include:
Bar Harbor:
Council members Gary Friedmann, Jeff Dobbs and Joe Minutolo.
Town Clerk Liz Graves
Finance Director Sarah Gilbert
Code Enforcement Officer Angela Chamberlain
Former assessor Steve Weed
The entire Planning staff
Police Chief Jim Willis
Harbormaster office staff
State Rep. Lynne Williams
Mount Desert:
Select board members John McCauley, Rick Moores, Wendy Littlefield, Geoff Wood, Martha Dudman
Town Manager Durlin Lunt
Entire office staff, especially Town Clerk Claire Woolfolk
Assessor Kyle Avila
Police Chief Jim Willis
Fire Chief Mike Bender
Public Works Director Tony Smith (retired)
Southwest Harbor:
Select members Carolyn Ball, Natasha Johnson
Town Manager Marilyn Lowell
Town Clerk Jennifer Lahaye and her staff
Code Enforcement Officer John Larson
Police Lt. Mike Miller
Tremont:
Town Manager Jesse Dunbar
Town Clerk Katie Dandurand
Thank you for doing the right thing: Conducting the public’s business in public.
I dedicate my award to the memory of Arthur Greif, the champion of the underdog in Bar Harbor who died in May. He used his brilliant legal mind on many occasions to challenge the status quo dominated by the self-interested tourism industry against the average citizens who just wanted to preserve their quality of life in a special place called Mount Desert Island.
The QSJ will return to its weekly schedule after Jan. 1. Happy holidays!
Congratulations- well deserved. Lucky us, to have the benefit of your local journalism.
Congratulations! Thank you for the dedication and hard work that you have put into shining the light and keeping the public informed.