Overview:
- Planet Detroit wins first place for food waste series examining how landfill methane contributes to climate change in Michigan.
- The newsroom receives second place for in-depth health reporting covering hepatitis B vaccines, water fluoridation, asthma, and more.
- Executive editor Nina Ignaczak is recognized for her work with the Detroit Writing Room's Summer Journalism Camp.
Planet Detroit journalists were honored Wednesday at the Society of Professional Journalists Detroit Chapter’s 2026 Excellence In Journalism awards.
Founder and executive editor Nina Ignaczak received a first-place award in Print Class C: Environment Reporting alongside photographer Nick Hagen and freelancer Shelby Jouppi for the series “Compost or Combust: Why wasted food is heating up the planet — and how Michigan can stop the rot.”
The multipart Planet Detroit Deep Dive on food waste, published in May 2025, investigated how Michigan’s food waste system contributes to climate change through landfill methane emissions—and explores the local solutions that could turn the tide. It was produced as part of the MIT Climate Solutions Journalism Fellowship and in partnership with NextCity.
The series includes a Guide on six ways to fight food waste in Michigan, reporting on the intersection of the state’s landfill rules and efforts to cut methane emissions, the future of food waste, the state of composting in Michigan, a Planet Detroit food waste game, and more.
In the category Digital: Health Reporting, Ignaczak; senior reporter Brian Allnutt; Ethan Bakuli, Planet Detroit’s climate solutions and service journalism reporting fellow; and freelancer David Sands received second place for In-depth public health reporting for Detroiters that offers solutions.
Planet Detroit’s health journalism in 2025 included:
• Ignaczak’s reporting on the federal rollback of hepatitis B vaccine recommendations at birth.
• Bakuli’s story on efforts by Detroit food banks, urban farms, and food aid groups to combat hunger caused by a pause in SNAP benefits.
• Allnutt’s reporting on the quiet discontinuation of drinking water fluoridation in Wyandotte and subsequent vote to leave water unfluoridated.
• Ignaczak’s coverage of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America’s naming of Detroit as the most challenging city in the country for people with asthma.
• Sands on the expansion of a free Detroit medical clinic, the Malta Clinic, and its impact on uninsured and underinsured residents.
• Bakuli’s Q&A with Mary-Jacqueline Muli, the Climate Justice Nurse, on how climate change manifests at the patient’s bedside.
• Bakuli on how Medicaid cuts put health insurance for Detroiters at risk and Allnutt on what the cuts mean for asthma care.
• Bakuli on the effects of rising extreme heat on pregnant people.
Ignaczak received a second place award with the Detroit Writing Room’s Stephanie Steinberg in the Open: Collaborative Coverage category for the Writing Room, Coaching Detroit Forward, and Planet Detroit’s “Our Detroit, Our Future: Detroit Teens Report on What Matters to Them — Health, Environment and Equality.”
Planet Detroit helps produce the Summer Journalism Camp for high school students and is sponsoring a student journalist this year in honor of the late Anaya ‘Kaz’ Lugo-Thomas.
Freelancer Eleanore Catolico received a third place award in Digital: Feature Reporting for “Stuck and Sick in the Motor City,” a series exploring how transportation barriers limit Detroiters’ access to health care, erode physical and mental health, and how the fragmented transportation ecosystem offers few reliable alternatives for patients without cars.
The series was produced as a project for the USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism’s National Fellowship, with support from the National Fellowship Fund and the Dennis A. Hunt Fund for Health Journalism. Catolico also participated in the Center’s Engagement Initiative.
In April, Allnutt was named the Michigan Press Association Foundation’s 2025 Richard Milliman Journalist of the Year.