Publication Items

Steep cuts for the U.S. National Park System look likely from the Trump administration, affecting visitors, roiling local businesses and raising political hackles. For environmental journalists, budgets slashed for hundreds of park units could also turn a summer standby story into something closer to disaster coverage. TipSheet has more than a dozen story ideas and reporting resources to cover the park nearest you.

It’s not just scientists who are being lost to the new administration’s extensive firings of federal workers. A Backgrounder Analysis argues it’s the science itself. It’s happening at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, but also across agencies that conduct research to protect health and the environment, whether around toxic chemicals or on the battleground of climate change science. A frank look at the reality and what’s being lost for journalists and the communities they serve.

As the Trump administration rolls back Biden-era rules limiting the presence of “forever chemicals” in drinking water, an updated data mapping tool helps pinpoint local angles on the PFAS story. The latest TipSheet outlines the basics on this class of widely used chemicals, their risks to humans and the challenges of regulating them, plus provides a half-dozen story ideas and questions to ask.

A project of vast scope was needed to tell the untold story of stolen lands originally promised to Indigenous nations. But for Tristan Ahtone, it was the pursuit of "smaller" stories arising out of the detailed data that was the Grist team’s proudest result. Explore the high points — plus three key lessons — of this Pulliam Prize-winning project, in Ahtone’s Inside Story Q&A.