El Paso Matters is a finalist for four national journalism awards that recognize achievement in accountability reporting and business development.
“These recognitions are further evidence that El Paso Matters is a national leader in rebuilding high-quality, sustainable local news coverage at a crucial time in our history,” said Robert Moore, the organization’s founder and CEO. “Strong, independent journalism is necessary for building successful communities, and El Paso has shown that it will support that kind of work.”
Lion Publishers, which supports local independent online news organizations, selected El Paso Matters as finalists for Business of the Year and the Accountability Award.
The Business of the Year award honors “a LION member that has achieved transformational impact for their news business by working to achieve sustainability through operational resilience, financial health and journalistic impact.”
For the Accountability Award, El Paso Matters is a finalist for its coverage of failures and abuses by former District Attorney Yvonne Rosales and her associates. The award recognizes “general excellence in journalistic impact that led to the accountability of those in positions of power and a demonstrable positive outcome for the affected community.”
Lion winners will be announced at a conference in October.
El Paso Matters’ Rosales coverage also is a finalist for the Community Champion Award from the Institute for Nonprofit News. The award honors “an INN member organization that made a significant contribution to the well-being of its community through a journalism-centered project or service.”
Reporter Christian Betancourt is a finalist for the Insight Award for Explanatory Journalism for a collaboration between El Paso Matters and Next City. Betancourt and reporter Oscar Perry Abello are recognized for their work on how credit unions have served communities of color.
This award recognizes “reporting that provides insight and understanding of a significant and complex subject.”
The INN award winners will be announced later this month.
El Paso Matters is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that has been publishing in-depth and investigative journalism about the El Paso region since 2020.
In its first three years, El Paso Matters has won numerous national and state awards, including INN’s Startup of the Year Award and the Society for Professional Journalists’ Sunshine Award in 2022, and being named one of three finalists for the Online News Association’s General Excellence for Micro Newsrooms Award in 2020.
