Ring Out the Year With a Donation to ProPublica

This has been a year of impact for ProPublica’s journalism. We’re making a difference. So as 2011 comes to a close, please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help ProPublica continue this important work.

by Paul Steiger
ProPublica, Dec. 27, 2011, 5:47 a.m.

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This has been a year of impact for ProPublica's journalism. We're making a difference.

So as 2011 comes to a close, please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help ProPublica continue this important work.

What do I mean by impact? I hope two examples -- one "big" and one "small," both profoundly important, and both in the news this month -- give you an idea.

First is fracking -- the hydraulic fracturing method of drilling for natural gas. When we first wrote about the subject (in 2008), the industry was in denial about any threat to our water from unsafe drilling methods, and was refusing to disclose the toxic chemicals used in the process. New York's governor, unaware of the issues, was about to approve unfettered drilling. Our first story changed that, and we've kept at it.

This month, the EPA finally confirmed that reckless fracking can—and has—polluted drinking water. Texas and Colorado have mandated disclosure of those chemicals. New York officials are limiting drilling. The U.S. Department of Energy will recommend safety steps.

And everybody, it seems, is talking about fracking. It was the subject of an Oscar-nominated movie, and of numerous newspaper reports. ProPublica broke the key stories on drinking-water contamination, maneuvers to gain exemption from environmental laws, chemicals left in the ground, effluent in our rivers and streams, and health impacts on local communities—more than 150 stories over three and a half years. The result is one of those shifts in popular outlook that alters the world just a bit.

Impact can also be more personal. Also in 2008, we started writing about violence in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Two years ago, we spotlighted the shooting death by police of a man named Danny Brumfield. This month, an NOPD officer was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in that shooting. One family had achieved a measure of justice.

This is the kind of work your support helps make possible. It's the kind of work that has won us Pulitzer Prizes two years in a row, the first ever for an online news organization. And 85 cents out of every dollar we receive is spent on news.

In 2011, we have definitively documented racial and ethnic bias in the awarding of presidential pardons, put persistent heat on bankers and regulators for their diffidence in the face of the continuing foreclosure fiasco, given parents new tools to assess how their kids' schools are performing, called out abuses by both parties in the redistricting process, revealed conflicts of leading medical societies and pinpointed the cancer risk in those proliferating new airport scanners.

ProPublica had 100 donors two years ago, 1300 last year. We need your help today to end 2011 on a strong note, and to propel our efforts to hold powerful interests accountable in 2012. Please click here to join us in that work.

3 comments

Shahislam

Dec. 27, 2011, 4:32 p.m.

I wish, I had the luck for being able of donating generously for the survival of such a selfless journalism with great causes.
Actually, for the last 3 years, I have no income, spent all my savings,
borrowing from others and banks to fight back against the injustice caused by the bad guys in the ‘too rich and shamelessly powerful’ -the Crown of Canada and its Corporation which, in reality and legally, is liable for inflicting direct physical injury, therefore, financial hard-ship on me. I hope, in one way or onother, I will donate big, in the coming time.

Janiece Staton Retired RN, BSN, MSW, MAT

Dec. 28, 2011, 7:36 a.m.

As a now disabled (thus forcibly retired) RN, BSN, clinical MSW, & MAT-educated teacher, I am SO GRATEFUL for your work! You keep focusing on topics that other media will NOT investigate, such as the amount of deaths being caused by indifferent, incompetent, unethical, irresponsible health care systems, groups, & individuals, across the USA! In my 25+ years practicing as a clinical RN, BSN, the amount of malpractice I personally witnessed, let alone saw documented in one patient chart after another, HORRIFIED ME! I had no way of knowing, that the same disastrous health care system (which has run amok in Oregon, since the late 1980’s), would lead to me becoming severely & permanently disabled, myself six years ago.

There are several MAJOR changes that MUST be made to the USA’s current health care system, IMHO, if ANYONE here is to consistently receive quality health care. The first involves regular (at least every 5 years) ongoing re-licensure testing (theoretical & “hands-on”), for all licensed/certified health care providers (of ANY type).

It’s MUCH too easy, for currently licensed health care providers to ignored, overlook, and/or pay minimal attention to issues of lifelong continuing education. I’m capable of & have been actively engaging in “medical (MD) continuing education” opportunities. It’s such a laughably simple process, it makes me NAUSEOUS!

Most of their “continuing education articles” require them to only answer TWO questions, after skimming through the article. They are free to answer those TWO questions, as many times as they wish, UNTIL they answer 70% or higher on the “test questions”! All this, while they’re, simultaneously, allowed to re-read the same article, over & over, until they get the TWO questions CORRECT!

In my professional experience, most elementary students could pass any “test” like THAT! Yet we wonder why our nation’s health care system costs SO MUCH & gives such poor results. Reinstating mandatory complete autopsies would enlighten the general public, (as to all of the health care issues that MDs are ignoring/ignorant of), I believe the outcry to Washington, D.C. would be deafening!

Right now, nearly the entire focus within our health care system, is on people at the top getting as wealthy as they can, as quickly as they can. The Scrooge-like attitudes toward patients & the general public, are so blatant (at least here in Oregon!), that RNs have been leaving the profession in DROVES.

Patients are now treated as “disposable goods”, rather than as soul-filled beings. The health care workers on the “front-lines” (particularly the RNs, PTs, OTs, S/LPs. RTs, CNAs), are expected to pick up ever-enlarging numbers of patients to care for, during the same periods of time, for less money/benefits, & with minimal educational help from their mega-wealthy employers!

I made LESS money, at the end of my RN career, than I did newly out of nursing school in 1984. My experience is the NORM, within the world of nursing, but most people choose to forget that RNs even exist. If you doubt this, think back to the hours of 9/11 media coverage that occurred, in 2001.

Did you witness a SINGLE RN being interviewed by anyone? No one, typically, recalls EVER seeing RNs anywhere, during that terrible time in our nation’s history. Yet, I know that RNs are STILL taking care of the survivors of those plane crashes, to this day! That’s what WE DO. At the same time, most people do not know that RNs are #2, in the USA, in terms of “on the job” injuries. We’re so easily ignored/forgotten.

It’s time for licensed professionals to be held responsible for maintaining their CLINICAL credentials. Otherwise, they need to “retire” their licenses, IMHO. Clinical credentials need to be repeatedly demonstrated, at least every five years (we have to undergo CPR training, every 1 - 2 years).

Though the very same “managers” will, undoubtedly, squack LOUDLY about the “costs” involved, I would feel comfortable any time, showing them the “costs” involved, in NOT requiring such ongoing standards! They have been piling up, all over my home, ever since my 72 year old surgeon butchered me so badly, during a “minor” procedure to remove a kidney stone, that I am now partially paralyzed on my left trunk, have a large “flank bulge” hanging off my left side, am on the brink of requiring kidney dialysis, am in severe/chronic pain, & experiencing other complications.

Thank you for doing your part to bring these major issues to light! I’ll be donating to you!

Anna Haynes

Dec. 28, 2011, 5:51 p.m.

> Please click here to join us in that work.

FYI, Chrome says the https page is not secure.

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