Environment reporter Kelly House finalist for international climate award
Bridge Michigan environmental reporter Kelly House was named an award finalist Wednesday by the Covering Climate Now Journalism Awards, an international environmental reporting contest that fielded nominations from 65 countries.
House is a finalist in the Writing - Daily Coverage category, one of 18 award categories honored by the group, a collaboration of more than 500 news organizations around the world that report on climate change.
Her entries included reporting on the consequences of thinning ice cover on the Great Lakes, what Michigan can learn from Duluth, Minn., on becoming a climate haven, and how our aging infrastructure was designed for an era with less extreme weather events.
Related:
- Michigan is on thin ice. Get used to it, climate experts say.
- Can Michigan become a climate haven? Duluth is already planning.
- Michigan’s soggy summer evidence of a global climate reckoning
Judges praised House’s work for explaining “how the climate emergency is already altering life for people in Michigan” and for her “dedication to reporting on the emotional toll warming temperatures have on people.”
The judges called her reporting “a stellar example of how local journalism can tell part of a global story in a way that honors both science and humanity.”
House, who joined Bridge in March 2020, is one of 68 finalists selected from more than 900 submissions by journalists in print, radio, TV and digital reporting. A separate jury will select category winners in May.
She has won numerous honors for her environmental reporting in Michigan including first-place finishes last year in the Excellence in Journalism Awards sponsored by the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists for articles on the Midland dam failure (shared with Bridge colleagues Mike Wilkinson and Riley Beggin) and how Michigan’s lakeshores are being battered by over-tourism. She also won the racial justice reporting category for reporting on how a public official’s use of the N-word at a public meeting roiled a northwest Michigan community. House, together with Capitol reporter Jonathan Oosting, also reported the article detailing allegations of sexual abuse against former House Speaker Lee Chatfield by his sister-in-law.
Previous to Bridge, House was a statewide environmental reporter for The Oregonian newspaper in Portland, Ore., where she won a National Headliner Award for Environmental Reporting, and also reported at The Miami Herald.
A native of Harrison in Clare County, House received a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Michigan State University and a Master of Environmental Law from Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Ore.
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