Recognized for work reflecting its focus on accountability reporting as well as feature writing and photography, Baltimore Brew was honored with 31 awards by the Maryland-Delaware-DC (MDDC) Press Association at its annual awards meeting.

Three of these, for work published in 2024, were “Best of Show” awards.

Earning top honors for Local Government coverage, General News Story and Local Column, The Brew’s two-person newsroom was judged against submissions by the region’s major print and online news media, including The Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Banner, Capital Gazette, (Delaware) News Journal, Baltimore Business Journal and other organizations.

The awards were presented on Friday as MDDC members gathered in Annapolis for their yearly meeting to highlight “news with integrity and excellence in journalism.”

This year’s contest admitted over 1,620 entries among 86 categories.

There are six divisions in the contest, which groups member publications into categories governed by audience numbers combining print and digital readership. A “Best of Show” award is given in each category across all divisions.

The entries were judged by news media professionals from the Washington State Press Association.

Best of Show: Local Government

Weeks before the workplace death of Baltimore sanitation worker Ronald Silver II on a blistering hot August day, Inspector General Isabel Cumming had zeroed in on hazardous high-heat conditions at his workplace.

The Brew’s Mark Reutter and Fern Shen were on it, too. We covered her findings in depth – non-functioning air conditioning, broken thermostats, inoperable water fountains and no ice, with the thermostat in a makeshift “cooling” trailer already registered 83°F and more.

But The Brew went further, with multiple follow-up stories that probed the systemic issues behind these appalling conditions.

Quoting emails, for instance, our reporting documented how officials had long known about the problems at its Bureau of Solid Waste facilities, but failed to take action. We reported what we, and Cumming, heard directly from workers – that they had been complaining for years, but faced a toxic culture of hazing and harassment.

• After unsafe conditions are flagged, a worker dies of the heat (7/10/24)

After Silver died, Mayor Brandon Scott promised a full investigation. But as The Brew reported first, the D.C. law firm the city hired specialized in defending big national employers and was leading an industry lobbying campaign to weaken OSHA’s proposed workplace heat standards.

When the law firm’s report finally came out, its findings differed little from what Cumming had found out months earlier. Namely, that Silver’s death was preventable, that DPW lacked policies and procedures to safeguard employees amid high heat conditions, and that many employees had previously fallen ill on the job.

For more context, we talked to union officials and expanded our coverage of a 2023 union-commissioned study that detailed “egregious” conditions across city-owned facilities and construction sites.

Best of Show: General News Story

We began this story with a southwest Baltimore woman’s sewage overflow nightmare:

City sewage infiltrating the water in the ice maker in her freezer and. on multiple occasions, filling up her basement toilet and bathtub with disgusting fecal sludge.

To varying degrees, we found, her experience is shared by thousands of city residents every year. In 2023, there were 4,648 sewage backups reported in Baltimore.

A small number of residents sue the city and reach settlements, but most endure the unpleasant, expensive and unhealthy experience of cleaning them up themselves.

• A Baltimore Sewage Saga: It started in the toilet, migrated to the refrigerator, then got worse (10/21/24)

Reviewing the litigation, we found one homeowner who was hit with 13 sewage overflows, another who suffered headaches and nausea cleaning them up herself and many cases where the city dragged its feet, tried to claim no responsibility or paid only a fraction of their true costs.

Experts acknowledge maintaining a 100-year-old sewer system is a challenge, but argue that doesn’t let the city off the hook.

“You have to find a way to repair the system so that your citizens don’t have raw sewage pouring into their house,” said attorney Jane Santoni, who has handled scores of such cases over the years. “That’s the law. They’re your pipes.”

Meanwhile, under a federal consent decree, the city is under pressure to expand the scope of its sewage clean-up assistance program, but has not so far complied. (In fiscal 2024, 39 residents applied for help with sewage overflows through the city’s Expedited Reimbursement Program. Three applications were approved, while 36 were denied.)

The lawsuits we reviewed confirmed Santoni’s observation that Baltimore’s basement sewage back-up problems stem from more than just a lack of resources.

“In many of our cases, there’s evidence of negligence. Things the city knew about but didn’t take care of. Or they didn’t take care of them properly. Or they actually made things worse.”

Best of Show: Local Column

Last fall, Circuit Court judge Cathleen Vitale invalidated a ballot question that would allow apartment buildings on public land alongside Baltimore’s Inner Harbor.

Brew Op Ed writer David Plymyer, an attorney, took aim at critics of her ruling, including then-City Councilman Eric Costello. who called the decision “voter suppression.”

Plymyer argued that Vitale was correct when she described Question F, as it was to appear on the ballot, as “confusingly written” and furled it should be the subject of “ordinary legislation” rather than a ballot measure.

• Calling the judge’s Harborplace decision “voter suppression” shows a real ignorance of the law (9/19/24)

“Dedicating parkland to permanent public use may be proper charter material,” he wrote. “But decisions on what types of private development are allowed on that parkland and where they can be located are not.”

Plymyer also criticized Mayor Scott’s remarks suggesting that opponents of the Harborplace plan were motivated by race, namely that developer he chose to carry out the project is Black.

“It takes a lot of nerve for Scott and Costello,” he wrote, “to attack the many smart, serious people – white and Black – who believe that MCB’s plan may be good for MCB, but would be bad for the Inner Harbor and the city in general.”

Powerful Work

The three “Best of Show” awards represent a fraction of The Brew’s 2024 coverage recognized for excellence by MDDC.

The online publication was honored with 28 awards in its size division, including 13 first-place wins and 15 second-place citations.

They ranged from a former firefighter’s connection to then-Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski to the generous arrangement made by the Scott administration to help fund a politically connected developer’s proposed office building.

Here is a sampling of the stories cited:

• Reutter and Shen won first place for pre-election coverage for multiple stories about the Harborplace ballot question, including the fact that the developer behind it spent over $400,000 to win voter approval: Drilling down on the mayor’s race and Question F.

• Reutter, Shen and freelancer Peder Schaefer won first place for environmental reporting for Sewage volcanoes still, despite the 2002 consent decree, for stories describing used condoms, surgical gloves and baby wipes scattered around a notorious sewer stack and documenting that overflows were on the rise again, despite massive city and state infrastructure spending.

• Shen won first place for Growth & Land Use Reporting for a piece on Curtis Bay’s fight for a safer, cleaner, more resilient community using a unique housing model:  Good News: South Baltimore Community Land Trust cuts the ribbon on its first affordable home (11/17/24).

• Reutter won second place in that category for uncovering the city’s commitment of $16 million in public funds for an office building the city would rent for 32 years from a politically connected developer: The Mayor’s MOED deal (8/1/2024).

• Shen won first place for investigative reporting for Law firm hired by city after DPW worker’s death represents companies seeking to weaken national workplace heat standard (8/20/24).

• Mark Reutter and Plymer won second place for investigative reporting for documenting the Tirabassi pension controversy in Baltimore County: The former firefighter and the soon-to-be-congressman (7/1/24).

• Shen and Reutter won first place for their profile: Short in stature but graced with a towering presence, Helena Hicks dies at 88 (4/20/24).

• Shen won second place in that category for an obituary for another influential Baltimorean, former Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke: Farewell to a dedicated crusader for good government (11/12/24).

• Shen won first place for feature story, non-profile for Sparse crowds as Preakness races toward an uncertain future (5/20/24) noting the low attendance for the annual horse racing event at Baltimore’s Pimlico Race Course, poised for a $400 million state-funded makeover.

• Photographer Marty Katz won second place for feature photo for Faidley’s Seafood vows to continue its crabcake magic at Lexington market (6/9/24).

• Shen won 1st place for photo series for Sparse crowds, as Preakness races toward an uncertain future (5/20/24).

• Shen won second place for general news photo for Fiancée of DPW worker Ronald Silver, who died on the job of heat stroke, speaks (10/24/24).

• Shen won second place for breaking news photo for Remains of the King Briscoe House in Baltimore’s Marble Hill neighborhood following yesterday’s demolition (3/14/24).

• Shen won 2nd place for general news story for As mayor salutes hotels purchased for the homeless, residents are confined to their rooms (7/2/24).

• Shen won second place for religion reporting for Baltimore to pay $275,000 to far-right Catholic group after trying to cancel 2021 rally (3/1/24).

• Shen won first place for state government for Months before Legionella finding at State Center, officials acknowledged a lack of potable water (11/13/24).

• Shen won 1st place for business reporting for Atlas Restaurant Group’s plan for a new bar on Thames Street stirs anger and fear (5/13/24).

• Reutter and Shen won second place for continuing coverage for  Conservative Businessman Dismantles the Baltimore Sun (1/15/24).

• Shen won second place for environmental reporting for Baltimore medical waste incinerator still pollutes, burning trash from as far away as Florida (8/9/24).

• Shen and Plymyer won second place for local government for coverage of bad-faith lawsuits meant to punish and intimidate: Slappping back at SLAPP suits (5/13/24).

• Shen won second place for the diversity, equity and inclusion category for Amid rapid development, Baltimore’s oldest Black neighborhood marks its territory (11/25/24).

• Shen won 1st place for for breaking news for Baltimore razes and encampment two days before it said it would (3/5/24).

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More shots by Fern Shen from the division winner in the photo series category, Sparse crowds as the Preakness races to an uncertain future.