A trio of Maine Monitor journalists were heralded with notable awards Saturday night at the Maine Press Association’s annual fall conference and awards banquet.
Rose Lundy, a senior public health reporter at The Monitor, was announced as Maine’s Journalist of the Year for her in-depth reporting over the years on Maine’s aging population. This marks the second time in the past four years that a Maine Monitor reporter was named the state’s journalist of the year.
As part of her COVID-19 coverage, Lundy began identifying gaps in Maine’s health care infrastructure, particularly for Maine’s aging population. In the years since, Lundy has carved out a niche reporting on the lack of quality aging care available in a state that is home to the oldest population in the country.
She devoted 18 months as a ProPublica Local Reporting Fellow to investigate Maine’s residential care facilities, carefully combing through hundreds of pages of monitoring and investigation reports, being dogged in her pursuit of the story and exceedingly careful in her analysis. She knocked on doors, visited facilities and spoke to neighbors.
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The investigation uncovered that Maine rarely sanctions residential care facilities even after severe abuse or neglect incidents, and Maine’s health department rarely investigates when residents wander away from their care facilities.
Following the investigation’s publication, the Maine Department of Health and Human Services announced plans to provide its first major update to assisted living and residential care regulations in more than 15 years. (Lawmakers later replaced the proposed measure instead with reporting requirements and a stakeholder study group.)
Maine Monitor editor Kate Cough was named the inaugural recipient of the MPA’s Mentor of the Year award for how she, as The Monitor’s editor, has amplified opportunities for emerging journalists, including six who have completed internships or fellowships directly under her guidance.
As part of The Monitor’s mission, the newsroom takes seriously its role in training and mentoring early career investigative journalists. As Cough put it in a letter to members earlier this year: “One of the pleasures of being editor of The Monitor is being able to offer intrepid young reporters a way into the field. The Monitor has always created these kinds of opportunities, but we’re doing even more now, once again bucking a trend.”
In addition to her duties as The Monitor’s editor, Cough has generously carved out time to mentor high school students in Mount Desert Island and has spent two semesters advising a Wabanaki history and culture class at the University of New England on its journalism projects.
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Kristian Moravec, an education and workforce development reporter for The Monitor, was recognized with the Bob Drake Young Writer’s Award, an accolade presented to a journalist with fewer than three years of full-time experience.
Moravec, while at the Times Record, broke the news about the malfunction of a fire suppression system that discharged 1,600 gallons of firefighting foam concentrate containing forever chemicals at the former Brunswick Naval Air Station. The incident spurred dozens of follow-up stories.
For The Monitor, at the time of her nomination in early July, Moravec had covered stories such as the implications of Maine’s fight with the Trump administration over Title IX, rural communities exploring withdrawals from their school district and what the future holds for Maine’s heat pump workforce.
Members of The Maine Monitor at the 2025 Maine Press Association awards banquet. From left: Emily Bader, Emmett Gartner, Rose Lundy, Micaela Schweitzer-Bluhm, Sean Scott, George Harvey, Daniel O’Connor and Kristian Moravec. Photo by Erin Rhoda.
The Monitor also received first place recognitions for Digital General Excellence and for usage of Maine’s Freedom of Access Act for Rose Lundy’s investigation into residential care facility residents wandering away from their facilities and Alexa Foust’s reporting on safety violations at child care facilities and reimbursement delays by DHHS to child care providers who accept children in foster care.
In addition to these accolades, 11 newsroom contributors collectively received 15 accolades for work produced between April 2024 and March 2025. The Monitor competed alongside daily news outlets including the Bangor Daily News, Portland Press Herald, Sun Journal, Kennebec Journal, Morning Sentinel and Times Record.
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The newsroom has now earned 221 accolades from the Maine Press Association since it began participating in the MPA competition in 2015.
First Place
Education Story: Child care providers cited for safety violations by Alexa Foust and Kate Hapgood
Environmental Story: How one Maine town is prepping for its next disaster by Emmett Gartner
News Story: Child care providers cited for safety violations by Alexa Foust and Kate Hapgood
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Coverage of Minority Community Issues: ‘Historically left out,’ a Wabanaki organization forges its own approach to addiction treatment by Emily Bader
News Video: The eclipse chasers by Roger McCord
Features/Lifestyle Video: A backstage look at a thriving Biddeford community theater by Roger McCord
News Story Headline: Gulf of Maine lobsters are experiencing a housing crisis by Kate Cough
Second Place
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Environmental Story: Community solar is booming, but who owns the projects? by Murray Carpenter
News Story: Maritime officials fear ‘catastrophic’ outcome if mariner shortage worsens by Jacqueline Weaver
Continuing Story: Court system troubles (five stories on indigent defense, public defender’s offices, child removal cases delayed by a lack of attorneys and Sixth Amendment violation decisions) by Josh Keefe
Outdoors Story: Seal Island sees record number of breeding puffins by Derrick Z. Jackson
Self-Promotion: Celebrating 15 years of in-depth and investigative nonpartisan reporting from the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting by George Harvey, Micaela Schweitzer-Bluhm, Pat Richardson, Kate Cough, Stephanie McFeeters and Ashley Carter
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Third Place
Health Story: Independent pharmacies are closing. Pharmacy benefit managers may be to blame. by Emily Bader
Education Story: Schools confront unique challenges in ridding their water of ‘forever chemicals’ by Emmett Gartner
Food Story/Feature: UMaine potato breed edges out longtime favorites by John O’Meara
The Maine Monitor
The Maine Monitor is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service of the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting. Our team of investigative journalists use data- and document-based reporting to produce stories that have an impact.
Content labeled as “By The Maine Monitor” are written by staff editors and are reserved for newsroom announcements (e.g. stories about accolades earned or welcoming new hires). This content is reviewed and approved by another editor.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. (WABI) – Maine veterans returned home Sunday after a weekend in Washington, D.C.
Giving local veterans and their loved ones a visit to the capital of the nation they dedicated their lives to is the aim of Honor Flight Maine.
Marking their second trip of the year, the nonprofit provided about 70 Pine Tree State veterans a free trip to Washington to visit the memorials and monuments dedicated to their service.
For many, this was this first time seeing the capital in person.
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“Unreal,” “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” and “tear-dropping” were among the sentiments shared by veterans about the Honor Flight. Others remarked on the memories revived by visiting the ceremonial spaces.
“I have some friends that’s over there, so it really was nice,” said Edward Lee, a Vietnam veteran from Bangor.
Lee was able to find one friend’s name engraved on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Using graphite and a piece of paper, he made a rubbing of the name to take home.
Rose Marie Curtis, a Navy nurse who served in Vietnam, said seeing the three nurses depicted at the Vietnam Women’s Memorial sent her back in time.
“For so many years, you don’t think about something. You’re doing this and doing that and having children, whatever. But this really brings you back,” Curtis described.
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Not only does the trip give veterans the opportunity to see these sites, it allows a chance to connect; with perhaps a past or present self, and with fellow veterans.
“It’s what makes Honor Flight Maine special because you’re with your own kind,” explained Charlie Paul, a Vietnam War veteran who has been involved with Honor Flight Maine for a decade. “We’re a segment of society, they remember us on Memorial Day. They remember us on Veteran’s Day. They remember us on Armed Forces Day. But then they forget about us. And so for us as an organization to take them down here and see their memorials, it just lets them know they’re that special.”
For Lincoln veteran Richard Rollins, the visit gave him “closure,” considering, “…when I got out of the service, I mean, to be honest, even in ’79, I was never thanked.”
Among former servicemembers of all ages, father-son veterans James and Michael Sherman said the trip opened up conversation, sharing stories they had never told each other about their service.
“It means the world that people care, and we shouldn’t wait a moment to tell the people that are important to us what they mean to us,” Michael Sherman remarked.
After Maine’s first Democratic gubernatorial debate, I commented that the candidates seemed to be vying with each other to be agreeable. Would it last? Back then, I thought I’d be happy with any of them as Maine’s next governor.
Not so now, as I observe the cronyism of Shenna Bellows, Troy Jackson and Hannah Pingree, whose plan to rank each other when they vote provides a blueprint for gaming the ranked-choice voting system in the primary. The political insiders are forming an alliance against the outsiders, Nirav Shah and Angus King III.
Shah’s campaign responded that it would stay focused on winning voters’ support, a more principled approach, in my estimation.
I prefer a governor who listens and learns from his constituents over one experienced at alliances and deal-making. I want integrity and leadership, not manipulation and exclusion.
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I no longer believe that Bellows, Jackson or Pingree would make a good governor.
