Civil Beat Named Pulitzer Finalist For Maui Fire Coverage
Our news outlet has been reporting on the Maui fires and their impact on the entire state since Day 1.
Civil Beat was named a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in the breaking news category on Monday.
The Pulitzer jury cited Civil Beat’s “distinctive, sweeping and urgent coverage of the Maui wildfires that killed more than 100 people and left a historic town in ruins, reporting that held officials to account and chronicled the aftermath and efforts to rebuild.”
The 2024 went to the staff of Lookout Santa Cruz in California for its coverage of flooding and mudslides in January 2023. More than 1,000 homes and businesses were destroyed.
The staff of the Los Angeles Times was also named a finalist for coverage of a mass shooting that left 11 people dead.
Civil Beat’s reporting began in earnest on Aug. 9 when the extent of the devastation was still unclear. We sent two teams of journalists to Lahaina, capturing some of the first images to come out of the still smoldering streets.
That day marked the beginning of our effort to be the definitive local news source for the people of Maui and Hawaii as they came to grips with the enormity of what happened and the profound impact that it has had on this state. We’ve dedicated a team of three reporters and an editor to Maui who are continuing to cover the efforts to rebuild Lahaina as well as the county’s financial and management struggles.
To date, we’ve published more than 500 stories and commentaries and thousands of photos documenting the fires and their aftermath. Our entire staff has been involved in Civil Beat’s coverage and outreach efforts, including holding numerous pop-up newsrooms on Maui to hear directly from residents, business owners and service providers.
Civil Beat’s reporting exposed critical flaws in the state and county’s emergency preparedness and response, including the absence of Maui’s top emergency management official, the county’s lack of transparency overall and the history of failures in ecological management that laid the foundation for the disaster.
Our newsroom has played a vital role in pushing back against the longstanding culture of secrecy in the state, engaging the public in our efforts to fight for public records and hold government leaders accountable.
And we’ve brought readers the stories of the people of Maui who have been so terribly hurt by this situation. Two special reports are ongoing — “The Lives We Lost,” which seeks to tell an in-depth story about every person who died in the Lahaina fire, and “The Long Road Home,” which follows three families who lost everything as they grapple not only with their current circumstances but how to rebuild their lives.
It’s hard to believe that it’s already been nine months since the fires swept through Lahaina and Upcountry. This continues to be a developing story, one that we intend to cover for the long run.
