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From News Editor Izzy Kapnick
From News Editor Izzy Kapnick
Day in and day out, Miami New Times’ reporters work to dig up scoops, glean insight from key sources, and bring unique stories to light. Rummaging through thousands of pages of public records each day and scouring a mountain of news tips is not just our job, it’s in our blood, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
When we find a national scoop, we don’t rest on our laurels. We keep digging.
In just the last few weeks, we obtained an FBI affidavit to expose serial child molestation on a popular cruise ship – long before any national outlets reported on the tragedy. We then jumped on a story about how Miami-Dade County was requesting millions of dollars in public funding for a stadium-and-park project despite the developer’s past assurances that it would be privately funded.
Our reporters produced a deep and rich catalog of stories this year. In the space allotted here, it would be impossible to recount all of my favorites, but I’ve been asked to name a few:
- Families Fear the Worst After Savings Disappear in Miami Investment Program: Months of research and interviews yielded this story about a local company accused of defrauding investors nationwide out of millions of dollars. Breaking the news of the alleged scam, we featured a woman who said her savings and those of her mother, who was fighting cancer, vaporized after they entrusted the money to the company. We learned that the husband of a registered agent of the firm had previously been fined and banned by a federal regulator for running a deceptive trade scheme.
- Randy Heath Starved in a Miami-Dade Jail: In this piece, our reporter Alex Deluca covered a lawsuit filed by the family of a man with severe schizophrenia who languished in a county jail until he weighed 113 pounds. Randy Heath was ultimately found unresponsive in his cell, his cause of death listed as “food asphyxia.” His family sought to hold the jail liable for letting him waste away and failing to monitor him in the time leading up to his death.
- Meet Dr. Deep Sea: Dialing in from the bottom of a Key Largo lagoon, retired Navy submersible expert Joseph Dituri chatted with reporter Naomi Feinstein about his residency in an underwater pod, which broke the world record for longest underwater stay in a fixed habitat. From his aquatic home, he told us about his work with director James Cameron, how he used the marine bathroom, and the effect that months of isolation had on his mental state.
We have a passion for writing that allows us to compete with much bigger newsrooms. Make no mistake, though, we are still the underdogs, still fighting to hold our ground and do right by New Times’ legacy of no-holds-barred reporting.
From Associate Editor Jose Duran
From music festivals to museum exhibitions and live performances, Miami has become a place where things happen year-round. That wasn’t the case a few years ago when the city tended to hibernate during the hot summer months.
The year started comically when the Joe Carollo-backed Dogs and Cats Walkway Sculpture Gardens, costing nearly $1 million in public funds, opened at Maurice A. Ferré Park in February. With so many talented artists living in Miami, it was disappointing to see Miami represented by such an underwhelming installation. “It doesn't take a trained artistic eye to realize these statues are ugly and unpleasant. None of them are visually coherent or particularly well made,” Douglas Markowitz wrote in his scathing review.
In August, writer Celia Almeida covered the cultural phenomenon that was Beyoncé’s Renaissance Tour. “The Renaissance World Tour reminds us that it's always unclear where Beyoncé will go next,” she wrote in her ecstatic review. Photographer Michele Eve Sandberg also shot the unforgettable fashion the Beyhive wore to the concert. Ultimately, Bey reminded everyone about the power music has to bring people together — a blessing that’s in woefully short supply in 2023.
Speaking of power, this year, the world celebrated the 50th anniversary of hip-hop. What rose up in the late 1970s and early ’80s in New York City grew into a global phenomenon with an outsize impact on music, fashion, and art. Miami has contributed to the genre since the earliest days, and in August, writers Marjua Estevez and Shanae Hardy looked into the foundation the 305 helped lay down for hip-hop. From the 2 Live Crew to City Girls, Miami’s impact on hip-hop continues to be felt today.
The year wrapped up with Miami Art Week, with celebrated Miami artist Hernan Bas debuting “The Conceptualist,” his first museum solo show since 2002, at the Bass. Meanwhile, at the Miami Beach Convention Center, writer Douglas Markowitz couldn’t help but notice the dark, verging-on-nihilistic mood of the art on display at Art Basel.
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