Vermont’s nonprofit news organization VTDigger picked up seven awards from the New England Newspaper and Press Association last weekend, including three first-place finishes across photography, protest coverage, and racial and ethnic issue reporting. The honors were announced Saturday at NENPA’s annual conference in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
NENPA represents more than 450 news organizations across New England, making the recognition a meaningful benchmark for regional journalism. VTDigger, which operates as a statewide nonprofit, earned top awards in categories that reflect some of the most charged stories to come out of Vermont over the past year.
Photographer Glenn Russell claimed first place in Contemporary Issues Photo for his images from last June’s No Kings Rally, which featured a speech by Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist Mohsen Mahdawi. Russell also took third place for his photographs of University of Vermont fans watching the UVM men’s soccer team clinch the national championship in December 2025. The two sets of images represent something worth paying attention to in visual journalism: the same photographer capturing both political protest and hometown celebration within months of each other, building a visual record of a single community’s emotional range.
Reporter Greta Solsaa, who covers Southern Vermont, won first place in Protest and Demonstration Coverage for her reporting on protests that met Vice President J.D. Vance’s visit to Sugarbush Ski Resort in Warren in March 2025. Covering demonstrations requires more than showing up. It demands accurate documentation of who was there, what they said, and what the broader moment meant. Solsaa’s first-place finish signals that her work met that standard at a regional level.
Auditi Guha, VTDigger’s immigration reporter, won first place in Racial, Ethnic or Gender Issue Coverage for her reporting on the interrogation and detention of Winooski schools superintendent Wilmer Chavarria by immigration officials while he was traveling through Houston. The story drew regional and national attention when it published. Guha’s award reflects both the significance of the story and the precision required to report on immigration enforcement in a climate where access and accuracy are constantly under pressure.
Peter D’Auria, Alan Keays, and Habib Sabet earned second place in General News Story for their investigation into the Zizian cult and the circumstances surrounding the shooting of a Border Patrol officer in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom in January 2025. That story required the reporters to untangle a complex web of ideology, geography, and violent extremism. A second-place finish from a field representing hundreds of New England outlets speaks to the depth of that reporting.
Two additional awards rounded out VTDigger’s sweep. Corey McDonald received second place in Business and Economic Reporting for his coverage of lawsuits against a Vermont construction company accused of incomplete work and unjustified charges. Austyn Gaffney earned third place in Environmental Reporting for her work documenting how Vermont is violating the federal Clean Water Act.
Taken together, the seven awards track across a range of subjects: immigration enforcement, political protest, environmental law, local business fraud, sports, and extremist violence. That breadth matters for a news organization operating at the state level with limited staff. Independent nonprofit newsrooms often face skepticism about whether they can match the coverage depth of larger legacy publications. Seven awards across seven distinct categories is one answer to that question.
For readers following Vermont news, the recognition also functions as a guide. These were the stories that cut through. They documented moments where Vermont became a flash point for national debates and where ordinary residents found themselves caught up in systems larger than their local community. Chavarria’s detention, Vance’s ski trip, the border shooting in the Northeast Kingdom: each story found resonance beyond the state line, and the reporters who covered them did so without the institutional backing of major metropolitan newsrooms.
NENPA’s annual conference serves as one of the few formal moments when regional journalism gets to take stock of itself. This spring’s recognition puts VTDigger at the top of that accounting.
