Let’s combine two things I love: The Salt Lake Tribune and data.
Yes, it’s the end of the year, and that means it’s a logical time to reflect. I’ve been thinking about how thankful I am to have this job — it’s cool that I get to spend all of my time going where my curiosity takes me, both with my weekly data columns and in my coverage of the Utah Jazz. The old maxim that working in journalism is like doing homework for the rest of your life is true, but with the subjects I get to work on, it’s a real treat.
That said, I’m nowhere near our school’s best student. My classmates — OK, I’ll end the forced metaphor — my colleagues blow me away. The craft of their writing is impressive and the sheer hours they work are awesome, but what really gets me is the reporting they do. That takes real skill and effort, especially in an increasingly secrecy-obsessed world.
Let’s look at some top-10 lists from The Tribune — which categories interest readers and what stories performed best, before getting into my personal top 10 picks in terms of impact.
Top 10 categories
First, a look at The Tribune’s top 10 categories of the year, in median page views per article.
Yes, Pat Bagley gets his own category. Our staff cartoonist takes home the No. 1 spot this year with cartoons that always spark interest. Drawn on both national and local topics, Bagley’s cartoons have a way of getting right to the heart of an issue. He’s a Pulitzer Prize nominee, been named editorial cartoonist of the year, and is the longest continually employed editorial cartoonist in America. For good reason.
If a picture is worth 1,000 words, a Bagley cartoon might be worth 2,000.
The other categories, though, require our staff to write words. I frequently am asked why we do so much faith coverage at The Tribune. One reason: It’s an incredibly important part of the lives of a huge number of people in our state. Another reason: People are interested. On a per-article basis, religion articles outperform every other topic we write about; it’s why the category represents about 10% of our total article count for the year.
This year, our longtime religion reporter Peggy Fletcher Stack was the recipient of the William A. Reed Lifetime Achievement Award from the Religion News Association.
People also love reading about food. Kolbie Peterson has done a great job on that beat since moving there earlier this year. Environmental, political and education coverage are all incredibly important for our state. Luckily, we have dedicated reporters covering all three categories.
I’m proud of the Jazz coverage Eric Walden and I do. Business and culture beats also draw a significant number of eyeballs.
Top 10 stories
Those top 10 categories should prep you for these lists. Religion stories are going to be heavily featured.
I recently grabbed drinks with a former Tribune staffer who moved away from Utah over 10 years ago, and he told me he kept up with Utah news more than anywhere else he has lived, including perhaps his own current home. Why? He said that the push and pull of the state was fascinating, with a primary culture so frequently led by religion and a counterculture so frequently driven as a reaction against it.
Perhaps it’s for those reasons that religion stories, especially ones that touch our political realm, do so well. They’re interesting to every part of our state, Latter-day Saint or not.
First, we’ll look at the top 10 stories this year in terms of how many people read them. Those stories are:
No. 1: These Utah brothers want the Supreme Court to remove Joe Biden from the White House, reinstate Donald Trump, by Bryan Schott.
No. 2: Thousands oppose an LDS Church apostle’s commencement speech at SUU because of his anti-gay statements, by Scott D. Pierce and Paighten Harkins.
No. 3: LDS temple ceremonies change again, putting more focus on Jesus and increasing gender equity, by Tamarra Kemsley and David Noyce.
No. 4: ‘We have work to do’ — Latter-day Saint image takes another hit in new poll, by Peggy Fletcher Stack.
No. 5: Commentary: The Catholic Church can never admit that something it taught for centuries was dumb, by Thomas Reese of the Religion News Service.
No. 6: ‘It’s a marathon, not a race’ — what Utah’s recent snowstorms mean for the Colorado River, by Leia Larsen.
No. 7: A Utah parent says the Bible contains porn and should be removed from school libraries. Here’s their full challenge, by Courtney Tanner.
No. 8: ‘A slap in the face’: LDS Relief Society leaders ordered off the stand, by Peggy Fletcher Stack.
No. 9: Rep. Chris Stewart plans to resign from Congress, by Bryan Schott.
No. 10: LDS apostle accused of sharing church members’ tithing records with Operation Underground Railroad, by Tamarra Kemsley.
And here are the top 10 stories in terms of the number of Tribune subscriptions that they led to, according to our online metrics:
No. 1: ‘A slap in the face’: LDS Relief Society leaders ordered off the stand, by Peggy Fletcher Stack.
No. 2: BYU prof becomes bullying target after mentioning her trans child in class, by Peggy Fletcher Stack.
No. 3: Breaking down the latest LDS Church membership data, by Andy Larsen.
No. 4: BYU faculty members urged to align their teaching, research better with LDS tenets, by Tamarra Kemsley.
No. 5: 30 years after the ‘September Six’ purge, would the LDS Church do it again?, by Peggy Fletcher Stack.
No. 6: Reed Hastings wants to turn around Powder Mountain, starting with a $100M investment, by Julie Jag.
No. 7: When it comes to hurrying up marriages and childbearing, Dallin Oaks must take a back seat to God, by Gordon Monson.
No. 8: LDS Church unloading even more Missouri land. What’s up in this former and future Zion?, by Tamarra Kemsley and Tony Semerad.
No. 9: Another LDS Church fund worth billions is drawing scrutiny, by Tony Semerad.
No. 10: Even Stevens appears to be done in Utah, with eight locations now closed, by Kolbie Peterson.
Andy’s Top 10
I want to draw attention to 10 other stories not featured above, ones that blew me away this year. To be honest, there’s something every week, maybe every day, in The Tribune that changes Utah in some way. Maybe to prove my point, as I was trying to put together this top 10, I ended up with about 75 “semifinalists” that almost made the cut. There are so many amazing stories not on this list.
Still, here are my top 10 stories — or series of stories, in some cases — this year, in no particular order:
Courtney Tanner’s three-part series on how Utah’s public education system was failing students from the Ute Tribe was deeply reported, with startling statistics and personal stories on just how wide the disparities are for those children. A further article showed how the Ute Tribe’s own high school is outperforming nearby public schools. Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson called the report “alarming” but “exceptional journalism,” and said the state would dig in to addressing the problem.
Donovan Mitchell said it was ‘draining’ in Utah. But why?
During his time with the Utah Jazz, Donovan Mitchell was one of the state’s leading Black voices, weighing in on a wide variety of racist episodes that occurred in the state during his tenure. Mitchell called the experience “draining.” In this two-part series, Eric Walden explored the impact of Utah’s culture on Mitchell upon his return to Utah as a Cleveland Cavalier, along with asking the pertinent questions: “Is he right? To what extent do other players have this problem? And if so, what can be done about it?” It’s a great example in reporting a story when key voices in the story choose not to participate. (Jazz representatives and Mitchell declined to be interviewed.)
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Donovan Mitchell at the NBA All-Star game in Salt Lake City on Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023.
Neighbors call it ‘basically a homeless camp.’ Unpermitted Utah County farmers market remains open.
Paighten Harkins’ story on this wacky plot of land in Utah County will surprise you at every turn. The four-acre lot has been a farmers market, an RV park, a petting zoo, a haunted house, a launch site for hot air balloon and helicopter rides, a food truck spot, and has hosted fireworks shows. The owner’s husband was, the county sheriff alleges, giving kids tractor rides in an Elmo costume while failing to register as a sex offender. There’s also an alleged attempted murderer. Just your normal, everyday situation going on there, which Harkins uncovers in the story.
94 Women Allege a Utah Doctor Sexually Assaulted Them. Here’s Why a Judge Threw Out Their Case.
Reported by The Tribune’s Jessica Miller in partnership with ProPublica, this series on the actions of Utah County doctor David Broadbent and the troubles his accusers have encountered in reporting their allegations of sexual assault against him, sparked outrage nationally. The suit was tossed out of courts but was revived in 2023 as the women made their case to the Utah Supreme Court. (Miller’s separate story on therapist Scott Owen’s alleged sexual assaults in August was followed by an arrest and charges.)
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) These women are among a group of 14 whom The Salt Lake Tribune and ProPublica spoke with about their experiences reporting their OB-GYN, David Broadbent, to the Provo Police Department. All speak Spanish, and some said they were met with delays, confusion over their reports or flat-out denials when they tried to contact police because there was no one working at the department who could speak their language. From left are Janet Rocio, Guadalupe Valencia, Marslen Bernal, Martha Santacruz, Karina Jacobo and Maria Gaspar.
Little Cottonwood Canyon Gondola Timeline
This timeline, put together by reporter Jordan Miller and made possible by behind-the-scenes presentation help from Tribune staffers Alex Partida, Christopher Cherrington, Todd Adams and Rachel Crosby, shows exactly how the Utah Department of Transportation decided to build an 8-mile gondola up Little Cottonwood Canyon, despite the idea’s unpopularity among many Utahns. The outcome of this issue is still to be decided.
Read The Tribune stories that led up to A.G. Sean Reyes’ announcement to not seek reelection
Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes announced this month that he won’t run for reelection — and that may be the least of his problems. Why? Numerous scandals in his administration, including many that were first revealed by The Tribune’s extensive reporting on the subject. Robert Gehrke was the lead reporter on many of the stories, but significant support came from other big Tribune names, too: Jessica Miller, Paighten Harkins, Bryan Schott, Tony Semerad and more.
12 seasonal workers charged $1,000 each to share one Park City 1-bedroom
How many people can you cram in to one one-bedroom, 1,000-square-foot apartment? And how much money can one landlord make on such an arrangement? Those were the questions asked — and answered — by The Tribune’s Julie Jag as she detailed this story. Photographer Francisco Kjolseth noted a “wall of funk” smell when he and Jag walked into the apartment, and Jag’s words bring that sense to life.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Mattresses and personal belongings for 12 foreign students from Argentina crowd the one-bedroom apartment they have been sharing in Park City for the past two months on Monday, Jan. 30, 2023. Working at Park City ski resort on J-1 visas, the living accommodations they encountered were less than ideal.
How the LDS Church could prevent its headquarters from becoming a toxic wasteland
While other LDS Church stories got more clicks this year, this one, from Leia Larsen and Peggy Fletcher Stack, had an immediate impact. As part of the Great Salt Lake Collaborative, Larsen and Stack looked at the impact of the state’s largest faith on Utah’s water supply and proposed some solutions. A month later, the church announced it had permanently donated the equivalent of 20,000 acre-feet of water to the Great Salt Lake. It’s unclear whether the reporting led to the gift, but regardless of the exact cause and effect, Utahns are better informed and the lake is better off, thanks to the collaborative and Tribune reporting.
We looked at banned books in Utah’s biggest school districts. What we found might surprise you.
This investigation from Megan Banta, Michael Lee, Carmen Nesbitt and Courtney Tanner involved compiling a database of Utah’s banned books from 17 of Utah’s school districts, one searchable by readers. They found that Utah’s most-banned authors were female, and that Washington County School District in southern Utah had banned the most books. Tanner’s story on Davis School District’s decision to ban the Bible also drew significant attention, even in the United Kingdom, with Tanner being interviewed by the BBC.
A life-altering I-15 project wasn’t in Grandma Molly’s retirement plan — not for a second time
West-side reporter Alixel Cabrera’s biggest splash came in her Reaching for Air series, detailing (along with KUER’s Saige Miller) the impacts pollution has on the Salt Lake Valley’s west side. But for sheer word-for-word brilliance, I loved the Grandma Molly story. This woman, 101 years old, was forced to move from her house 63 years ago in order to support the construction of Interstate 15. Now, as the state considers expanding the freeway, she may have to move again. A great story on a life well lived, albeit one frequently upended.
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Molly Segura talks about her life in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Jan. 21, 2023. Segura, 101, was once displaced from her home to make space for an I-15 project. Now, her current home is just a block away from the highway and her family fears they may be displaced again if it gets expanded.
Thank you so much for reading this year — and a Merry Christmas and happy holidays to you all.
Andy Larsen is a data columnist for The Salt Lake Tribune. You can reach him at alarsen@sltrib.com
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