Investigative Journalist in Houston, Texas
I had always wanted to write a story about police chases after I watched a crazy high-speed pursuit unfold on local TV. I wondered how often these chases go bad, and how the San Antonio Police Department keeps track of that information. Law enforcement agencies usually churn out paperwork for every situation known to man. …
The San Antonio Police Department keeps a unique database that documents every police chase by SAPD officers. I’m working on a story that will be published Sunday that’s based on an analysis of the data. We’re examining the challenges and risks police officers face when they try to catch a suspect in a high-speed chase. …
WOAI featured a unique, data-driven story last week about the high number of accidents caused by inattentive drivers talking on their cell phones. Journalists at the television station analyzed an accident database kept by the Texas Department of Transportation that tracks contributing factors for all vehicle crashes in Texas. To get the story, WOAI had …
Somehow my unofficial beat during every election in San Antonio is to roam around and write about the problems and low-voter turnout that afflict our messy Democracy. While on “election snafu” patrol, I was relying on a list of voting sites put out by the Bexar County Elections Department. But the list of locations was …
Matt Stiles, data guru at the Texas Tribune, wrote a great tipsheet with links to user-friendly Web tools for generating charts and maps. Stiles was one of the presenters at a Watchdog Workshop last weekend in Austin organized by Investigative Reporters and Editors. Related: Sign up for blog updates from John Tedesco These are handy …
Even people living outside Texas have heard of Don’t Mess with Texas, the public relations campaign by the Texas Department of Transportation. TxDOT wants to persuade litter bugs to stop throwing trash out of their cars. Buy what exactly do people tell TxDOT when they report a litterer? In her newspaper column today, Peggy Fikac …
Using the Texas Public Information Act, reporter Karisa King obtained a huge database that tracks property tax protests in Bexar County and San Antonio. She analyzed the data and here’s what she found: Everybody wants lower property taxes. But those with the least ability to pay rarely protest their appraised values, while owners of upscale …
Kelly Guckian, the database editor for the San Antonio Express-News, produced this handy interactive map showing low-water crossings in San Antonio. During this week’s downpours in South Texas, Kelly’s map is a potentially life-saving resource for people who want to zoom in on their neighborhoods or other parts of town to check out dangerous, flood-prone …
View Larger Map I made a quick Google map of the data we analyzed for this story about fire response times in San Antonio. Many residents of the exclusive Dominion, home of the San Antonio Spurs’ David Robinson and other celebrities, aren’t happy about a slow response to a recent fire that destroyed a $1 …
After retired state Sen. Frank Madla and members of his family died in a fire in November 2006, the tragedy raised an obvious question: Are San Antonio firefighters doing a good job arriving to fires quickly and keeping residents safe? Express-News Projects Editor David Sheppard asked us to find out. At this point, what would …