Veronica Penney joined Colorado Public Radio in 2021 as a data reporter.
Professional Background: Veronica joined CPR in 2021 after working at The New York Times, where she covered climate science as part of a yearlong fellowship program. She started her investigative journalism career writing for Columbia Journalism Investigations and the Miami Herald.
Education:
Bachelor’s degree in English and International Affairs from the University of Colorado; Master’s degree in Data Journalism from Columbia University.
Awards:
Veronica was part of the Columbia Journalism Investigations team awarded first place in public health reporting by the Association of Health Care Journalists in 2020.
Though the booster dose is considered the most effective defense against the omicron variant, Coloradans are not yet embracing it at the same pace they took to initial doses of the vaccine.
Some of the biggest wildfires in Colorado have cost lives and caused millions of dollars in damage. But without knowing how they started exactly, Coloradans can’t change policies to try to prevent new ones. And no one gets held accountable.
A CPR News investigation found that state, local and federal authorities in Colorado could pinpoint the ignition source for fewer than half of the human-started wildfires in the state since 2000.
Colorado wildfire investigators found the exact origins of just 43 percent of human-caused fires from 2000 to 2018 — the worst rate of any state in the West. As a result, policy makers are left without key data that could explain what people who cause fires are doing wrong.