Jeff Burnside has been immersed in complex investigative reporting (with extensive under cover and hidden camera work), live daily news coverage, newsroom management and national environmental journalism leadership for many years. He was most recently published in the Seattle Times Sunday magazine cover story. Jeff was a longtime board member and twice president of the Society of Environmental Journalists, the world’s leading such group. He was a 2017-18 Scripps Journalism Fellow at the Center for Environmental Journalism, University of Colorado in Boulder. He serves as a national environmental journalism judge for Columbia University’s Oakes Award and previously for the Scripps Howard Meeman Award at the Poynter Institute. Numerous times, he has delivered the annual address for SEJ’s Guide to Covering Energy and the Environment at the National Geographic Society and at the Wilson Center in Washington, D.C.
He’s won more than 25 journalism awards including three national honors (IRE, National Press Club and Clarion) and 10 regional Emmys. He’s been a TV news reporter for more than 15 years working at stations including KING Seattle, KIRO Seattle, WCVB Boston (freelance), WTVJ Miami and Senior Investigative Reporter for KOMO 4 News Seattle.
His first book will be published by WSU Press in early spring, followed by his first documentary film. Other books and films are in the works.
Jeff’s work has:
• Went undercover to expose a little-known national pipeline from puppy mills to pet stores
• Exposed drinking water contamination to millions of people from dairy farms and from rock mining
• Utilized hidden camera video to reveal wildlife poachers
• Ran tens of thousands of tests on tap water in viewers’ homes
• Installed remote cameras to chronicle controversial oil train practices through population centers
• Went inside cults and underground while supremacy extremists; survived a severe pistol-whipping, death threats and faced down extremists aiming AK-47s directly at him
• Triggered the return of $17 million to taxpayers from large security firm cooking the books
• Was among the first to chronicle harm to marine mammals from certain Navy sonar
• Has traveled the world covering the decline of coral reefs and ventured to the bottom of the ocean aboard a scientific submersible searching for medical cures
– Went into the dangerous slums of Jamaica to track down fake lottery scammers ripping off elderly Americans
Jeff is also a frequent invited speaker, guest lecturer and panelist on journalism ethics, media law and other topics. He’s earned working fellowships at:
• Reynolds Center for Business Journalism: The Green Economy (Cronkite School at ASU)
• The Center for Strategic and International Studies (Tromso, Norway)
• Heinrich Boell Institute for green energy (Berlin)
• Steinbrenner Institute for climate science (Carnegie Mellon University)
• Metcalf Institute for Environmental Reporting (University of Rhode Island)
• The Western Knight Center for Specialized Reporting in political coverage (University of Southern California Annenberg School)
He was invited to speak in Moscow, Russia in 2018 on an international panel examining that city’s urban sustainability initiatives.
He earned an executive certificate on Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability from the Leeds Business School, University of Colorado.