About
MaryJo Webster
MaryJo is a data journalist at the Star Tribune in Minneapolis, where she has worked since 2015. Prior to that she spent 9 years as data editor at the St. Paul Pioneer Press. She also spent a couple years as the sports data editor at USA Today, and was the first data editor for The Center for Public Integrity. She started her career as a reporter at small papers in New Ulm, Minn. and Oshkosh, Wis.
She has a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls and a master's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri-Columbia. While in Missouri, she worked at Investigative Reporters and Editors, running the data library, editing a newsletter and helping with bootcamps, workshops and conferences.
She is also a senior fellow with the Data Fellowship program run by the USC-Annenberg Center for Health Journalism. Previously, she has taught data journalism courses at the University of Minnesota and the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. She is a frequent teacher or speaker for journalism workshops and conferences.
This series of stories, published in 2018, exposed failings in how Minnesota's criminal justice system handles criminal sexual conduct cases. It resulted in widespread changes, including an overall of the state statutes pertaining to sex assault, and was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Local News.
The story started after Minneapolis became the first city in the nation to eliminate single-family zoning, which accounted for about 70% of the city's residential land. We had to collected zoning GIS files from more than 100 communities to show the relationship between zoning and racial segregation.
This annual analysis uses an index that MaryJo Webster and Jim Buchta created to find cities in the Twin Cities metro that have the "hottest" housing markets, based on home sale data from the previous year.
This series, published in 2022, revealed that counties across Minnesota are failing to intervene early enough to help troubled youth, despite pleas from parents, and that the quality of youth rehabilitation programs varies widely from county to county. The legislature passed sweeping reforms a few months later and the series was a finalist for the Investigative Reporting Pulitzer Prize.
Other stories:
As playoffs loom, a closer look at the wildest Minnesota Vikings season ever
$600M a year, yet the gap still persists (State makes changes in response to our story)