Title: content director / investigative reporter
Contact: 605-937-9398 / bart.pfankuch@sdnewswatch.org
Language spoken: English
Demographic expertise: South Dakota, including the Rapid City area, the Black Hills, rural towns and reservations
Topic expertise: agriculture, state government, education, rural issues, Indigenous people, poverty
Potential conflict of interest: Pfankuch serves on the board of the Oyate Prevention Coalition in Rapid City, which works to prevent substance abuse among Native American youth. He will recuse himself from reporting on the organization.
Biography: Pfankuch (pronounced FAN-cook) is Wisconsin native and former editor of the Rapid City Journal. He has worked for more than 30 years as a reporter and editor at newspapers in Wisconsin, Florida and South Dakota, including as reporter or editor at the Eau Claire Leader-Telegram and Capital Times in Wisconsin, and at the Florida Times-Union and Sarasota Herald-Tribune in Florida. He also is a syndicated writing coach who has presented at newspaper conferences across the country. Pfankuch has won more than four dozen state, regional and national journalism awards, including, while at News Watch, agricultural writer of the year from the North American Agricultural Journalists association in 2020, 2021 and 2023 as well as first-place reporting awards in the Great Plains Journalism Awards sponsored by the Tulsa Press Club and South Dakota NewsMedia Association. Pfankuch lives in Black Hawk.
Professional memberships: Investigative Reporters and Editors, North American Agricultural Journalists, South Dakota NewsMedia First Amendment Committee
Social platforms: X/Twitter; LinkedIn
Archive of work: South Dakota News Watch
Bart Pfankuch
Total 307 Posts
Poll Part 3: South Dakotans support ballot initiative process and oppose lawmaker interference
Many South Dakotans feel that democracy is not working very well in America right now, but those same people are highly supportive of their own right to make law directly from the voting booth.
According to a recent statewide poll, a wide majority of South Dakota residents supports the citizen-led
Poll Part 2: Why some South Dakotans are pessimistic about the future
Long-standing economic hardships have prevented a sizable segment of the South Dakota population from achieving financial stability and prosperity, and those hurdles have resulted in a sense of pessimism for what awaits future generations, according to two experts who study the state economy.
State and federal data routinely show that:
New poll reveals economic pessimism and dissatisfaction with democratic institutions
As the state emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, some residents of South Dakota are uneasy about what life holds for future generations and have only limited confidence in the effectiveness of some democratic institutions.
The findings are part of a large set of results from a recent poll of 500
South Dakota News Watch wins regional reporting awards for work published in 2020
South Dakota News Watch won a first-place award and three finalist citations in the annual Great Plains Journalism Awards for work produced in 2020. News Watch competed against newspapers of all sizes in an eight-state region that includes the Dakotas, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and Oklahoma.
Content Director Bart
Vaccine hesitancy in South Dakota could prolong pandemic and delay a return to normal
Medical experts in South Dakota and across the country are concerned that reluctance among some people to get vaccinated against COVID-19 may prolong the pandemic, delay a return to normal life and possibly lead to more deaths.
Health officials say that the U.S. and individual states are in a
South Dakota Matters: News Watch to host online panel discussion on civics and history initiative
In her State of the State speech in January, Gov. Kristi Noem proposed one-time funding to enhance and expand teaching of civics and history in public schools, and the state Legislature approved her $900,000 request during the spring session.
In response, the state education department has embarked on development
Civics/history Part 2: How new civics and history program will be developed
If all goes as planned, South Dakota public school teachers and students should find it easier to teach and learn social studies topics in the coming years.
The proposed South Dakota Civics and History Initiative is just getting started, but hopes are high that the effort will result in deeper,