Newsroom Staff

ARIZONA CAPITOL TIMES EDITORS:

Jim Small
Arizona News Service Editor
jim.small@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7133
@JimSmall on Twitter
Jim oversees all editorial content for Arizona News Service, including the Arizona Capitol Times, the Yellow Sheet Report and the Arizona Legislative Report. He began covering Arizona politics for Arizona News Service in 2004, when he became the company’s House of Representatives reporter. In that role, he was responsible for covering daily action in the House, as well as the complex state budget process, education, immigration and corrections issues. He has won numerous state, regional and national awards for his reporting. In 2010, Jim became editor of the Yellow Sheet Report, the state’s oldest and most prestigious political tip sheet. In 2011, he was named Arizona News Service Editor and given oversight of all of the company’s publications. Under his leadership, the Arizona News Service team has been honored with dozens of state and national awards for its reporting, including being named the 2012 and 2013 non-daily Newspaper of the Year by the Arizona Newspaper Association. Before coming to Arizona News Service, he covered city government, public safety and business issues for a pair of community weeklies in the West Valley. He is a graduate of Grand Canyon University and attended Northern Arizona University.

Click here to see Small’s latest stories.

Tom Spratt
Managing Editor
tom.spratt@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7138
@TomSprattPHX on Twitter
Before joining the Arizona Capitol Times in 2012, Tom was an editor, columnist and reporter for The Arizona Republic and the Phoenix Gazette. He was the Republic’s political editor from 2001-2008 and also worked as civic affairs editor, breaking news editor, community editor and urban affairs writer for the newspaper. He edited stories that won many state awards and several national awards, including a National Headliners Award for public service for a series on problems facing patients in elder care homes.  In his current position, Tom edits stories for the Capitol Times and writes for the newspaper’s Focus section. He lives in Tempe with his wife, Diana, and has two grown children, Katy, who lives in Phoenix, and Sam, who lives in San Diego. Tom attended Princeton University, has a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of California-Riverside and a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Missouri.

Click here to see Spratt’s latest stories.

Don Harris
Copy Editor
don.harris@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7136
Don joined Arizona Capitol Times as copy editor/reporter in 2001, capping a journalism career that began in Chicago. Immediately prior to his service with the Capitol Times, for nearly nine years Don was a public information officer for state of Arizona agencies, first with the Department of Commerce and then the Department of Insurance. Don also covered politics, organized labor and general assignments at The Arizona Republic for 19 years, periodically serving as an assistant city editor. At The Republic, Don covered the Arizona House of Representatives for 10 years, as well as five national political conventions and most major political races. Political figures he covered extensively include Barry Goldwater, Bruce Babbitt, Burton Barr, Evan Mecham, and Rose Mofford. He received several journalism awards in Arizona and Chicago. Don, his wife and their three children moved to Arizona from Chicago in 1973, after having been a reporter for the Chicago Today/Chicago American for a number of years.

Click here to see Harris’ latest stories.

Luige del Puerto
Capitol Reports Assistant Editor
luige.delpuerto@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7131
@LdelPuerto on Twitter
Luige covers state politics for the Arizona Capitol Times. He also edits the Yellow Sheet Report, Arizona’s premier political tipsheet. He is a native of the Philippines and previously worked in Manila for the nation’s largest daily newspaper, The Philippine Daily Inquirer. At the Inquirer, he covered crime, labor, elections and national security. He was also part of the paper’s special projects team and covered several coup d’état attempts in his home country before moving to the United States in 2006. Luige graduated with honors from the school of journalism at the University of Philippines. He joined the Arizona Capitol Times shortly after moving to Arizona. He has won numerous local and national awards in the U.S. for his reporting about politics, including earning first place for politics and government reporting in the Arizona Press Club’s annual contest.

Beat Assignments:
• Religion and Politics
• Energy Issues
• Healthcare
• Education
• State Senate
• Auditor General
• Congressional Elections
• Transportation Issues

Click here to see Del Puerto’s latest stories.

ARIZONA CAPITOL TIMES REPORTERS:

Jeremy Duda
Governor’s Office Reporter
jeremy.duda@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7146
@JeremyDuda on Twitter
Jeremy covers the governor’s office for the Arizona Capitol Times. A Phoenix native, he graduated from the University of Arizona in 2002 with a degree in journalism. After starting as a sports writer at the Hobbs (New Mexico) News-Sun, he moved to the news desk, where he covered city government and cops. From New Mexico, he moved to Provo, Utah, where he covered courts and cops for the Daily Herald. He has won numerous awards in New Mexico and Utah, including the Society of Professional Journalists 2007 award for best reporter at a mid-sized Utah daily newspaper.

Beat Assignments:
• Governor’s Office
• Secretary of State’s Office
• Attorney General’s Office
• Treasurer’s Office
• Superintendent of Public Instruction’s Office

Click here to see Duda’s latest stories.

Gary Grado
Reporter
gary.grado@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7111
@geegra on Twitter
Gary has been a journalist since 1994 and worked at two other newspapers in the Valley before joining the Arizona Capitol Times in 2010. Gary, a Valley resident since 1988, spent 13 years at the Pulitzer Prize-winning East Valley Tribune, where he covered courts, public safety and municipal government. He won third place for Best News Story in the 2008 Arizona Newspapers Association Better Newspapers Contest for a story about a jailhouse interview with a mass murderer, and he also contributed to other award-winning stories throughout the years. At the Chandler Independent, he covered municipal government for three years. Gary covers courts and county government for the Capitol Times. He is a graduate of Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Beat Assignments:
• Courts
• County Government

Click here to see Grado’s latest stories.

Hank Stephenson
Reporter 
hank.stephenson@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7126
@HankDeanLight on Twitter
Hank covers the Arizona House of Representatives for the Arizona Capitol Times. He is a Phoenix native who studied journalism and political science at the University of Arizona, and studied Spanish at the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos, in Cuernavaca, Mexico. Before joining the paper, Hank’s reporting appeared in the pages of the Tucson Weekly, Inside Tucson Business, Nogales International, Green Valley News, Arizona Daily Wildcat, Capital Journal (South Dakota), Williston Herald (North Dakota), The New York Times and The Associated Press.

Beat Assignments:
• State House of Representatives
• Elections

Click here to see Stephenson’s latest stories.

Ben Giles
Reporter
ben.giles@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7132
@ben_giles on Twitter
Ben covers the Arizona Senate for the Arizona Capitol Times. A Maryland native, Ben graduated from Virginia Wesleyan College in 2009, before attending the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland, where he earned a master’s degree in journalism while freelancing for local newspapers and interning at Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic. Ben moved to Phoenix in 2010 to work for News21 at Arizona State University, then returned to the Washington, D.C., region that fall to work at The Washington Examiner, where he spent more than two years as a local reporter covering county governments, the Maryland General Assembly, crime and courts.

Beat Assignments:
• State Senate

Click here to see Giles’ latest stories.

Rachel Leingang
New Media Specialist
rachel.leingang@azcapitoltimes.com
602-889-7143
@rachelleingang on Twitter
Rachel covers the Corporation Commission and energy/environmental issues for the Arizona Capitol Times. Originally from North Dakota, Rachel earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and international studies from Minnesota State University-Moorhead, where she headed the school’s student newspaper. After graduation, she worked with AmeriCorps to build mentoring and service-learning programs for minority college students in Washington state. She then got a master’s degree in mass communications at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, where she worked for the school’s wire service, Cronkite News. She interned at ABC15 in Phoenix and was a fellow with the News21 program at Cronkite. After graduation, she covered city and county government for the Rochester Post-Bulletin in Rochester, Minn., before returning to Phoenix.

Beat Assignments:
• Arizona Corporation Commission
• Energy issues
• Water
• Health

Click here to see Leingang’s latest stories.