Education: BA St. John&rsquo;s University, MA Stony Brook University



	I started working at Newsday at 19, answering phones hoping to find the next great story about high school sports. Then came years of covering the New York Yankees during the days of George Steinbrenner, Joe Torre and Derek Jeter.



	Since then, my curiosity has led me across Long Island &ndash; evaluating the safety of helmets worn by high school football players, talking to hospital nurses about the lack of personal protective equipment early in the COVID-19 pandemic, and investigating why Long Island&rsquo;s police forces have not diversified.



	Over my 25 years at Newsday, my job has changed, but my mission has not: I spend each day focused on reporting the stories that matter most to the people who live here.



	Born and raised on Long Island, I grew up devouring Newsday&rsquo;s sports pages and dreamed of doing this job. Whereas most kids went to Shea Stadium eager to meet the Mets players, I was busy also looking for Newsday&rsquo;s sportswriters. I wanted to interview them!



	Sports drew me into this business, but it&rsquo;s the journalism that motivates me. Reporting a story is similar to building a sandcastle on the beach. There&rsquo;s always more work you can do to make the product better.



	I like the tireless nature of the job. I scour public records at every level of government in the name of transparency. I scrutinize board meeting agendas and minutes for hard-to-find information. I&rsquo;m politely persistent.



	Being a Newsday reporter gives me a platform to connect with new people every day and hear about their experiences. It&rsquo;s satisfying to be the person who answers a question, exposes an issue or helps solve a problem affecting others who live here.



	It&rsquo;s a daily challenge to hold those in power accountable. Long Islanders depend on us.

Jim Baumbach

Jim Baumbach

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Jim grew up on Long Island and began working for the high school sports desk when he was 19. His tireless work ethic includes covering high school football helmet safety, the coronavirus pandemic and more. He now works on the investigations team reporting on the issues that matter.

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Newsday Journalists: Jim Baumbach

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Way back in the last century when I started college, I was a computer science and statistics major. Yeah, yeah, I know the jokes about journalists and math, but I was good at math then. No lie.



	I was doing all right, plowing along through Fortran and COBOL and other long-out-of-style programming languages, but not enjoying it much. It all seemed too secluded from the world at the time, walled off and fumbling with formulas.



	Though I couldn&rsquo;t put into words at the time, in hindsight I knew I wanted to be involved in something with more real interactions with people. Not to go Will Rogers on you, but I generally like most people and I&rsquo;m interested in their stories, their histories and what they&rsquo;re trying to do in the world.



	To make a long story medium, one day, with the encouragement of a college professor, I walked into the student newspaper offices and asked if I could help. I&rsquo;ve been in the news business more or less since. I began as a sportswriter in Louisiana, my home state. But I&rsquo;ve now worked in New York for three decades.



	I&rsquo;ve covered rodeos and high school football, a hostage standoff, a manhunt and too many political conventions. I&rsquo;ve written about corruption at your New York State Capitol, but I&rsquo;ve seen many touching moments there, too, like the joy of activists when same-sex marriage was legalized, and when adoptees were given access to their birth records.



	I&rsquo;ve spent the night on a newsroom floor waiting for a hurricane to roll in from the Gulf of Mexico, and flown in an airplane in Cuba where the seat instructions were in Russian and whose tires were so bald you could see steel belts. (It bounced three times on the landing, but made it.) My family likes the one about being on 15 flights in five days during a presidential campaign.



	I hope this doesn&rsquo;t sound like bragging, because it&rsquo;s not how I meant it. Besides, many journalists have had far more colorful adventures than I have.



	It&rsquo;s meant to be a roundabout way of saying newspapers and journalists strive to tell about how we live. Writing about big events, keeping you informed about important matters and sometimes surprising you. Life&rsquo;s rich pageant.



	We keep an eye on how politicians spend your money and what decisions affect your schools, businesses and daily lives. Sometimes, it means sifting through hype and hysteria to get to the bottom of claims. Sometimes, it means finding malfeasance.



	Knowing reporters are monitoring them (officials) does make a difference. But we also tell stories about the new restaurant or brew pub in the village, the candidates for the Oscars, the latest eighth-grade test scores and, yes, bad accidents on the Long Island Expressway.



	And writing local obituary stories about Long Islanders, which, believe or not, can be one of the more fascinating assignments. You have to talk to relatives at a very bad time, but you give them space to tell a person&rsquo;s story, and that can be enlightening and heartening for the family and the writer. I know: I&rsquo;ve delivered two eulogies myself.

Yancey Roy

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Newsday Journalists: Yancey Roy

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I joined Newsday in February 1986 to work in the New York City edition and immediately took part in covering several major crime stories. Working under legendary Newsday editor Bob Greene, I played a role in the paper&rsquo;s massive coverage of the 1986 Mafia Commission trial. Soon afterward, I was made lead reporter for the trial of subway gunman Bernhard Goetz. Both the commission coverage and the Goetz trial gave notice that Newsday was a force to be reckoned with in the media world.

I came to journalism indirectly. I was born in the Bronx and after studying media at Ithaca College, where I graduated, I continued studies in film and media at Michigan State University. My Michigan studies were interrupted by a stint in the U.S. Army, where I was assigned to work in a press office north of Saigon. The experience was an eye opener to the world of reporting, particularly war and international coverage. After the military, I lived in Europe, doing freelance journalism, including articles for Newsday about the U.S. military in Europe. After returning home, I earned a law degree.

In Newsday, I see a newspaper committed to reporting the news without sensationalism and with a deep probing level of reporting. My beat finds me covering the New York City Police Department. The beat is synergistic for Newsday because not only do a great many cops live on Long Island &ndash; close to one-third of the force &ndash; but the subject of crime is something of deep interest and concern to other Long Islanders who work in New York City. How the Big Apple goes dictates the impact for Long Islanders.

What I like about Newsday is the collegial working atmosphere, which has allowed me to do some of my best work, including coverage of mafia trials and the Gilgo Beach killings. For Gilgo, my biggest stories were about the genetic genealogy used in the investigations, telling the tragic stories of victims Valerie Mack and Karen Vergata, as well as the inside story of how the investigation led to the arrest of suspect Rex Heuermann.

Education: BS Ithaca College, MA Michigan State University, JD New York Law School 
 
Anthony DeStefano&nbsp;covers law enforcement,&nbsp; criminal justice and legal affairs for Newsday from New York City.&nbsp; He joined Newsday in 1986 after working as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, Fairchild News Service&nbsp;and the Hartford Courant.

Honors and Awards: Part of a team of New York Newsday reporters who won the Pulitzer Prize for spot news reporting in 1992;&nbsp; New York Emmy Awards, 2019-2020 for &ldquo;Gilgo Beach Investigations, 10 Years, 10 Bodies, 0 Arrests.

Anthony M. DeStefano

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From witnessing war in the U.S. Army to covering major crimes at Newsday, Anthony has dedicated his career to pursuing truth and justice. He uses his investigative skills and legal background to hold powerful institutions accountable and uncover stories that impact the lives of Long Islanders.

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Newsday Journalists: Anthony DeStefano

Education: Colgate University



	Verne Gay has covered television for Newsday since 1989, and before that, for Variety. Over his 34 years at Newsday, he&#39;s covered all aspects of the television industry, with an emphasis on news and entertainment. He became Newsday&#39;s TV critic in 2010.

Verne Gay

Long Island

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Find out what's happening with Nassau & Suffolk news, Long Island schools, plus the latest crime, courts, politics. Coverage includes Fire Island, the Hamptons & North Fork.

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