I believe in the power of stories to make people’s lives better. I’ve been a reporter and editor for more than 30 years, with a passion for narrative and investigative reporting. Since December 2005, I’ve been an editor and reporter at the Star Tribune, Minnesota’s largest daily newspaper. Before coming to Minnesota, I spent 12 years as a reporter and editor at The News & Observer in North Carolina. You can contact me at james.shiffer [at] gmail.com

I helped narrate this 2021 TPT public television documentary that drew from my book, “The King of Skid Row”

In 2022, I edited a project about biodiversity for the Minnesota Star Tribune called Vanishing North, which we turned into a book the following year.

I was a member of the Minnesota Star Tribune team that won a Pulitzer Prize for breaking news reporting in 2021 for the coverage of George Floyd’s murder and its aftermath.

Here’s some other info:

Podcast, coverage and gallery from Minnesota Public Radio interview, May 2016
Streets.mn podcast with Bill Lindeke, November 2016

Harvard’s Nieman blog on how I did the Janet Lee Dahl story

About Whistleblower:

What works: the Star Tribune’s Whistleblower, David Brauer, Minnpost, March 19, 2009
Neighborhood Watch, Mary Lynn F. Jones, Presstime, March 2009
Resolution: To spend more time digging, Nancy Barnes, Star Tribune, January 3, 2009

About Rubbed Out:

Star Tribune’s Whistleblower digs into muckraker’s murder 65 years later, David Brauer, Minnpost, March 8, 2010
Who rubbed out Arthur Kasherman? Noir, the Star Tribune and a senior thesis combine for multimedia storytelling, Andrea Pitzer, Nieman Storyboard, March 12, 2010

Other mentions:

Discovering Family, John Carlin, Prologue: Journal of the National Archives and Records Administration, 1996