Special Panel to Explore Future of Arts & Cultural Journalism

Bill Marimow, the editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer, is a native Philadelphian, who has served as a reporter, editor and assistant to the publisher at the newspaper. Marimow has twice won the Pulitzer Prize – first, in 1978, for a series of stories written with a partner about criminal violence by Philadelphia police, and in 1985, for investigative reporting about the Philadelphia Police K-9 unit, whose dogs were attacking innocent, unarmed men and women.

At the start of his career, Marimow was a reporter at The Evening Bulletin and The Inquirer, where he covered economics, labor, state and federal courts and served as City Hall bureau chief. In 1993, Marimow joined theBaltimore Sun, serving as Metro Editor, Managing Editor and Editor in Chief. During his 11 years at The Sun, the newspaper won Pulitzer Prizes in feature writing, investigative reporting and beat reporting. After leaving The Sun, Marimow joined National Public Radio, where he was managing editor for national news and vice president for the news division.

In Nov. 2006, he joined The Inquirer as editor and led the newspaper until fall 2010. Eight months ago, Marimow rejoined The Inquirer as the editor after teaching at The Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona StateUniversity.

A graduate of Trinity College, he also studied law in 1982-83 as Nieman Fellow at Harvard Law School. He is currently a member of the Trinity College board of trustees. Marimow is married to Diane, a sculptor and potter, who also works in the Education Department of the Philadelphia Art Museum. He has two children – Ann, a reporter at The Washington Post, and Scott, who is a principal at Providence Equity Partners.

Chris Satullo joined WHYY in late 2008 as executive director of news and civic dialogue. At WHYY, he has been instrumental in developing the news and dialogue website NewsWorks.org and the companion radio program NewsWorks Tonight.

Before that, he was editorial page editor and columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer. In 2007, he co-founded the Penn Project for Civic Engagement, which convenes forums to connect citizen concerns to journalism and politics.

He won the 2000 James F. Batten Award for Civic Journalism for a Citizen Voices project on city elections inPhiladelphia.  The Great Expectations project on the 2007 city elections won a 2008 National Headliners Award for journalistic innovation. He's won more than 40 awards for news writing, columns and editorials.

He's a graduate of Williams College and a former Fulbright Fellow.

Megan Wendell has been championing the arts for over a decade as President of Canary Promotion, providing communications services for arts, culture and mission-driven clients. Established in 2001, Canary Promotion was founded and is run by people who are truly invested in the cultural, creative and nonprofit communities. The Canary team brings to each project over 15 years of experience working in various areas of the communications, journalism and arts fields.

Wendell has led campaigns for dozens of cultural organizations and artists in performing arts, visual art, design, higher education, heritage and history. She has worked on numerous projects, of both regional and national scope, funded by such granting organizations as The National Endowment for the Arts, The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, The William Penn Foundation, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Philadelphia Cultural Fund.

She is a member of the Public Relations Society of America, has served on the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Advisory Panel and Americans for the Arts convention marketing committee, and has participated in several professional development programs, including courses at the Wharton Small Business Development Center and the Forum of Executive Women mentoring circles.

Wendell regularly draws from her own artistic background as a musician who graduated from Berklee College of Music, launched several successful tours, nationally released and promoted albums and founded an independent record label.  She loves that her work gives her an opportunity to fully immerse herself in the amazing cultural community of Greater Philadelphia and beyond.

Tom Kaiden joined the Cultural Alliance in 2001 and leads the Alliance’s continuing efforts to promote the positive awareness and value of arts and culture and deliver high-quality services and professional development to 402 member organizations from the Greater Philadelphia region. Prior to joining the Cultural Alliance, Kaiden served as the executive director of the Stowe (Vermont) Area Association, a member-based tourism marketing corporation and Chamber of Commerce. He holds an MBA from Cornell University and a BA in Economics from the University of Connecticut. Click here for Tom Kaiden's full bio.

This program is part of the Cultural Alliance’s research initiative, Creating Change, and is supported by a grant from the William Penn Foundation.