Jon Harris
Jon Harris is a business-of-health-care reporter at The Buffalo News, focused on how health systems, insurers and regulators shape the cost and delivery of care in Western New York. His coverage is distinguished by close tracking of the money, contracts and rate filings behind health care, turning technical material into clear, localized stories about what employers, workers and patients will experience. He combines detailed reporting on insurance and hospital finances with on-the-ground reporting about workforce disputes and the people who rely on these institutions.
Health insurance rates and regulation
Harris devotes sustained coverage to health insurance markets, especially how proposed and approved premium changes affect individuals and small employers. He reports on filings and decisions around 2027 health insurance rates, explaining the differences between what insurers seek and what regulators ultimately allow, and how those numbers translate into real-world costs. In coverage of statewide rate actions, he breaks out the individual and small group markets, comparing requested increases with the lower percentages approved by financial regulators, and highlighting that some Western New York plans remain flat while others see double-digit hikes. His reporting on rate decisions consistently links statewide regulatory moves to specific local insurers and products, making it clear which segments of the market are under the most pressure. Across these pieces he uses figures, averages and comparisons to show whether regulators are cutting back insurers’ requests and what that means for premiums in the coming year.
Hospitals, health systems and workforce
Another core strand of Harris’s work examines hospitals and health systems as large employers and complex businesses, especially when their internal decisions collide with public expectations.
He covers investigations into discrimination and racism within major cancer centers, detailing how leadership responded by hiring outside firms and how little of those findings were shared with staff or the community. In those stories, he focuses on governance, transparency and trust, scrutinizing whether institutional processes match the promises made to patients and employees. Harris also reports on health care workforce issues, including vaccine mandates for health care workers and labor strikes at major hospitals, framing them as business and operations stories rather than only labor disputes.
His early coverage for The Buffalo News included the state’s vaccine mandate and the start of a high-profile hospital strike, using those events to show how staffing, wages and working conditions ripple through the region’s health care system. Taken together, his hospital reporting follows money, management decisions and labor actions, and ties them to the stability of care delivery in Western New York.
Community health, technology and patient stories
Harris frequently writes about community health providers and the tools they adopt to diagnose and treat patients, often through focused features on specific clinics and technologies. In his coverage of a community health center using the Cerebro system to diagnose concussions, he explains how the technology works, why the clinic adopted it, and what it means for athletes and other patients who might otherwise go undiagnosed. He presents these stories as both business decisions and care improvements, examining costs, implementation and outcomes rather than solely the novelty of the tool.
Harris’s work also includes human-focused narratives tied to long-term health and trauma, such as a front-page article on two local women who have spent years helping victims and families affected by the September 11 attacks. In that piece, he foregrounds their sustained efforts and the continuing needs of affected communities, showing how informal networks of support complement formal health and social services.
These community and patient stories underscore his interest in how systems-level decisions show up in individual lives, whether through new diagnostic tools or enduring volunteer work.
Media business and newsroom leadership
While his primary beat is the business of health care, Harris also shows an interest in the business of media and the corporate decisions that shape his own outlet. He has summarized major developments involving the corporate parent of The Buffalo News, including a multi-million-dollar investment, changes to debt terms and leadership transitions at the company, presenting them in concise, financial terms. This work reflects fluency with corporate finance and governance beyond the health sector, and an ability to distill complicated ownership structures into clear takeaways.
In addition to his reporting role, Harris holds a leadership position in the Buffalo Newspaper Guild, representing editorial workers and engaging with contract and workplace issues. That union role complements his coverage of health care labor dynamics, giving him practical exposure to negotiations and newsroom economics.
Across health care and media business stories, Harris’s work is marked by attention to ownership, investment and labor, and by a steady focus on what those forces mean for people who depend on the institutions he covers.
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Abigail Summerville
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Adekunle Agbetiloye
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Aimee Picchi
Aimee Picchi connects Social Security, retirement programs and economic policy directly to the financial security of ordinary Americans, showing how macro decisions hit household budgets. She is associate managing editor for CBS MoneyWatch at CBS News, covering business and personal finance with clear, accessible explanations of complex money issues. Her core beat is Social Security and retirement, interest rates and inflation, and how policy, markets and company strategies affect workers, retirees, savers and investors. She reports on benefit adequacy, looming Social Security cuts, COLA changes, Federal Reserve rate decisions, fuel costs, trade tensions and labor’s share of income, always framing coverage around pocketbook impacts. Her background includes retirement reporting fellowships, prior staff reporting on technology, media and business, an Institutional Investor book on affluent investors, and freelance work for national outlets. She also writes science fiction and fantasy and is a Nebula Award finalist.
Alex Harring
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