People of the Year

Just over a week before Christmas, after months on the frontlines caring for people during the pandemic, five Pittsburgh hospital workers became the first recipients in the city, and among the first in the nation, to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. In a city that ranks among the top for health care jobs in the country, it would be a mistake not to recognize the heroics of Pittsburgh’s brave doctors, nurses, and other health care workers in our People of the Year issue. We hope you’ll join us in giving them our sincere gratitude for not only the work they’ve done, but the work they’ll continue to do to care for our friends, family, and neighbors during these unprecedented times.

But for this year’s People of the Year issue, we have also found unsung heroes of the pandemic outside of hospital walls. A group of volunteers who worked nonstop to make sure frontline workers were protected. Organizations and businesses who found ways to adapt to never-before-seen financial and physical limitations.

And this year brought more than just the coronavirus pandemic. Following the police killings of Breonna Taylor in March and George Floyd in May, the world also faced one of the largest civil rights battles of our lifetimes, with Black Lives Matter protests taking to the streets, demanding long overdue equal rights. For our People of the Year issue, we’re recognizing a local activist group who helped fight for the cause here in Pittsburgh and a young entrepreneur who boosted Black businesses throughout the city.

We’re also highlighting a writer who began the year publishing one book and ended the year by publishing a second, to much critical acclaim; an arts group who boosted its community while growing its brand; a journalist who became a one-woman labor movement; and a politician who inspires as he leads. We invite you to check out all 10 of this year’s People of the Year winners in Politics, Theater, Visual Arts, Literature, Activism, Business, Food and Drink, Health, Music, and Labor. During our reporting throughout 2020, we’ve found Pittsburgh to be a city full of heroes, from those inspirational folks working every day in our hospitals, to the people making our food, to the people creating the artwork we admire, to the people fighting for all of our rights into the new year.

Here at Pittsburgh City Paper, we’re ending this year hoping 2021 is a better one than the last for all of you.