A headshot of Megan Munce wearing a black sweater.

Megan Fan Munce

Hi! My name is Megan Fan Munce, I'm a San Francisco-based journalist.

I currently write for the San Francisco Chronicle's climate desk where I primarily cover California's home insurance crisis, combining accountability reporting, reader utility and data journalism.

I've broken dozens of scoops, including when California's largest home insurer began warning of potential insolvency. I was also the first reporter to begin turning regulatory filings into unique datasets that allowed the Chronicle to visualize for readers how rate hikes and regulatory reforms will impact their communities.

          

"Burned"

At the end of 2024, my colleague Susie Neilson and I started to travel to California communities that had burned down in wildfires to investigate the obstacles behind their recovery. Three months later, two wildfires in Los Angeles County killed 31 people and destroyed tens of thousands of homes. Our investigation, "Burned," used internal insurance industry documents, government investigations and interviews with more than 200 sources to uncover how and why insurance fails to help wildfire survivors recover.

The series inspired a multi-state investigation, inspired five proposed laws and won the 2026 Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting, among other honors.

Video by Bronte Wittpen/S.F. Chronicle

          

Data journalism

At the Chronicle, I've both collaborated with our data journalists and done my own analyses to give readers a detailed look at how California's insurance crisis is affecting different parts of the state. The Chronicle was the first major news outlet to begin publishing data visualizations of information sourced directly from regulatory filings.

San Francisco Chronicle ● July 21, 2025

California wants regular insurers to grow. But it’s the FAIR Plan that’s growing faster than ever

Policy data from California's insurer of last resort shows exactly where home insurance is the hardest to find


San Francisco Chronicle ● July 25, 2024

California insurance crisis: Map shows which areas are hardest hit by nonrenewals

Compiled data sourced from regulatory filings provides a novel approach at how to look at where insurers are most wary of wildfire risk


San Francisco Chronicle ● June 28, 2024

How State Farm’s financial peril could upend the entire California insurance market

An analysis of what different financial measures say about State Farm the day after we broke the news it was filing for an emergency rate hike due to potential insolvency

Graphic by Megan Fan Munce/S.F. Chronicle

          

Enterprise and features

Images by William Hale Irwin/For the S.F. Chronicle

San Francisco Chronicle ● Feb. 21, 2026

Tragedy in Tahoe: How a holiday ski adventure ended in California’s deadliest avalanche

Narrative and graphics explain how a change in the weather led to a deadly avalanche that killed nine backcountry skiers


San Francisco Chronicle ● Dec. 23, 2024

California’s deadliest wildfire devastated this town. Now an insurer is eager to return

A profile of the town of Paradise's efforts to lure back insurers with wildfire-safe homes


San Francisco Chronicle ● Aug. 14, 2026

A California official helped a company pitching data centers. His daughter works there

A quick-turn investigation using business records and public records requests to reveal the people behind a pitch to put small data centers on historic California fairgrounds

          

Where else I've been

I joined the San Francisco Chronicle in 2023 through the two-year Hearst Fellowship program.

My first year of the program was spent as a business reporter at the Houston Chronicle, where I profiled historic businesses, covered the local impact of national economic trends and helped grow the paper's coverage of the Asian American community.

While in college, I also spent two quarters as a fellow with the Texas Tribune. My first fellowship was on the reporting team, leading the Tribune's coverage of bills in the legislature that would have prevented transgender children from participating in school sports or accessing gender-affirming medical care. Through neither bill passed that year, they later set the stage for a growing national debate around the rights of transgender youth.

My second fellowship was on the audience team, where I wrote social copy, newsletters and explainer articles on topics like reproductive rights and the state's electrical grid.