The paper proves a result on the existence of finite flat scheme covers of Deligne–Mumford stacks. This result is used to prove that a large class of smooth Deligne–Mumford stacks with affine moduli space are quotient stacks, and in the case of quasi-projective moduli space, to reduce the question to a classical question on Brauer groups of schemes.Research of the first author supported in part by the Wolfgang Paul program of the Humboldt Foundation; research of the second author supported in part by the University of Bologna, funds for selected research topics.