The Reporter brought home six journalism awards from NYPA’s spring convention — including top prizes in three categories — this past weekend at the Gideon Putnam Resort and Spa in Saratoga Springs.
And Times/Review Newsgroup, which includes the Reporter’s sister papers, The Suffolk Times and The News-Review, topped all other newspaper groups in the state for total wins at Saratoga.
The News-Review received the Stuart C. Dorman Award for overall editorial excellence, and The Suffolk Times picked up first place honors for general excellence.
The 2013 NYPA entries were judged by the Pennsylvania Press Association, just as NYPA members volunteer to judge other states’ entries in their competitions.
Mr. Olsen was speaking about one of the most prestigious awards that NYPA bestows, which went to Staff Reporter Julie Lane for her multi-part series on the serious problems of postal delivery on the Island. Ms. Lane’s series took first place over every newspaper in the association, winning the Sharon R. Fulmer Award for Community Leadership.
“This issue is so core to a community’s needs and the coverage demonstrates a newspaper’s ability to have a major impact …” the citation from the judges read.
The award comes with a $500 stipend the writer can donate to the charity of her choice. Julie has chosen to split the stipend between the Shelter Island Educational Foundation and the Shelter Island Ambulance Foundation.
Ms. Lane also won a third place award for feature writing for “From Russia with love,” a profile of a college student and part-time Island resident who began life in a Russian orphanage.
Editor Ambrose Clancy won a first place NYPA award for feature writing for a story on two Islanders who were dead center at the horrific Boston Marathon bombings.
It wasn’t just words that NYPA recognized and honored from the Reporter’s pages. Both free lance photographer Eleanor Labrozzi and Staff Photographer Beverlea Walz took home prizes in photography categories.
Ms. Walz’s prize was a third place finish for “A Midsummer’s Night Dream,” a cover photo of Shakespearean actors arriving by boat for a performance at Sylvester Manor.