It's awards season for Creative Loafing Tampa, and this weekend we learned that we'd done very well.
In the Association of Alternative Newsmedia (AAN) Awards, a national competition judged by Ohio University's Scripps School of Journalism, we won first place in Election Coverage and second place in Photography, both for our coverage of last year's Republican National Convention in Tampa. The judges chose the winners from more than 900 entries submitted by alternative publications across the U.S. and Canada. The results were announced during a reception on Saturday at the Miami InterContinental Hotel.
In the Sunshine State Awards, which are given to publications and broadcasters throughout Florida and administered by the Society of Professional Journalists South Florida chapter, CL Tampa took home four first place awards and one second.
The first place awards went to CL News Editor Mitch Perry for Election Commentary; Creative Director Todd Bates for Front Page Design; Theater Critic Mark E. Leib for Arts Commentary & Criticism; and Andrew Spear for Illustration (he created the "Seven People You'll Meet at the Convention" feature, above, plus other caricatures, for our RNC guide). The second place award, also in Arts Criticism, went to Visual Art Critic Megan Voeller.
The Tampa Bay Times took home several major Sunshine State Awards, including the James E. Batten Award for Public Service, which went to Alexandra Zayas' extraordinary series, "In God's name," about the horrific abuses at Florida religious group homes, and the Diversity Award, which went to media critic Eric Deggans. The Lakeland Ledger, Tampa Tribune and Tampa Bay Business Journal were among the other local winners, and the Journalist of the Year award went to a fellow alt-weekly journalist, the Miami New Times' Michael E. Miller, for his story "Death Trap."
SPJ So Florida chapter members announced the awards at a luncheon Saturday at the Mayfair Hotel in Coconut Grove.
All in all, a pretty stellar Saturday for CL. Congrats to the winners, and to all the Florida publications and alt-weeklies across the country who are dedicated to doing good work and telling great stories.