Nigel Jaquiss of Willamette Week and Pete Kotz of Cleveland Scene are awarded special citations by the Education Writers Association.
Ida Ford comes to Cleveland Scene as classified advertising director from the Plain Dealer, where she directed inside and outside sales units for both real estate and recruitment advertising. Scene Publisher Ramon Larkin says her experience in these two vital areas, as well as her community and professional contacts, will be "a great contribution."
The San Francisco Bay Guardian wins two first place awards in the National Newspaper Association's 2002 Better Newspaper Contest: Tali Woodward for Best Health Story, and Dan Zoll for Best Education/Literacy Story. Willy Stern of the Nashville Scene takes a first in Best Investigative or In-Depth Story or Series for his five-part dissection of The Tennessean.
Village Voice Media paid NT Media more than $1 million to close New Times Los Angeles, sources tell the Los Angeles Times. New Times paid VVM a lesser amount to shutter Cleveland Free Times, the daily reports. An anti-trust lawyer says the transaction, negotiated quietly over the past three months, "could raise rather interesting antitrust issues."
Nashville Scene Editor Bruce Dobie has discontinued "Desperately Seeking the News," a hallmark of the Nashville Scene since its inception, the Nashville City Paper reports. Dobie reportedly says the column, which has traditionally served as a launching pad for strikes on The Tennessean, has gotten stale. Matt Pulle and Henry Walker, the two writers who have alternated weekly columns in the past year or so, say they're disappointed but defer to Dobie's judgment.
The Nashville Scene’s series “Grading the Daily,” by Willy Stern, has won first prize for press criticism (single entry) in the 2002 National Press Club journalism awards competition. The series dissects The Tennessean’s slow decline from a crusading daily newspaper during the Civil Rights era to mediocrity under Gannett's ownership.
Bob Norman of New Times Broward/Palm Beach was the big winner in this year's Green Eyeshade competition, picking up three awards, including two first-places. Norman wasn't alone; AAN members captured 15 of the 24 awards handed out in the weekly/monthly category of SPJ's Southeast region contest: Miami New Times picked up six, New Times Broward/Palm Beach won five, Creative Loafing Atlanta took home three, and the Nashville Scene received one.
