Finalists announced for Carmage Walls Commentary Award

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In alphabetical order, the finalists in this year's Carmage Walls Commentary Prize competition are:

Under 50,000 circulation:

  • Jeff Fowler, editor and publisher, and Travis Webb, managing editor, Seguin Gazette, Seguin, Texas. Their entry represents the Gazette's op-ed take on the efforts of the local school board and district superintendent to silence a local radio station that had been critical of several controversial moves from the district. These controversies – largely centered around extravagent expenditures of taxpayer dollars (including the purchase of the largest high school video/scoreboard in the nation) – had been brewing for some time and culminated in a series of meetings that drew hundreds of residents and saw dozens of letters and guest columns submitted to the Gazette.  Ultimately, the majority of the school board was voted out and the superintendent was placed on leave (and ultimately resigned his position) over an unrelated accusation of sexual harassment. View their entry
  • Dink NeSmith, owner and chairman, The Press-Sentinel, Jesup, Ga. Dink NeSmith has been leading a passionate fight to keep his hometown from potentially becoming America's largest dumpsite of toxic coal ash as well as the Eastern Seaboard's trash bin.  Before Republic Services, the nation's second-largest waste-management company, waved the white flag on April 5, NeSmith had written 58 columns on the subject.  Additionally, he coordinated with freelance cartoonist Jim Powell to create 70 cartoons aimed at Republic and Wayne County commissioners, who were doing little to thwart the landfill owner's scheme. View his entry

Over 50,000 circulation:

  • Brian Colligan, associate editorial page editor, The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va. Throughout 2016, The Virginian-Pilot's opinion page published a series of editorials about Jamycheal Mitchell, a 24-year-old resident of Portsmouth, Va.  Mitchell was arrested in April 2015 for stealing $5 in snacks from a convenience store and ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation at a nearby hospital. He was sent to the regional jail for holding until his transfer.  He was held for 101 days.  A series of bureaucratic blunders meant Mitchell wallowed in the jail without the care needed to adequately treat his mental illness.  In August 2015, he was found unresponsive in a cell, which was covered in human waste, and was pronounced dead.  Soon after, questions about Mitchell's death mounted.  Read his entry
  • Sharon Grigsby, editorial writer, The Dallas Morning News, Dallas, Texas. Sharon Grigsby first dug into Dallas' longstanding loose-dog crisis in 2014, highlighting a pernicious safety and quality of life problem that symbolizes the city's great divide.  It's a problem in the poorer half of Dallas that simply wouldn't be tolerated in the more affluent neighborhoods to the north. In 2016, her leadership and tenacity prompted reform. An independent investigation of Dallas Animal Services led to the demotion of the department director and the installation of new bosses. Those leaders quickly began doing what the previous regime said was impossible: Picking up more dogs while actually increasing the number that make it out of the shelter alive. Read her entry

The awards (first- and second-place honors in each circulation category) will be presented on Monday, Sept. 11, at the Annual Meeting in Colorado Springs.  The winners also will be posted early afternoon that day on the SNPA website.

Several additional Honorable Mentions also will be announced Sept. 11.

The prize is named for the late Benjamin Carmage Walls whose newspaper career spanned seven decades.  Walls primarily owned community newspapers and advocated strong, courageous and positive editorial page leadership.

Awards in SNPA's Print Quality Contest and Photo Contest, as well as the Frank W. Mayborn Leadership Award also will be presented at the Annual Meeting.

Read about finalists in the:

Carmage Walls Commentary Prize
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