Advertiser receives 10 awards for excellence

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

The Honolulu Advertiser has won 10 top awards for journalism in 2001, from the Society for Professional Journalists Hawai'i Chapter.

David Montesino

Jerry Burris

Martha Hernandez

Jeff Widener

Andrew Gomes

Dan Nakaso

Tanya Bricking

The Advertiser finished the annual competition in a dead heat for "Excellence in Journalism Awards" with the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, as the two publications swept the field in the awards in the newspaper division. Each newspaper also won six awards in categories open to all print media.

The Maui News took home the top prize for public service reporting for a seven-part series on traffic issues.

Fifty first-place trophies were awarded for all forms of journalism Saturday at a banquet at the Sheraton Princess Ka'iulani Hotel in Waikiki.

Categories were judged by members of the society's Spokane, Wash., chapter.

In addition to 10 top awards, the Advertiser's staff members won recognition as finalists in another 10 cases, while the Star-Bulletin had 13 finalists.

Andrew Gomes of The Advertiser won the top award for business reporting with what judges called a "very reader-friendly" account of a major hotel development in Honolulu.

In a sweep of the business category, The Advertiser's Kevin Dayton was a finalist with a story on a developer's use of federal money, while the Advertiser staff got finalist recognition for its coverage of the Liberty House sale.

Reporters Dan Nakaso and Tanya Bricking of The Advertiser received the top award for longer feature articles, with their double-barreled account of the USS Greeneville/Ehime Maru collision from points of view aboard both vessels, called "Quick Decisions, Enduring Pain."

Advertiser Managing Editor David F. Montesino was the winner in daily newspaper feature page design for "Pearl Harbor: Plus Sixty Years." Montesino also was the only finalist in the category, for the design of a feature page on "Bob Krauss: 50 years, 8,290 columns, 1 million stories."

Both of Montesino's "excellent designs" were so "powerful and clear," the judges said, "it was difficult to choose between first and second."

The Advertiser Staff won again for breaking news reporting, for its coverage of the submarine USS Greeneville's collision with the Japanese fisheries training ship Ehime Maru.

Jerry Burris, editorial page editor of The Advertiser, won the Editorial Opinion award for a piece on Hawai'i schools.

Graphic artist Martha P. Hernandez of The Advertiser was honored for excellence in her depiction of the plan to recover the Ehime Maru, "Return from the Depths."

"Beautiful presentation, tons of information" combined to make The Advertiser's online coverage of Pearl Harbor Plus Sixty Years "a clear winner" by the newspaper's online staff, which provides news to readers via the Internet, the judges said.

Other Advertiser finalists and their work included:

• Staff, for "9 missing after sub hits Japanese ship," spot news reporting.
• Alice Keesing, Jennifer Hiller and Kevin Dayton, for general news enterprise reporting for "Hawai'i Schools Strike."
• Page designer Chris Sykes for Daily News Page Design, "America's Bloodiest Day."
• Sports writer Ferd Lewis in the sports reporting category, for "Akebono Retires."
• Cartoonist Dick Adair, "Hawai'i Economy."
• Nick F. Gervais, for illustration titled "Punk on @ Rock."
• Photographer Bruce Asato, in feature photography, for "Matriarch's love, faith, run deep."
• Kevin Dayton, for investigative reporting, "Prison Problems."
• Staff, public service reporting, "The State of the Hawaiian."

The Star-Bulletin took the top awards for spot news reporting, general news enterprise reporting, short features, investigative reporting, government reporting, column writing, sports reporting, editorial cartoon, daily news page design and sports photography.

In nondaily journalism, Pacific Business News won awards for business reporting, feature writing, community reporting and page design.

Among television broadcasters, KGMB won six awards, the most of any station, for its work in investigative, business, general news enterprise, series and sports reporting. KHNL took the top prize for television public service reporting, for "Surviving the Storm," a look at hurricanes and how to prepare for and survive them.