It’s official: The Brooklyn Paper is the best of the better.
Your beloved weekly broadsheet took home two top prizes at the New York Press Association’s prestigious Better Newspaper Contest, earning the gold for our beautifully designed front pages, and getting an A-plus as a tutor to the journalists of tomorrow with a “Rookie Reporter of the Year” award.
Cheers, high-fives, and handshake were shared across our MetroTech newsroom as the word spread of the honors.
“I’ve always said that nothing can capture a moment in time better than the front page of a newspaper,” Brooklyn Paper editor Vince DiMiceli told his gathered staff Monday morning. “And these awards show that there aren’t many better at finding and delivering the news than our team.”
That team used to include Rookie Reporter of the Year Matthew Perlman (who sadly left The Paper shortly before earning the award), a former computer programmer and skilled City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism alum whose technical know-how infused his work with the kind of gee-whiz razzle-dazzle that makes the kids today pick up newspapers and read neighborhood news online.
Perlman was singled out for his work on a story and graphic about the dangers of walking and driving down Atlantic Avenue, his dogged reporting on the mysterious death of a young runner tackling the Brooklyn Half-Marathon, and his weekly column focusing on the technology industry in Brooklyn, “Circuit Lord.”
“The young reporter demonstrates his versatility in the broad range of stories submitted,” the judges wrote. “He is comfortable with big data and investigative pieces, and shows his mettle as an imbedded beat reporter.”
DiMiceli used the opportunity to pitch the latest job opening for the next rookie reporter at The Paper — an award his staffers have won before.
“It’s great to produce the next generation of journalists right here in Brooklyn,” he said. “Past winners, such as Michael McLaughlin, have gone on to great things, and I expect the same from Matthew.”
Multiple award-winning art director Leah Mitch was yet again honored for her work putting together The Paper’s front pages each week — an award she shared with DiMiceli back in 2009.
The three covers entered in the contest showed off Mitch’s superior skill mixing photos, fonts, imagery, and words to produce a front page that, week after week, keeps readers coming back.
“Love the bold typography and colors,” wrote the judges. “Pages drive readers inside for more. Great look.”
The Paper’s staff also took home two second-place awards — one to photographer Paul Martinka for best spot-news photo (“It’s a sneaky kind of photo,” wrote the judges), and one for headline writing, including the instant classic “It’s raining mensch” (“We think you had a little too much fun,” wrote the judges).
Meanwhile, our sister Brooklyn publication, the Bay News, won a second-place award for Coverage of Local Government thanks to a series of stories by Max Jaeger about the city’s “Build it Back” Superstorm Sandy recovery program, and Colin Mixson, Bill Ebert, Vanessa Ogle, and Jaeger brought home a third-place award for Coverage of the Environment thanks to their series on the planned elimination of mute swans living in Sheepshead Bay that the judges called “as entertaining as it is important.”
