Business Report received 11 awards, including first place for best news coverage, best news story, best news photo, best photo package and best Web site — at the Louisiana Press Association convention Saturday at the Hilton Baton Rouge Capitol Center.
In winning for best news coverage, Business Report was honored for its March 11 issue, which featured a cover package on business sectors feeling protection from the storm clouds swirling around the national economy, and the Sept. 23 issue, which focused almost exclusively on the aftermath of Hurricane Gustav. “Far and away the king of its class,” said judges from the Kansas Press Association.
Other first-place awards went to writer Anna Thibodeaux for her Oct. 7 cover story on the dredging of Bayou Postillion; graphic designer Carolyn Valentine Blakley for her Sept. 9 cover photo of a tree that fell into a house during Gustav; photographer Marie Constantin for her March 25 photo package of dirty jobs in the Capital Region; and the Business Report Web site, businessreport.com, led by Web editor Brandi Simmons and online news editor Timothy Boone.
Business Report finished second to New Orleans’ Gambit Weekly in general excellence. Writers Stephanie Riegel and Steve Clark received second place for best continuing coverage of a single news event for their stories on the Baton Rouge housing market, and Riegel, Boone and writer David Jacobs received second place in the same category for their stories on downtown Baton Rouge. Constantin also received second place in best photo package for her Women in Business portraits.
Art director Hoa Vu received honorable mention for best front page for the May 26 and Sept. 9 issues, and Riegel received honorable mention for her June 17 story on the Capital Region’s residential real estate market.
