First, I apparently, contra an old post, misunderstood the configuration of current divisions of semiweekly and weekly papers. I have no complaints about anybody I was running against.
Now, the actual awards?
Yes, and not just in my division, as far as observations on judging, which I have long questioned. (I did it for another state's newspaper association contest once, long ago, and I'll admit it's not fun.) I also have a non-judging observation about one winner in another division, in one category.
I entered more categories than I have at any time previous, at my current position, and still just took one first and one fourth.
I didn't even place, not even fourth, in sports coverage, despite one of my two entries being the the issue of the local public school winning a state football title. (With the other paper I run, I won that category two years ago with a volleyball team finishing state runner-up.) Since I didn't even finish fourth, I won't have any judges' comments on why.
SMH.
Now, the other division and judging? Two levels above me, in sports photography, the picture TPA highlighted on its slideshow? It was simply of a high school pitcher, on the mound, pitching. It wasn't even as creative as one of my shots, or one of my stringers, to get the ball 2-3, or 5-6, inches out of his hand. Really?
Then, because I love dogging on CNHI?
Gainesville won the news writing award in its circulation class, even though one of its two entries, and the one displayed, had less than the full story.
That was about the Black Lives Matter-related organization, PRO Gainesville. At its last march, it did NOT have a parade permit, walked in a street that's also a state highway, and got its three leaders arrested.
After losing in county court at law, it appealed. ACLU of Texas then got involved and made it a political issue. The Gainesville Register never reported then one big issue, nor after they lost that appeal and appealed again to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, nor after THAT, when, with ACLU national now involved, they did a Hail Mary to the US Supreme Court. That "big issue," which I noted more than once in news stories and in columns, is that the ACLU's own pamphlet, available as a PDF online, says you can't march in a street, without possibility of arrest, if you don't have a permit.
I tweeted both state and national ACLU about that as well. No response.
(Any civil liberties organization donations I've made in the last 15 years have gone to the Center for Constitutional Rights, and this only confirms that.)
Sigh.
