Twice-monthly paper, university journalism program share public-service award in Alaska

The Skagway News, a twice-monthly paper in southeast Alaska, and the journalism program at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks shared the top prize last night at the annual awards banquet of the Alaska Press Club in Anchorage. For a PDF list of all winners, go here.

The Skagway paper won for its stories on the billing practices of a company that operates air ambulance service for the town, which had 862 people at the 2000 census and is three hours by road from Whitehorse, Yukon, and six hours by ferry from the state capital of Juneau. "The newspaper showed how local residents were being double-billed for medevac flights and that the cost of such flights had quadrupled in a year," the judges said. The stories helped prompt an inquiry by Alaska's congressman, changes in practices by the company and an official effort to get local residents to take insurance that covers the flights. "The paper went beyond just pointing out the problems: Its stories discussed possible solutions and helped frame a public policy debate about the best and most-affordable way to ensure that all residents and visitors to Skagway would have access to medevac insurance." Here's the first story, the next story and the latest story. The UAF program shared the award for embedding three students and a professor with American military units in Iraq for a month. Here is a report on the multimedia project, which the judges called "creative and corageous."

The contest for newspapers is mostly divided between small and large markets. Multiple winners in the small-market category included the Nome Nugget for best sustained coverage, environmental reporting and breaking news; and the Homer Tribune for best series, political reporting and education reporting. The Tribune was named best weekly newspaper; its competitor, the Homer News, placed second. Jenny Neyman of the Redoubt Reporter of Soldotna, also on the Kenai Peninsula, won for best use of story and photo, and she picked up many second- and third-place awards. So did Alex DeMarban of Tundra Drums and Alaska Newspapers Inc., who won for best news story.

Much of the good rural journalism in Alaska is on radio, thanks to the state’s large network of public stations. Radio winners included Ed Ronco of Sitka’s KCAW for comprehensive reporting, Rosemarie Alexander of Juneau’s KTOO for government or political reporting (on the ethics case against former Gov. Sarah Palin), Mike Mason of Dillingham’s KDLG for environmental reporting (a story on the proposed Pebble Mine), Jay Barrett of Kodiak’s KMXT for public-affairs program (the Alaska Fisheries Report), Jenny Canfield of KNBA in Anchorage for documentary (Native Perspectives on Statehood, after 50 years) and Alaska Public Radio Network Washington Correspondent Libby Casey for best crime or courts reporting (a story on Supreme Court arguments). Casey is “a Nina Totenberg in the making,” said judge Cathy Duchamp of Washington, D.C.

Canfield is now editor of the Tundra Telegraph, an online, citizen-journalism site that is part of Alaska Dispatch, an online news site that has attracted refugees from the state’s shrinking mainstream media and major investment by Publisher Alice Rogoff. The top award for editorial writing, open to all media just as the public-service award is, went to Craig Medred of the Dispatch.