SFR Wins Five Awards in SPJ’s Top of the Rockies Competition

SFR food, opera, crime and health stories all received awards in this year’s Society for Professional Journalists’ Top of the Rockies Competition, administered by SPJ’s Colorado chapter and open to media in New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. This year’s competition garnered more than 1,900 entries from more than 80 news media outlets and 30 freelancers in all four states. SFR competes in the medium newsrooms division.

“The competition grows each year, and with that, we honor outstanding journalism throughout the four-state region,” contest coordinator Deb Hurley Brobst says in a statement that followed Saturday night’s awards ceremony. “It’s an honor to recognize the hard work of these journalists.

SFR Culture Editor Alex De Vore’s cover story, “Yes Chef” received first place in the Arts & Entertainment and Food News and Feature Category. The story profiles Santa Fe Chef Dakota Weiss and the multi-concept micro food hall Capital Coal Neighborhood Eatery. “Food and art both seem like inexhaustibly rich subjects in these entries,” the judges write. “We were especially drawn to how the Santa Fe Reporter writer delves into the interesting personal lives as well as culinary goals of the people who’ve opened a micro food hall.”

As he did in 2023, Art Director Anson Stevens-Bollen received a first place award in front-page design for “Taking Cover,” an original illustration that accompanied a cover story by former staffer Andy Lyman on the City of Santa Fe’s plan for pallet homes to help address the growing crisis of unhoused people. “This cover and story are very good, and the picture is very revealing,” the judges wrote.

Editor Julia Goldberg won first place for the second consecutive year in the A&E criticism category for her reviews of the Santa Fe Opera’s 2023 season. “Julia Goldberg with the Santa Fe Reporter is a wealth of knowledge about opera and all things arts-and-entertainment,” the judges write.

In addition, former SFR Editor Julie Ann Grimm placed second in the breaking news category for her coverage of last year’s Española shooting during an Oñate monument protest. Staff writer Mo Charnot’s story about a push for global health budgeting by the local NAACP and Santa Fe NOW placed third in the health news category.

Earlier this spring, SFR also won more than a dozen awards in its division in this year’s New Mexico Press Women competition, including a first-place award for Stevens-Bollen in cover design; first place in the specialty writing category for staff writer Evan Chandler’s story “A Light in the Desert”; first place for Charnot in the in-depth reporting category for “Attacked on Campus”; first place in continuing coverage for our reporting on New Mexico’s downwinders; and first place for Morning Word in the electronic newsletter category.