LOS ANGELES – The Greater Los Angeles chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists will honor five local journalists, a photographer and two attorneys at its 33rd annual awards banquet this spring.
The Distinguished Journalist honorees are Paul Pringle of the Los Angeles Times, Terri Vermeulen Keith of City News Service, John Schwada of KTTV Fox 11, and Frank Stoltze of 89.3-KPCC. Kevin Roderick of LAObserved is the first recipient of the chapter’s Distinguished Work in New Media Award. Thomas Newton and Jim Ewert, of the California Newspaper Publishers Association, will receive the chapter’s Freedom of Information Award and Nick Ut, Pulitzer-winning photographer with the Associated Press, will receive a special Lifetime Achievement Award.
“These award winners represent a broad array of experience in coverage of our region and in defense of the rights of all journalists,” said Los Angeles chapter President David Dow. “We are deeply grateful for their service to the community.”
SPJ/LA presents Distinguished Journalist Awards to members of the profession who demonstrate good news judgment, a strong sense of ethics and a passion for getting the story right. Honorees are journalists who have achieved a record of accomplishments over the course of several years. For the past three decades, the chapter has recognized reporters, editors and photographers in print and broadcast journalism. In 1997, the chapter began honoring journalists in four categories: television, radio, newspapers with a circulation of less than 100,000 and newspapers with a circulation of 100,000 or more.
The Distinguished Work in New Media award is given to a journalist who uses the new media’s unique characteristics and capabilities while striving to uphold traditional journalism’s highest standards of honesty, accuracy, responsibility and accountability.
Newton and Ewert are being honored for their efforts in increase government transparency and improve and protect First Amendment freedoms. Ut, who is best known for his iconic photo of a naked Vietnamese girl fleeing a napalm attack, is being honored with a special award for his more than 40 years of photojournalism and his contributions to the profession.
The awards banquet will be May 6, 2009. Details on the location of the banquet will be announced at a later date and posted on the chapter’s Web site.
The Society of Professional Journalists is the nation’s largest and most broad-based journalism organization, dedicated to promoting high standards of ethical behavior and encouraging the free practice of journalism. Founded in 1909 as Sigma Delta Chi, SPJ works to inspire and educate the next generation of journalists and protects First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech and press.
2008 Honorees
Television
John Schwada is an award-winning political, government and investigative reporter for KTTV Fox 11 in Los Angeles. He has won two Los Angeles area Emmy awards and a Golden Mike for his investigative reports for that station. Prior to joining Fox 11 in 1996, Schwada worked as a political and City Hall reporter for the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, winning LA Press Club awards for investigative stories. Schwada was previously honored by SPJ/LA as print journalist of the year in 1989. That same year, Schwada joined the Los Angeles Times, where he helped develop a weekly political column for the paper’s Valley edition and covered politics and City Hall. Before coming to Los Angeles, he worked for the Riverside Press-Enterprise, Arizona Republic, San Diego Union, San Francisco Bay Guardian and freelanced for The Economist. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of UC Berkeley, he earned bachelor degrees in history and journalism, as well as a master’s degree in American history.
Radio
Frank Stoltze covers politics and criminal justice for 89.3-KPCC, the National Public Radio affiliate in Los Angeles. He has won numerous awards for his reporting on gang violence, the LAPD and politics, including a Golden Mike for a documentary he co-produced on the recall of Gov. Gray Davis. Frank was named the LA Press Club’s “Radio Journalist of the Year” in 2005. He was a fellow at USC’s Annenberg Institute for Justice and Journalism, where he completed a five-part series on prisoner reentry in California. Frank was the News Director at KPFK-Pacifica Radio, and before that a reporter for KLON (KJZZ), where he covered the 1992 LA riots. His work has appeared on National Public Radio, the BBC, Latino USA and The California Report. Frank was born and raised in Santa Barbara and started his career at a 3600 watt FM in San Luis Obispo. He graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
Print (Circulation over 100,000)
Paul Pringle is a staff writer for the California section of the Los Angeles Times. He joined the newspaper in 2001 as city editor of the San Fernando Valley edition. He was previously the West Coast bureau chief for The Dallas Morning News, and Los Angeles bureau chief for Copley News Service. He began his journalism career at the old News Chronicle in Thousand Oaks. Pringle is a graduate of The Pennsylvania State University (M.A.), and California State University, Northridge (B.A.).
Print (Circulation under 100,000)
Terri Vermeulen Keith has spent just over two decades in journalism — the majority of the time as a wire service reporter. She covered both O.J. Simpson trials and a number of Academy Awards ceremonies during her seven years at United Press International. Since then, she has spent almost a decade as the criminal courts reporter for City News Service. Groups including the Los Angeles Press Club, California School Boards Association and Orange County Fair Best Reporter’s Contest have honored her work. She is a graduate of El Camino College in Torrance and Cal State Fullerton, and enjoys spending time at home in her off-hours with her husband and their 3-year-old son and dog.
Distinguished Work in New Media
Kevin Roderick started LA Observed in 2003 and is the Web site’s editor, publisher and main blogger, posting more than 10,000 entries and receiving more than 14 million hits.
Roderick’s experience in Los Angeles journalism spans three decades, including a Los Angeles Times stretch as City Hall reporter, education reporter, roving state correspondent, state desk editor and senior projects editor. He left the Times in 2000 to open the Los Angeles bureau of the late Industry Standard magazine. Kevin currently is a contributing writer for Los Angeles magazine and won a Golden Mike Award last year for his weekly commentaries on National Public Radio station KCRW 89.9 FM. His magazine pieces have run in Smithsonian, Los Angeles Times Magazine, Los Angeles Times Book Review, C, the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles and L.A. Architect. He is the author of two books on “Los Angeles, The San Fernando Valley: America’s Suburb” and “Wilshire Boulevard: Grand Concourse of Los Angeles”, an L.A. Times bestseller.
Lifetime Achievement Award
Born in Vietnam, Nick Ut joined the Associated Press in 1966 as a war photographer. While covering the invasion of Cambodia in 1970, Ut was wounded three times. On a rainy day on June 8, 1972, Ut photographed 9-year-old Kim Phuc running from a misdirected napalm bomb that dropped on her home. The girl suffered third-degree burns over 75 percent of her body. “After I took her picture, I didn’t want to see her die,” Ut said. He rushed her to a hospital. The photograph was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. It also won awards from the World Press Photo, Sigma Delta Chi, George Polk Memorial Award, Overseas Press Club and National Press Club. In 1993, Ut opened the AP bureau in Hanoi and moved AP’s first photograph out of the post-war office. Ut, who also worked in Tokyo, has been in the Los Angeles bureau off and on since 1977.
Freedom of Information Award
Thomas W. Newton is the general counsel and legislative advocate of the California Newspaper Publishers Association, a position he has held for more than 15 years. Newton has pursued legislation to comprehensively reform California’s open meeting and public records laws, and has drafted and influenced hundreds of legislative bills to enact or amend California laws. Newton is an editor of The Reporter’s Handbook on Media Law, the CNPA Legislative Bulletin and has collaborated on various publications and articles. He is a two-time winner of the James Madison Freedom of Information Award and a winner of the Bill Farr Freedom of Information Award.
James W. Ewert is CNPA’s legal counsel and legislative advocate. He advocates on behalf of CNPA before California’s Legislature on issues relating to freedom of information, media access, workplace relations, advertising, workers’ compensation and the environment. Ewert has been successful in getting legislation passed prohibiting the attachment or insertion of hate literature in newspapers, and another requiring candidates for state office to electronically file campaign finance information and to report that information online. He also has worked on student press law legislation, to protect college and university publications from censorship and to prohibit the theft of freely distributed newspapers. Ewert operates CNPA’s legal HelpLine, which provides general legal assistance to publishers and staff members at CNPA-member newspapers who are often confronted with a broad array of legal issues.
Question. John Schwada from FOX11 does not work alone. Will Dan Leighton and Pete Noyes also be honored? They produced all of Schwada’s sweeps and investigative reports and were important contributors to the very reports that helped John Schwada win this award. John Schwada the only journalist from KTTV being honored? That doesn’t seem right. Those reports were team efforts.