Telegram staff finalists for five Atlantic Journalism Awards
Saltwire’s editorial team at The Telegram has been named finalists in five 2023 Atlantic Journalism Awards categories and took home a gold in a sixth category.
Photographer Keith Gosse, a previous winner of multiple AJAS, adds another one to his shelf as he was acclaimed as the gold winner in the Photojournalism Feature category for his snap of a young girl gleefully enjoying a dousing of cold water on a rare hot June day at the Bowring Park splash pad in St. John’s.
Gosse’s images from a house fire on Lime Street on Oct. 31 also earned him a nomination in the Photojournalism News category.
2022 National Newspaper Award winner Juanita Mercer is in the running in the Commentary category for her piece “Province procrastinates on protected areas” from Feb. 27, 2023, an analysis piece based on her own reporting of the Newfoundland and Labrador’s government’s slow movement on protected areas over several years.
Justice reporter Tara Bradbury was selected as a finalist in Legal Affairs Reporting and Writing based on her June 13 piece “Justice for Dad,” which told the story of a St. John’s lawyer who made it her career goal to seek compensation for her father for abuse he suffered at the Whitbourne Training School youth correctional facility.
Tely newcomer Jenna Head, who has become an integral part of the news team in N.L. in a short time, is in line for the Jim Macneill New Journalist Award.
All three journalists, along with multiple newsroom peers, are also in contention for the Socal Justice Reporting and Writing honour for “Inside the walls of HMP,” an in-depth, intimate and visceral collection of stories exploring the deteriorating conditions at Her Majesty's Penitentiary, the Victorian-era jail still housing prisoners in St. John's.
The series has already earned The Telegram a nomination for the National Newspaper Awards' John Honderich Award for Project of the Year.
AJA winners will be announced during an awards show at the Nova Scotia Community College’s Ivany Campus in Dartmouth on May 4.