The Better Government Association and its media partners have been nominated by the Chicago Headline Club for nine Peter Lisagor awards, long considered one of the highest honors in local journalism.
The BGA’s Lisagor nominations for 2015 include:
- Education. The BGA was nominated in the category of Best Multimedia Collaboration for the report, “Dropouts in Chicago: How the city both addressed them and ignored them.” Former BGA reporter Sarah Karp, who now works at WBEZ, was nominated with WBEZ’s Becky Vevea and Catalyst Chicago, an online education site.
Also in education, the BGA, the Chicago Sun-Times and Sarah Karp
were nominated in the category of Best Education Reporting for Daily Newspaper, News Service or Bureau, circulation more than 250,000 for the story, “Bureaucracy Balloons at City Colleges.”
- Police and crime investigations. The BGA/CBS2 were nominated in the Broadcast Television: Best News Specialty/Crime News category for the story, “State’s Attorney Has Had Video Evidence In Lynwood Police Brutality Case For Two Years.” Andrew Schroedter, BGA senior investigator, Robert Herguth, BGA director of investigations, CBS2 investigative reporter Pam Zekman and CBS2 investigative producer Dan Blom were nominated.
In the category for Specialty/Trade: Best In-depth Report or Series, BGA Senior Investigator Schroedter was nominated for his story: “Did Ex-Chicago Cop Frame Multiple Suspects?”
- Government investigations. In the category of Non-Daily: Best Political Reporting in Newspaper or Magazine, the BGA and Chicago Reader were nominated for the story, “The trials of Anita Alvarez.” Also nominated was BGA’s Herguth, Schroedter, Brett Chase, investigations editor, Katie Drews, investigator, and Patrick Rehkamp, formerly a BGA senior investigator and now a reporter with the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal. Also nominated is Mick Dumke, former Reader senior writer, who now writes for the Sun-Times.
- Environment/State Government. In the Broadcast Television: Best News Specialty/Environment News category, BGA and ABC7 Chicago were nominated for “State parks’ cash crunch: $720 million for repairs.” BGA’s Drews and ABC7 Chicago reporter Paul Meincke reported the story.
- Local Government. In the Broadcast Television: Best News Specialty/Politics/Government News category, the BGA staff and FOX 32 investigative reporter Dane Placko were nominated for “FOX 32/ BGA investigation finds problem with Brown re-election petitions.” The story uncovered questionable re-election petitions submitted in behalf of Cook County Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown.
- Commentary. In the Specialty/Trade: Best Commentary category, BGA CEO Andy Shaw was nominated for his “Shaw Thoughts,” a weekly column that runs in the Chicago Sun-Times and on the BGA web site, bettergov.org.
- Web/Online. In the Online: Best News Web Site category, the BGA’s bettergov.org was nominated.
The 39th annual Lisagor Awards presentation and dinner will be held Friday, May 6, 2016, at The Union League Club of Chicago.
