San José Spotlight wins 4 first place state journalism awards

San José Spotlight brought home seven California Journalism Awards in the annual contest sponsored by the California News Publishers Association, including four first-place wins.

The yearly competition showcases the best print and digital reporting and photography statewide. News organizations compete in divisions based on size and circulation and, for the first time, the awards combined the print and digital publication honors rather than separating them into different competitions. San José Spotlight competed in a division for publications with a circulation of 200,000 to 299,000 unique monthly visitors.

“This recognition is an important reminder of the power of local journalism and its ability to shed light on the inner workings of government, hold power to account and uplift marginalized voices,” Ramona Giwargis, co-founder and CEO of San José Spotlight, said. “I’m incredibly proud of our remarkable team and we’ll continue working hard to serve San Jose.”

San José Spotlight received first place in the category for In-Depth coverage for a San Jose police union office manager hit with drug smuggling charges and for Coverage of Local Government on the potential for and resolution of a San Jose city employee strike. The news outlet earned first place for Coverage of Business and the Economy with its local-centric coverage of the Silicon Valley Bank collapse and what it meant for everyday business owners, which competition judges said pointed to this newsroom’s admirable job of “keeping up with the breaking news, pushing hard for answers, examining a number of angles and holding key leaders and their egregious business tactics accountable.”

The newsroom also won first place in the category of Public Service Journalism in its continued fight to gain transparency from former San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo, who is now running for Congress. Last year, a Santa Clara County Superior Court judge ruled Liccardo and the city violated a state transparency law after they failed to adequately prove they searched his private email and texts for public records following this organization’s lawsuit. That lawsuit led to the introduction of legislation in the state senate that aimed to require public officials to forward communications on personal accounts and devices that deal with public business to an official channel.

Competition judges called the work a “masterful example of public service that has made the residents of California better off because of it.”

“This news organization and its staff exemplify journalistic courage and commitment to transparency,” the judges added.

San José Spotlight earned three additional awards for coverage including second place for breaking news on Congresswoman Anna Eshoo’s retirement; third place for homelessness reporting intimately detailing the struggles of the thousands of unhoused older adults in the county; and fourth place for enterprise reporting that explored the “political assassination” of Santa Clara Councilmember Anthony Becker.

Our news is for everyone.

That means it needs to be free! We don’t put our news behind a paywall. Your tax-deductible donation is critical to our mission of keeping you informed.

“In a country where local news outlets are disappearing, stories about local government, business and community inequality are more important than ever,” Moryt Milo, an editor at San José Spotlight, said. “Our dedicated, nimble team of reporters work hard to keep residents throughout our local coverage area constantly in the know. They are an incredible team.”

This year’s California Journalism Awards received 2,964 entries from print and digital publications.

Readers like you make this news organization’s award-winning work possible. To help us continue our public service journalism, please consider becoming a member today.

Contact Annalise Freimarck at [email protected] or follow @annalise_ellen on X, formerly known as Twitter.