Union Leader Wins 12 Awards

The New Hampshire Union Leader received twelve awards, including four for first place, at the New England Better Newspaper Competition.

Mark Hayward, Doug Alden and Ryan Lessard received a first-place award in the Right-to-Know category for a series of stories about efforts by the New Hampshire American Civil Liberties Union and the Union Leader to gain access to documents associated with an audit of the Salem Police Department.

Dave Lane won a first-place award in the News Feature Photo category for a photo of a 99-year-old Manchester woman celebrating her birthday at a nursing home as her family greeted her outside through a window.

Tom Lynch won a first-place award for best Front Page design for a Sunday News cover that included a feature about the impact of the coronavirus quarantine on alcohol consumption.

Josie Albertson-Grove won first place in the Racial or Ethnic Coverage category for a story about the struggle of immigrants to obtain information about COVID-19. She also won a second-place award for Human Interest Feature Story.

Michael Cousineau earned second-place awards in the Business/Economic Reporting and the Best Solutions Journalism Project categories for a selection of stories from What’s Working, an ongoing investigation about workforce problems and solutions in the Granite State.

Shawne K. Wickham earned second-place awards in the Best Coverage of Coronavirus and History Reporting categories.

Mark Hayward won third-place awards for Serious Columnist and Reporting on Religious Issues.

Mike Cote, Jonathan Phelps and Dave Lane won a third-place award for best Business Page or Section.

"We're proud of the Union Leader's showing in the NENPA awards because it represents excellence in reporting, photography, page design and commitment to the First Amendment by a hard-working group of veteran journalists," Senior Editor Mike Cote said. "Competing regionally with other newspapers also forces us to reflect not just on what we accomplished but also where we fell short. How can we best serve our readers? They are the ultimate judges of whether we are doing a good job."