Editor Jondi Gumz won third place in headline category in the 2021 Best of the West journalism contest with “Nisene Marks: A park loved to death / Cars, cyclists and hikers on narrow road delay ambulance response.”
Judge Samantha Ruland, digital producer at Philadelphia Inquirer, wrote: “It was a thought-provoking headline that brought attention to an enormous problem in the community. The Aptos Times did a great job in a limited space of playing on a popular catch phrase.”
Jondi Gumz, Editor, Times Publishing Group, Inc.
The story was the first in a series exploring safety issues at Nisene Marks State Park, which had become a refuge for residents in the pandemic.
Alicia Inez Guzmán of Searchlight New Mexico, won first place with “You’ve reached 17,494 students. Please leave a message. / New Mexico paid millions to a Utah company to text, email and phone “disengaged” students. Was it the right call?”
Second place went to Dave Bowman of the Los Angels Times for the print headline: “Thin Mints on your phone? Enable those cookies / Covid rules prohibit in-person sales, so Girl Scouts go digital to reach customers.”
Ruland wrote, “All the entries were well thought out and impressive. They showed just how clever and experienced these writers and editors are, with minds wired for the artful craft that is headline writing. No longer are we writing for one audience. We have print to consider, web, social media. It takes great skill to make a headline that stands out on just one of those mediums and many of these contestants came up with headlines that did that on more than one if not all.”
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