Bottom Line Communications™

   The contest, sponsored by the Kansas City Press Club, honors journalists at newspapers and at radio and television stations in western Missouri and eastern Kansas. The KC Press Club is a chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. 
   Star reporter Christine Vendel was named "Journalist of the Year" for the second time (she also won it in 2009), and the Lee's Summit Journal won honors as the area's "Newspaper of the Year."
   Overall, the Star captured top honors in six categories.  (The newspaper only lists its own winners and not winners in other categories LINK).
   The Pitch, KC's alternative weekly which competed in the same major publication category as the Star, captured four gold awards. 
   Pitch winners included Carolyn Szczpanski (General Reporting), David Martin (News Column), Grace Suh (Entertainment) and Nadia Pflaum (Magazine Story).
    In the major TV category KCTV, the area's CBS affiliate, dominated the category by capturing five Gold awards with News Director Blaise Labbe named a winner in Newscast, Breaking News and Spot News. 
  The KCTV investigative team of Dana Wright, Ken Ullery and Chris Henoa captured two gold awards, including one for its famous "Wrongful Arrest" series of an elderly man wrongly accused of stealing at Walmarts.
   Jack (Miles) Ventimiglia of the Warrensburg Daily Star-Journal dominated in the print category of newspapers below 50,000 daily circulation by capturing eight Gold Awards. 
     Veteran Sun Newspaper Sports Editor Mark Dewar captured a Gold Award for a riveting story he did on a high school athlete who committed suicide.  The judges said the article was "A difficult story to write that was handled with care and compassion." 
    (LIST OF ALL WINNERS)