From Staff Reports

CANAAN VALLEY, W.Va. — The Intelligencer and Wheeling News-Register captured 11 awards Saturday during the 2017 West Virginia Press Association Better Newspapers Contest, held at Canaan Valley Resort.

The awards honored editorial and advertising work done in 2016. The newspapers compete in Division I with the state’s large dailies.

The newspapers earned two first-place awards, five second-place awards and four third-place awards.

First-place honors came for Best Newspaper Design for the Feb. 9, 2016 edition. That day’s newspaper carried stories and graphics from a police report on an incident that allegedly took place on an Ohio County Schools bus carrying the Wheeling Park High School basketball team on a return trip from Morgantown, where an alleged sexual assault took place, along with a timeline of the alleged events and the fact that neither the schools nor the prosecuting attorney planned to take any action.

The issue also touched on the controversy surrounding the hiring of a new school superintendent in Ohio County following the non-renewal of former Ohio County Schools’ Superintendent Dianna Vargo’s contract. The main headline that day read, “District in Turmoil.”

The second first-place award went to the classified advertising staff for best classified advertising theme page.

Second place came in the following categories:

– Best theme pages, retail advertising;

– Best house ad, Earth Day 2016;

– Best theme pages, classified, Father’s Day tributes;

– Best front page, Paul Campbell; and

– Best feature photograph, Scott McCloskey.

Third-place awards were in the following categories:

– Best process color ad, Stephanie Warren;

– Best governmental report, Alec Berry, Costly Field of Dreams;

– Best single issue, June 1, 2016, staff; and

– Best news columnist, Mike Myer.