The Daily Herald has won 11 awards in the 2020 Peter Lisagor award competition, sponsored by the Chicago Headline Club.
In lieu of its annual banquet, the Headline Club on Friday announced the winners virtually.
“It’s so gratifying when other media professionals deem our staff’s work worthy of accolades,” said Managing Editor Jim Baumann. “But while awards are nice, it’s doing good for the community and our readers that’s paramount.”
The competition featured a variety of media outlets. The Daily Herald competed in the daily newspaper category for publications with fewer than 100,000 subscribers.
Here are our winners:
• Best Political and Government Reporting: Lauren Rohr and Katlyn Smith for ongoing coverage of Election 2020: Voting by mail.
• Best Investigative Reporting: Jake Griffin, “Religious institutions got $166M in PPP loans.
• Best Education Reporting, Madhu Krishnamurthy, “Pandemic decisions for schools, parents.”
• Best Science, Health, Technology or Environment Reporting: Daily Herald Staff, Covering COVID-19 in the suburbs.
• Best News Column or Commentary: Burt Constable, Suburban stories.
• Best Editorial Writing: Diane Dungey.
• Best Business or Consumer Reporting: Rick West, “Tiny office demand surges.”
• Best Arts Reporting and Criticism: Barbara Vitello, “The making of a musical.”
• Best Sports Commentary: Barry Rozner, “Marc Silverman collects the biggest win of his life”; “We’ll not see the likes of Theo Epstein again”; “The story behind Len Kaspers’ bold decision.”
• Best News Photo: Brian Hill, “Centenarian’s COVID birthday.”
• Best Sports Photo: Mark Welsh, “Championship hug.”
Barbara Vitello 
Barry Rozner 
Brian Hill 
Burt Constable 
Diane Dungey 
Jake Griffin 
Katlyn Smith 
Lauren Rohr 
Madhu Krishnamurthy 
Mark Welsh 
Rick West