SPJ NORCAL HONORS 2021 EXCELLENCE IN JOURNALISM AWARD WINNERS

SAN FRANCISCO (US)— The Society of Professional Journalists, Northern California chapter, honors Alexandria Bordas as Journalist of the Year for her work at the San Francisco Chronicle, for the 36th Annual Excellence in Journalism Awards.

Bordas is being honored for her dogged and relentless pursuit of truth and justice by telling the stories of numerous women who say they were sexually assaulted by the then-mayor of Windsor, a small town in the heart of Wine Country. Bordas connected with the women, who trusted her to expose the abuse of power and injustice. She pitched the story to the San Francisco Chronicle, where she now works as an investigative reporter, and where her continued reporting on this issue led to the resignation of the mayor and an ongoing criminal investigation.

Bordas’s work serves as a reminder of journalists’ responsibility to shed light on wrongdoing and hold power to account.

The SPJ NorCal board honors William Gee Wong with the Career Achievement Award in the print category. Wong began his 40-plus-year career at the San Francisco Chronicle, then moved to the Wall Street Journal and finally the Oakland Tribune. Born and raised in Oakland Chinatown, Wong became one of the few Asian Americans on any newspaper masthead when he was made assistant managing editor of the Tribune. Ultimately, he found his metier as a columnist at the Tribune and commentator with outlets as disparate as AsianWeek and “NewsHour With Jim Lehrer.” The Asian American Journalists Association came about, in part, because its co-founder had been inspired by Wong’s short-lived attempt to unite journalists via a group he started in the 1970s, Asians in Mass Media. He is author of “Yellow Journalist: Dispatches From Asian America, Images of America: Oakland Chinatown and Images of America: Angel Island.”

The board honors Wayne Freedman with the Career Achievement Award in broadcast for his four decades of award-winning reporting in Northern California. Freedman became a fixture of the Bay Area airwaves during his 30-year career at ABC-7 News in San Francisco, where he was known for his masterful writing and his own brand of visual storytelling. His unique approach has been honored with more than 50 Emmy Awards. Freedman also authored the book “It Takes More Than Good Looks to Succeed at Television News Reporting” and has taught journalism seminars across the country. Freedman retired in 2021 but remains active with the National Academy of Television Arts and Science.

The board honors Cristina Azocar and Lourdes Cárdenas with the Distinguished Service to Journalism Award. The pair created a Bilingual Spanish Journalism degree at San Francisco State University — the first public university in the country to offer such a credential — that will equip coming generations of journalists to better cover Spanish-speaking communities. Azocar, a professor in the university’s journalism department, researches race and journalism and served as president of the Native American Journalists Association. Cárdenas is an assistant professor in the journalism department and has worked as a journalist in U.S. and Mexican media for more than 25 years.

NBC Bay Area News Operations Manager Kenneth Lopes is being honored with the Unsung Hero Award for his crucial behind-the-scenes work keeping reporters safe and on the air during the pandemic. Lopes overcame the station’s work-from-home logistical challenges, equipping reporters and anchors so they could report from in-home news studios. Lopes also helped protect his colleagues, sourcing PPE for field crews and in-house staff, and taking measures to address the recent wave of armed robberies targeting broadcast and photojournalists.

The Silver Heart is awarded to Paula Lehman-Ewing for her extraordinary dedication to amplifying the unheard voices of formerly and currently incarcerated people. She was given the task of revitalizing a defunct publication that now supports the voices and includes the leadership of formerly incarcerated people in the movement to restore the human and civil rights of people impacted by the prison-industrial complex. The All Of Us Or None newspaper is now sent into every prison in California and more than 160 prison yards all over the country.

The John Gothberg Award for Meritorious Service to SPJ NorCal goes to Rahsaan Thomas for his work leading the San Quentin SPJ Satellite Chapter during the pandemic, working to keep information and news coming out of the prison while it was locked down and being ravaged by the virus. Thomas also continued his own journalism from the inside as a writer, host of the Ear Hustle podcast, and documentary filmmaker. His infectious personality and passion also help draw men newly arriving at San Quentin into journalism. Even as the pandemic rages, the San Quentin media center still buzzes with creative energy, thanks, in large part, to Thomas and his colleagues.

The 2021 winners will be honored at SPJ NorCal’s 36th Excellence in Journalism Awards Ceremony, to be held virtually on Thursday, Feb. 17