The Bulletin wins five awards in regional journalism contest

Published 10:47 am Friday, June 2, 2023

: Sled dogs are eager to pull the sled of local musher Jerry Scdoris during the Bachelor Butte Dog Derby at Wanoga Sno-park on March 5, 2022.

The Bulletin won five awards in the 2022 Northwest Excellence in Journalism contest.

Newsroom reporters and photographers won awards for covering the aftermath of a shooting and for a series that profiled people experiencing homelessness across Central Oregon.

Four of the awards were for first place, and the fifth was for second, according to results released Thursday by the Society of Professional Journalists, which represents journalists and media professionals nationwide.

The newsroom was judged alongside similar-sized newsrooms across Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Alaska and Montana.

Bulletin reporters Bryce Dole, Zack Demars, Anna Kaminski, Suzanne Roig and Gary A. Warner won a first place award for breaking news for coverage of a shooting at Safeway on Bend’s east side in August 2022. A gunman shot and killed two men while firing an AR-15-style rifle at innocent shoppers, and then turned a gun on himself as police arrived.

The newsroom reported from the grocery store parking lot within an hour of the shooting, and reporters spread out across Bend the next day. Reporters and photographers reported a half-dozen stories in less than 24 hours of the shooting, including details from police, witnesses, politicians and city officials.

Witnesses to Bend shooting describe chaos, fear

Bend reels from gun violence

Safeway worker tries to disarm gunman before being shot, killed in Bend grocery shooting

Community remembers shooting victims at Bend vigil

Bend shooting brings gun issues to forefront in election

Reporters Brenna Visser and Demars won a first place award for poverty and homelessness reporting for contributions to The Bulletin’s Faces of Homelessness series.

Over a year, it told the stories of more than 40 people experiencing homelessness across Central Oregon, from parents to students to veterans and more.

Faces of Homelessness

Bulletin photographer Dean Guernsey took home two first place awards, for feature photography and a photo essay in stories about dog sledding and a grieving mother who lost her two children in a fire. He also won a second place award for a photo essay for The Bulletin’s Faces of Homelessness series.