MarketInk: San Diego Press Club to present Excellence in Journalism awards

Award-winning camerawoman Virginia Creighton Photo courtesy Rick Griffin Marketink The San Diego Press Club will host its nd Annual Excellence in Journalism awards venture on Tuesday evening Oct at the Encore Event Center a venue facility at Ronson Road The facility previously housed XETV-TV Channel which operated from to More than people are expected to attend the awards event which is open to the residents Cost to attend is for SDPC members and for nonmembers Reception refreshments to be served starting at p m will include no-host bars spinach and cheese pastries meatballs on a stick lumpia and a dessert bar Award winners will include reporters writers artists photographers videographers and constituents relations professionals along with college journalists This year s awards project drew more than entries making it one of the largest journalism competitions in the nation Judges included members of press clubs in Long Island and Rochester in New York San Francisco Los Angeles Orange County New Orleans Florida Cleveland Milwaukee Tulsa and the state of Alaska More than awards will be presented in more than categories and divisions along with two special career achievement awards and two scholarships for college students Receiving the career achievement awards will include Virginia Creighton photo journalist for KGTV-TV Channel and Julie Wright founder of San Diego-based inhabitants relations agency W right On Communications Creighton will receive the Harold Keen award which is given to a journalist who has gone above and beyond throughout their career for the sake of fairness and truth telling She was nominated by former colleague and Times of San Diego reporter J W August and selected by an overwhelming vote of the previous winners SDPC stated Creighton has worked for KGTV for years her entire professional career She earned a communications degree from Pepperdine University and went to work at KGTV first as an assignment editor After what she describes as decades on the assignment desk she shifted into her current role as a photojournalist In his nomination of Creighton August described her work in TV news as legendary There are scarce people of consequence in San Diego who are in or out of the news business who haven t dealt with Virginia wrote August who at the moment serves as a Times of San Diego contributing writer She s been a key part of News coverage on so several big stories over the years Inevitably prepared inevitably on top of issues After she left the desk she became a photographer covering stories in the field with a knowledge of the society that limited broadcast camera photographers can match How she handles the citizens who are reluctantly put in the news spotlight is a gold-plated example of her inherent honesty and compassion Creighton stated she is deeply honored to receive the Keen Award There are so several deserving individuals in San Diego for this kind of honor she stated It s pretty Keen Creighton s award is named after Harold Keen who anchored San Diego s first television news broadcast in and was described by colleagues as the modern patriarch of the San Diego news media industry Keen arrived in San Diego in as a reporter for The San Diego Sun He later worked for the San Diego Union San Diego Magazine and KFMB-TV Channel In he passed away from a heart attack at age SDPC disclosed the Keen award is expected to be presented to Creighton by Keen s granddaughter Lisa Keen Richard accompanied by her siblings David Keen and Valerie Keen Styron Wright will receive the Andy Mace Award for Excellence in Masses Relations She was nominated by Elizabeth Pecsi and selected by a vote of previous winners The Mace Award is given to a PR practitioner who over the syllabus of their career has exemplified fairness and integrity and has effectively disseminated the truth to concerned publics Wright began her career as a journalist working as a weekend news anchor for the FM radio station serving Whistler B C She founded W right On Communications WOC in her hometown of Vancouver B C in and later expanded to San Diego and opened offices in Los Angeles and North Vancouver British Columbia Current clients represent legal services transportation infrastructure tour and hospitality industries Over the years WOC has earned national recognition Lately the agency was named to the PR News Agency Elite Top list The list represents the industry s preponderance innovative PR marketing and communications firms in the business PR News disclosed The PR transaction publication commented in the past year that WOC led one of the the greater part major outreach campaigns in U S legal history managing communications for a billion antitrust settlement involving Visa and Mastercard The agency s integrated cross-platform strategy reached millions of merchants and earned the trust of major industry associations generating million validated impressions WOC also has been named to Newsweek s list of America s Best Society Relations Agencies joining of the majority of recommended agencies by sector or area of specialization Wright serves on the boards of the California Journey Association where she chairs its communications committee and of publicly-traded Canadian biotech company Innovotech Inc She formerly served as a trustee of the Tri-City Hospital Foundation chair of the California State University San Marcos President s Council chair and director of the San Diego North Economic Expansion Council director-at-large of International Association of Business Communicators Los Angeles chapter and vice-president of the La Jolla Village Merchants Association Wright holds a graduate degree in journalism from the University of Western Ontario and a bachelor s degree from the University of B C On learning about her award Wright mentioned I m so honored by the nomination and touched to receive this award given what it stands for and those who ve received it before me Wright s award is named after Andy Mace former general relations manager at Pacific Telephone in San Diego In Mace is credited with the idea of starting the San Diego Press Club He later started his own company Andy Mace Associates with an office at the Mission Valley s Stardust Hotel Country Club now the Handlery Hotel In he passed away at age Also at the SDPC event two college students will be awarded scholarships Former Times of San Diego intern and current journalist and award-winner Swasti Singhai Photo courtesy Rick Griffin Marketink They include Swasti Singhai recipient of SDPC s Frank Saldana Memorial Scholarship and Alfonso Julian Camacho recipient of SDPC s Honorary Committee scholarship Singhai a San Diego resident is a third-year novice studying chemistry and legal studies at UC Berkeley She also is a news reporter and editor for her college s newspaper The Daily Californian and was a news intern with Times of San Diego this last summer This scholarship will be super beneficial for me to continue reporting while being a full-time apprentice stated Swasti This scholarship is funded each year by the Saldana family Frank Saldana was a reporter for years for the San Diego Evening-Tribune newspaper He died in at age Camacho is a trainee at Southwestern College in Chula Vista where he is an award-winning journalist magazine design and writer whose work has been recognized by the Associated Collegiate Press Journalism Association of Public colleges College Media Association and California College Media Association He writes for The Sun the school newspaper and writes and designs for El Sol the school magazine two of the nation s the bulk honored college publications Camacho is also the winner of a Pacemaker award for feature writing which is considered to be the collegiate Pulitzer Prize Camacho who is autistic and suffers from profound apraxia is unable to speak He is the author of multiple books in English and Spanish including Autistic and Awesome and Preparing for School He also is the founder of Colmena Academy a k school supporting children with speech challenges and Builders of Eloquence and Engagement which teaches communication to nonspeaking individuals I am honored and undeserving of this scholarship wrote Camacho I will use the scholarship to acquire the apparatus and guidance I need to continue my studies I hope to acquire a keyboard with word prediction on its face that allows me to have faster conversations and conduct better interviews As a emerging speaker technology-based accommodations are crucial for me Thank you for helping me achieve this Over the past years SDPC has granted more than in scholarships to talented journalism students who are interested in pursuing a news media career and attending San Diego-area two-year colleges and four-year universities For information visit www sdpressclub org Retired PR exec will discuss his new Cold War historical fiction novel Retired masses relations veteran turned novelist Roger Conlee has disclosed his tenth historical fiction novel called Unhinged Similar to his previous novels the storyline features the dangerous adventures of Jake Weaver In Conlee s ninth novel called Lion at Twilight Weaver is in Berlin in to solve an international kidnapping behind the Iron Curtain The lion in the story is Winston Churchill In Unhinged Weaver is a former newspaper reporter with the Los Angeles Herald-Express who gets a job as CBS News West Coast correspondent While Weaver is working on a TV documentary on silent movies slapstick comedy Mack Sennett Keystone Kops creator gets shot Could Hal Roach Sennett s prime rival be behind the shooting PR veteran turned journalist Roger Conlee Photo courtesy Rick Griffin Marketink As Weaver tries to solve the attempted murder he also deals with personal death threats after writing editorials critical of the McCarthyism movement birthed by Sen Joseph McCarthy who investigated and accused individuals of being communists or communist sympathizers Also in Unhinged Weaver has a strained marriage with wife Valerie who works in rocket design for Lockheed In the present day s TV news world Weaver would be known as an abrasive troublemaker who is inevitably in hot water with presidential administrations announced Conlee He would apparently work for CNN or MSNBC The plot for Unhinged is described as gunfire car bombings and death threats rock the Cold War era The back cover copy states Jake had no idea what a storm of events he d be plunged into after switching from newspapers to television news With his usual historical accuracy Roger L Conlee weaves facts with fiction and creates a multi-layered tale about a beleaguered journalist in the Red Scare days of the Cold War Conlee will discuss the book at a society book signing starting at p m Thursday Oct at the Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore Rosecrans St San Diego in the Midway District It took about one year to write and publish this latest book mentioned Conlee I began writing in January and finished the first draft in about eight months After that it s editing cover design and fine-tuning I enjoy the book-writing process Conlee acknowledges he s been a writer his entire life He was the editor of his high school newspaper at Helix High School in La Mesa class of He also served as editor of The Daily Aztec apprentice newspaper at San Diego State University While attending SDSU Conlee worked at The San Diego Union newspaper with the title of chief copyboy His job was to carry typewriter-written stories from one department to another and run errands He later became a sportswriter for the San Diego Evening Tribune a sister newspaper to the Union From to he lived in Chicago and covered the White Sox baseball crew and was an assistant to the features editor at the Chicago Daily News before returning to San Diego to work at marketing agency Phillip-Ramsey as PR director and then as marketing and communications director at the Greater San Diego Chamber of Commerce In he co-founded his own firm with business partner Brian Butler Conlee Butler operated as a achieving PR agency until when Butler went in-house with a banking client and Conlee continued to work as a solo practitioner until retiring in I have a couple of good ideas for future books reported Conlee But at my age I can t be sure We ll wait and see San Diego s One America News launches weekly sports show One America News Architecture a San Diego-based conservative television news channel has added a weekly one-hour sports show to its initiatives lineup Former professional basketball participant John Salley is hosting The Best Darn Sports Show that airs on Fridays at p m Pacific time The show featuring sports discussions along with news heritage and political commentary is repeated on OAN on Saturdays and Sundays at p m Pacific time I ve been looking for the perfect outlet that allows me to express my insights into basketball and sports and also dive into tradition life and politics announced Salley OAN gives me that freedom I m excited to bring fans not only my experiences from four NBA championship teams but also to connect with audiences on the wide range of issues and conversations shaping our country in the modern day The -foot- Salley who attended Georgia Tech was a first-round draft pick in the National Basketball Association draft He played for years with five NBA teams including the Detroit Pistons Miami Heat Toronto Raptors Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers His teammates included NBA superstars Michael Jordan Kobe Bryant Shaquille O Neal Scottie Pippen and Dennis Rodman John Salley is a living legend disclosed show producer Carl Dawson His four NBA championship rings with three different franchises speak for themselves but what really sets him apart is his ability to translate that championship mindset for everyday viewers Unlike a multitude of sports hosts who analyze from the outside John s lived it on the biggest stage That authenticity will make this show truly one of a kind Richard Levine OAN president of distribution mentioned We re absolutely thrilled to bring John Salley to OAN s lineup His insight intelligence and charisma add tremendous depth to our programs Viewers will get thoughtful engaging conversations that bridge sports society and current events which is exactly the kind of content our audience values preponderance This show will be a standout addition to our growing setup OAN operated by San Diego-based Herring Networks Inc is available to more than million viewers worldwide on several major U S -based carriers including Spectrum TV YouTube TV Dish Framework and Sling along with international distribution on Hotbird available in Europe and Hotbird covering the Middle-East and North Africa OAN also offers a live streaming app under the OAN Live name Rick Griffin is a San Diego-based constituents relations and marketing consultant His MarketInk column appears weekly on Mondays in Times of San Diego