I hope you’ll pardon some boasting as I note that The Gazette today won the 2008 Sigma Delta Chi Award.
Our coverage of the floods of 2008 won the deadline reporting award for newspapers under 100,000 circulation.
This continues a terrific run of recognition for our outstanding staff, which has previously won awards for our flood coverage from the Inland Press Association, National Press Photographers Association, Iowa Newspaper Association and Iowa Associated Press Managing Editors (and maybe something that I forgot).
The Buttry Diary 
How many of the excellent journalists who covered the “Epic Surge” were swept out of the Gazette in the “Epic Purge” you had last month?
It’s interesting how you celebrate an award won because of the hard work of the people you sent packing.
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Knox Fan,
I credited those people for their outstanding work on the flood coverage in this blog the day we had to eliminate their jobs:
https://stevebuttry.wordpress.com/2009/02/24/a-reluctant-farewell-to-valued-colleagues/
Several of those who lost their jobs played key roles in our coverage and I am glad they have this award to add to their résumés. They deserve it. I wish the economic situation — of which the flood is a part — allowed us to keep all of them.
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