WASHINGTON — WTOP won 12 Chesapeake Associated Press Broadcasters Association (CAPBA) Awards on Saturday at a banquet in Ocean City, Maryland.
The news organization on the whole won a pair of major awards: Outstanding News Operation and Best Website (WTOP.com).
The sports team won for Outstanding Year-Round Local Sports, and reporter Dick Uliano’s story on the soap box derby taking place near the Capitol Building on Constitution Avenue won for Outstanding Sports Feature.
The station also won the Outstanding Newscast award and the award for Outstanding Coverage of a Continuing Story for its coverage of last August’s protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, that left one woman dead.
“These awards are a testament to what an incredibly talented team we have here at WTOP,” said Mike McMearty, WTOP’s Director of News and Programming. “The diversity of recognition from digital innovation to investigative to breaking news illustrates the broad range of our staff’s talent.”
A number of the station’s reporters and writers won awards for individual stories, series or feature projects:
- Mark Lewis won for Outstanding Radio Only Talk Show for “Ask the Governor.”
December 22, 2017 | Ask the Governor (Mark Lewis) - Megan Cloherty won the award for Outstanding News Series for her reporting on robocalls.
April 25, 2024 | Best Reporter (Megan Cloherty) - Cloherty also won in the Best Reporter category and in Outstanding Enterprise Reporting for a series on how Maryland handled its investigation of serial child abuser Carlos Bell.
August 25, 2024 | Carlos Bell (Megan Cloherty) - Rachel Nania won in the Outstanding Documentary/In-Depth Reporting category for her five-part series on the child care crisis in the United States.
- Digital writer Jack Moore won for his story on Amy Carter, the daughter of President Jimmy Carter, attending Thaddeus Stevens School in Washington, D.C. after her father’s inauguration in 1977. No child of the president has attending a D.C. public school since.
Overall in 2018, WTOP has received over 32 major awards for excellence in journalism.
