Middletown Patch: 2nd-Place SPJ Award

Editor's note: The full list of winners will by posted on the Connecticut SPJ website by 11 p.m.

The Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists gave out its annual Excellence in Journalism awards Thursday at Fantasia in North Haven.

Middletown Patch was nominated for two awards for online, independent reporting for a feature () and an investigative story (). The latter won second-place.

The CTSPJ inducts new members into the Hall of Fame, presents scholarships to journalism students and honors supporters of Freedom of Information. This year's Helen Loy Freedom of Information winner is political blogger Jonathan Pelto. Former New Haven Register photographers, the late Edward Cotter Jr. and the late John Mongillo Jr., were inducted into the Journalism Hall of Fame.

Special guest speaker, Edgar-winning author Leonard Levitt spoke about the art of hard-core investigative journalism in this era when traditional newsrooms are brutally understaffed and digital start-ups are struggling to build their identity.

Levitt writes the “NYPD Confidential” blog that regularly breaks national news about the hidden workings of the country’s biggest police force.

Here are excerpts from Middletown Patch's original features:

Dec. 6, 2011

If you have driven by the rambling Ridge Road colonial across from Farm Hill School, you’ve seen the ever-changing trio of chalkboard-like block-lettered signs staked in the grass with messages like: “GOP cares about jobs. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha. 99%” and “Occupy Wall Street Good. GOP Reaction Bad.”

Who, you wonder, would litter their yard with protest signs?

These pithy front-yard slogans are the work of the owner, David P. Schulz, who’s a successful artist by profession — and occasional political pundit.

Most of the time, Schulz is an award-winning painter with a background in illustration and graphic design. He is equally adept at portraits and the human body as landscapes, still-life and what he calls “the other me” — colorfully abstract oil paintings in which horizontal, vertical and sometimes diagonal grids of earth tones appear as watercolors.

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Nov. 3, 2011

Five days without heat, electricity and hot water has strained the patience of two women — mother and daughter — who live at the 96-unit, two-building Fernwood Apartments off Washington Street.

Thursday at 4 p.m., Donna Duda, Sarah L. Duda's 62-year-old mother, was beside herself with anger. She spoke quickly, after saying her phone battery was dying.

“We’re in dire straits here. I've got no heat, no hot water, no food, running out of clothes. Washington Street is lit up like the Vegas strip. Monday, we went to the shelter for showers, there were 300 people there. [While waiting, personnel] said we could sit on the floor. If it’s that bad, call out the National Guard.”

At 3 p.m., her hallway was pitch black. Donna and the two kids were using a flashlight to make their way to the door.

At 2 p.m. Thursday, 6,135 — or 27 percent — of Connecticut Light & Power customers in Middletown were without power. Statewide Thursday evening, there were nearly 400,000 customers still without power since the freak snowstorm that hit the region Saturday and Sunday.

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Highlights of Connecticut Patch winners:

• Jason Bagley Stratford Patch first place online editorial.
• Jessie Sawyer Avon Patch first place online general column and first place in video storytelling, third place arts and entertainment.
• Naugatuck Patch third place in video storytelling.
• West Hartford Patch first place feature
• Branford Patch first place feature
• Windsor Locks Patch first place photo
• North Branford Patch first place feature reporting
• Montville Patch second place features
• Tolland Patch second place

Here is the full list of SPJ finalists.