The Ark wins national excellence honors, sets record with 54 awards in 2024

First place, reader-generated campaign: In October 2024, Tiburon resident Linda Hill captured a photo of Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, which is visible once about every 80,000 years and came an estimated 44 million miles from Earth. Meanwhile, Tiburon resident Sam Stewart captured his image of the aurora borealis from Blackie’s Pasture.

The Ark has been named among the nation’s best community weeklies, winning 26 awards in the National Newspaper Association’s 2025 Better Newspapers Contest. The honors include second place for general excellence and first for breaking news, feature writing, photo essays and headline writing.

The Ark’s readers were also winners, awarded first and third places for published community submissions.

The paper, which has a circulation of about 2,500, was honored in the association’s contest for its coverage of the Tiburon Peninsula in 2024. The awards were announced July 8 in advance of the association’s 139th annual convention Oct. 9-10 in Minneapolis.

They add to the paper’s 28 honors in the California News Publishers Association’s annual California Journalism Awards, announced in May. In all, The Ark’s 2024 coverage won a record 54 state and national awards, surpassing the 48 it won for its 2023 coverage.

In the national contest, the paper competed against other nondailies with circulations of 2,000-3,999 copies in most categories, unless otherwise noted.

• General excellence: The Ark won second place among nondaily publications under 3,000 circulation, recognizing overall newspaper quality across content, design, photography and community service.

• Family life/living section: The ArkBeat entertainment and calendar section won first place among all community papers of any size. Editions included articles by contributors Carol Benet, Michele Caprario, Diane Smith and Robin Scott Wray, with calendar by Diana Goodman and design by Executive Editor Kevin Hessel.

• Reader-generated campaign: Ark readers won first place among all nondailies of any size for photo essay “Air shows over Tiburon” and third for Sports Shout, which highlights local athletic achievements and announcements. The photo package included an image of Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS by Tiburon resident Linda Hill and another of the aurora borealis over Blackie’s Pasture by Tiburon’s Sam Stewart.

• Breaking news; Communication in Crisis: Hessel and former Belvedere reporter Naomi Friedland won first place for breaking news among nondailies under 3,000 circulation and third for crisis coverage among all newspapers under 6,000 circulation. The article covered December’s tsunami warning, when local authorities remained largely quiet as they relied on AlertMarin to warn residents — even though only a third are signed up and, for those who are, the system suffered significant notification delays. The same article also won first place for breaking news in the California contest.

• Localized national story; business story: Tiburon reporter Francisco Martinez won first place for localized story and third for business story for his article examining how local businesses adapted to economic pressures during 2024.

Martinez also won second place for business story for his coverage of the controversial closure of The Candy Store on Main Street due to rising commercial rents.

• Feature story: Contributor Gretchen Lang won first place for her article examining the lives of people living on boats on the Richardson Bay and a required move to onshore housing.

• Photo essay: Contributing photographers Leo Leung and Ted McDonnell won first place among all papers under 3,000 circulation for images from a festive start-of-summer weekend that included Juneteenth, Friday Nights on Main, the Tiburon Classic Car Show, the Wooden Boat Show and Belvedere’s Concerts in the Park.

• Headline writing: The Ark won first place among all papers under 5,000 circulation for overall headline quality.

• Environmental story; localized national story: Lang won second place for environmental story among all papers under 6,000 circulation, plus honorable mention for localized story, for her article examining local responses to sea-level-rise projections.

• Education/literacy story: Martinez won second place for his article on Tiburon student Peter Dachtler, who graduated from Redwood High School and College of Marin in a three-week span. The story also won fourth place in the state contest.

• Front-page design: Hessel won second place, following a third in the California contest.

• Public-notice journalism: Hessel and Friedland won third place among all newspapers of any size for their coverage of Belvedere needing to rework its accessory-dwelling-unit incentive program after The Ark discovered the ordinance did not comply with state laws.

• Newspaper website: Website thearknewspaper.com, designed and maintained by Hessel, won third place among all community newspapers of any size.

• Reporting on local government: Martinez and Hessel won third place for their article on a group of Circle Drive apartment owners fighting to regain ownership of their shared pools, recreation area and laundry facilities after the county mistakenly sold it against “unpaid” tax bills that weren’t actually due. The article won fourth in the state contest.

• Informational graphic: Hessel won third place for a map illustrating the Circle Drive story. It won second in the state contest.

Third place, feature photo: Contributor Clara Lu won for her image of Richardson Bay anchor-out Arthur Bruce, seen on his 1963 Cheoy Lee Bermuda in March 2024.

• Feature photo: Contributor Clara Lu won third place for her photograph of Richardson Bay anchor-out Arthur Bruce that accompanied Lang’s winning anchor-outs feature story.

• Special section: The Ark’s year-in-review special edition won third place among all papers under 3,000 circulation.

• Sports feature story or series: Martinez won third place among all papers under 3,000 circulation for his article on Branson School teammates Mirabel Arlander and Katie Warrin of Belvedere facing each other in the Marin County Athletic League tennis championship.

• Community Service Award: Martinez and Friedland received an honorable mention among all papers of any size for their coverage of the Trust for Public Land’s $42.1 million fundraising effort to purchase the 110-acre Martha Co. property and transfer it to Marin County. It won fourth place for public-service journalism in the California contest.

• Best review: Contributor Michele Caprario received an honorable mention among all papers of any size for her review of Novato Theater Co.’s “Nunsense.”

In the advertising categories, competing against all papers under 5,000 circulation, Assistant Editor Emily Lavin and Publisher & Business Director Henriette Corn won first place for multiple-advertiser section the spring Home edition.

The National Newspaper Association was founded in 1885 and represents more than 2,000 community newspapers across the U.S. and Canada, making it the largest newspaper association in North America.

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