The Ark named nation's best small community weekly by National Newspaper Association

The Ark has been named the nation’s best small community weekly, winning first place for general excellence in the National Newspaper Association’s 2026 Better Newspaper Contest.

The paper won 19 awards for its 2025 coverage of the Tiburon Peninsula, including four first-place honors and a sweep of first, second and third place in the best local government reporting category. The general-excellence award, the contest’s top recognition for overall newspaper quality, placed The Ark first among nondaily papers with circulations under 3,000.

The Ark, with a circulation of about 2,300, finished second in the category last year. The paper previously won national general excellence in 2018 and 2019.

The awards were announced July 7. They add to the 21 California Journalism Awards The Ark won last month from the California News Publishers Association, bringing the paper’s total to 40 state and national honors for its 2025 work. The Ark also placed second for general excellence in the state contest, the top finish among print newspapers in its division.

Newspapers submitted 1,798 entries in the national contest from 93 papers in 32 states, and judges distributed 724 awards. The paper competed against other nondailies with circulations of 2,000-3,999 in most categories, unless otherwise noted.

Winners will be recognized Sept. 18 at the National Newspaper Association Foundation’s 140th annual convention in Detroit.

The Ark’s national awards included:

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

• Local government reporting: The Ark swept the category. Tiburon reporter Francisco Martinez won first place for his coverage of the fight over Tiburon Boulevard bike lanes. Belvedere reporter Tyler Callister and Executive Editor Kevin Hessel won second for their coverage of Belvedere’s decision to uphold a $300,000 fine over construction delays. Martinez won third for his reporting on the termination of a popular librarian, which also won second place for labor reporting in the state contest.

• Environmental story: Contributor Gretchen Lang won first place among all papers under 6,000 circulation for her article on coyotes swimming to Angel Island to establish new territory. Martinez earned honorable mention in the category for his story on stalled invasive-plant removal at a Tiburon marsh, where a threatened frog had halted the work and the overgrowth contributed to a rat infestation behind a condominium complex.

• Feature writing: Martinez won second place in four feature categories. He was honored for business feature for his story on the owners of the struggling Cinelounge theater converting it to a nonprofit, judged among nondaily papers under 6,000 circulation; for nonprofile feature for his story on a bartender’s daughter who unearthed the lost recipes of former Main Street tiki bar and restaurant Tiburon Tommie’s; for profile feature for his story on 90-year-old Tiburon ice skater Richard Dwyer, known as “Mr. Debonair”; and for sports feature, among all papers under 3,000 circulation, for his profile of Tiburon tennis player Amy Rennert. The Tiburon Tommie’s story also won fifth place for writing in the state contest.

• Breaking news: Hessel won third place among nondaily papers under 3,000 circulation for his coverage of a Russia earthquake that triggered a 19-hour tsunami advisory.

• Sports story: Martinez won third place for his article on Tiburon teen Audrey MacLean’s record-setting Dipsea Race victory.

• Special section: The Ark won second place among all papers under 3,000 circulation for its spring 2025 Home edition, produced by Assistant Editor Emily Lavin, with design by Hessel and articles and photography by Lavin and contributors Diane Lynch, Ann Mizel and Amelia Plumb.

• Family life section: The ArkBeat entertainment and calendar section won third place among all papers of any size. The section featured calendar by copy editor Diana Goodman and articles by Martinez and contributors Carol Benet, Diane Lynch and Diane Smith.

• Front-page design: Hessel won second place.

• Informational graphic: Hessel won second, third and honorable mention for, respectively, a graphic on cocktail recipes from Tiburon Tommie’s, a map of the Tiburon Boulevard bike lanes and a graphic on crime in Tiburon and Belvedere. The Tommie’s, bike-lane and crime graphics also won third, fourth and second place, respectively, in the state contest.

• Public notices: Leigh Pagan won first place for the Ark’s public notices section among papers of all sizes in the advertising contest.

The National Newspaper Association was founded in 1885 and is one of the largest newspaper associations in the country.