The Lens, a two-time winner of the Knight Community Information Challenge, won big at this year’s local Excellence in Journalism Awards. 

The site, supported by the Greater New Orleans Foundation, received three first-place awards, including Best Local News Website. Nola.com, the site of the local Times-Picayune newspaper, came in second. 

The Lens also received first place for Best Investigative Story in Print as well as third place in this category and first for Best News Affiliated Blog in the annual contest, sponsored by the Press Club of New Orleans.

The awards came at the start of a busy week for the news media scene in New Orleans, which learned recently that its daily newspaper would publish only three days a week, starting in the fall.

The week ended with the announcement of formation of a new nonprofit news organization, NewOrleansReporter.org, a collaboration of NPR, the University of New Orleans.

Steve Beatty, managing editor of The Lens, said his organization will contribute content to the new site and will explore additional collaborations.

By Michele McLellan, Knight Community Information Circuit Rider