NNA noms? Nil

Nominations for the 2006 National Newspaper Awards have been posted and the long, embarrassing dry spell for the Toronto Sun and its Sun Media sister newspapers continues.

In all, 60 finalists from 20 news organizations have been nominated for 2006, but the Toronto Sun, Ottawa Sun, Calgary Sun and Edmonton Sun are once again non-contenders.

The coveted national awards, open to all Canadian newspapers, have not been won by Toronto Sun staffers since 1995. (See our earlier awards posting.from Dec. 28.)

There have been a few Toronto Sun nominations since 1995, including nominations in 2004 for Mark Bonokoski in the columnist category, a first for the Toronto Sun in that category, and Ernest Doroszuk for photography, but no wins.

The absence of NNA wins for the Toronto Sun since 1995 is a clear indication that Doug Creighton's ouster in November of 1992 was the day the music died for the once proud tabloid.

It also reflects the sagging morale at the shrinking Toronto Sun and Quebecor's preoccupation with the bottom line rather than producing a quality product with adequate staff.

It is difficult to still think of the Toronto Sun as a competitive major Toronto daily newspaper in viewing the full list of 2006 nominees.

The NNA web site says: "The Globe and Mail leads all newspapers in Canada with 13 finalists in the 58th National Newspaper Awards competition.

The Toronto Star and Montreal’s La Presse have seven nominations each, followed by the Ottawa Citizen with four.

The Canadian Press and Edmonton Journal have three each.

The Hamilton Spectator, National Post, Vancouver Sun, Kingston Whig-Standard, Reuters, Montreal Gazette, The Record of Waterloo Region, Winnipeg Free Press and Le Journal de Montreal have two nominations each.

Valley Today of Windsor, N.S., Guelph Mercury, The Windsor Star, Victoria Times Colonist, and Saskatoon StarPhoenix have one each.

The 60 finalists in the 20 categories were announced March 9 from the National Newspaper Awards office in Toronto. There were 1,380 entries in this year’s competition for works that appeared in the year 2006, the third highest in NNA history.

The winners will be announced at a gala awards ceremony in Winnipeg on Friday, May 11. Winners will receive cheques for $1,500 and a certificate of award. Runners-up receive citations of merit and cash awards of $250 each."