After a very busy year in news, broadcasters from the major local news stations all took home Southeast Emmy awards last weekend on topics including the death of John Lewis, the social justice protests and the 2020 election.
11Alive’s Cheryl Preheim was named best large-market anchor while the station’s Brendan Keefe won best investigative reporter and tied with Rafael Olavarria of Univision for best daily reporter. Keefe also took home the best specialty assignment reporter Emmy along with Valerie Burgos of Univision as well as five other Emmys. Keefe now has a whopping 113 Emmys over his lifetime.
Sports reporter Paul Byrd won best sports reporter for what was Fox Sports South and is now called Bally’s Sports South.
Ashley Thompson of CBS46 and Mario Guevara of MundoHispanico tied for best live reporter.
Steak Shapiro pocketed the best TV host Emmy for his work on “Atlanta Eats.”
Matt Pearl, who just departed 11Alive to join E.W. Scripps as a national correspondent, won three more Emmy awards for a total of 38 over 12 years at the station.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution won its third Emmy in five years for “The Imperfect Alibi,” a crime-based documentary based on Joshua Sharpe’s investigative work. Visual journalists Ryon Horne, Tyson Horne and Hyosub Shin and editor Sandra Brown produced it.
11Alive (WXIA_TV) won the most Emmys in total, a feat it has achieved for many years. This year, the NBC affiliate won 21, including two for tributes to the late John Lewis.
Georgia Public Broadcasting won nine, including six for Jaye Watson, a former 11Alive reporter. She hosts the GPB show “Your Fantastic Mind.”
CBS46 (WGCL-TV) took home eight, including best morning newscast and its coverage of the first night of Atlanta’s protests over the death of George Floyd while in custody of Minneapolis police.
Channel 2 Action News (WSB-TV) won six including best daytime/evening newscast and news excellence. Fox Sports South, now Bally Sports South, won six.
Fox 5 (WAGA-TV) won two.
Among the Hispanic news stations, Univision won 15 and Telemundo earned five.
The Southeast Emmy chapter covers Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina and Asheville, North Carolina.
Usually, the ceremony is held with hundreds of attendees at the Grand Hyatt in Buckhead. This year, some presenters were at the hotel but there were no partygoers. Darryl B. Cohen, an attorney and one of the organizers, said he expects the awards dinner will occur under normal circumstances in 2022 with cocktails, food and a post-awards party.
>>RELATED: Here is the entire list with the winners in bold.
