Post reporters win statewide awards for sports coverage, addiction treatment investigation
Two Palm Beach Post staff writers have won awards from the Florida Society of News Editors for sports reporting and for an investigative project about addiction treatment centers published in 2023.
Post columnist Tom D'Angelo won first place in the Sports category for stories that ranged from the thing Tiger Woods' son earned that his Dad never will to the fate of Mike Leach's bar stool in Key West:
KEY WEST ? Joey Faber, the owner of Capt. Tony's Saloon, one of the most famous landmarks in a town filled with them, knew it was time.
The mourning period for Mike Leach, the head coach at Mississippi State and one of Key West's most beloved figures, had entered its next phase. The bar stool bearing Leach's name had been removed from the stage. As had the memorial candle. And the symbolic drink preferred by Leach — grape vodka and water.
It was time to find a spot in the ceiling to hang that stool.
D'Angelo brought his readers into a not-so-happy halftime locker room at FAU head coach Tom Herman's debut, making a speech to rev up his 18- to 22-year-olds after a rough end to the first two quarters.
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D'Angelo has been covering sports for The Post since 1981.
He also is a member of the Palm Beach County Sports Hall of Fame, among the likes of Jack Nicklaus. Burt Reynolds and Chris Evert.
Investigative project on addiction treatment honored
Post reporter Antigone Barton won third place in the Community Service category for her investigation of the state agency that oversees addiction treatment centers, told through the experience of a couple placed in danger amid its nonexistent oversight.
Barton illustrated the Department of Children and Families' incompetence in regulating an industry notorious for fraud, negligence and abuse. Subsequently, vulnerable patients can end up on the streets and die when they slip back into substance abuse. Joseph Havrilla, whose story Barton told, did.
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Two state legislators, Sen. Gayle Harrell of Stuart and Rep. Mike Caruso of Delray Beach, both Republicans, introduced companion bills that included a provision addressing an issue uncovered in Barton's investigation. The bill would require DCF to display license applications, inspections, complaints, investigative reports and findings, and referrals to recovery residences prominently on its website.
DCF Secretary Shevaun Harris vowed to Harrell that her agency would do it. Displaying those documents not only gives families a chance to find a good treatment center for their loved ones but also hold the agency accountable, showing it was doing all the things that generate the documents.
Harrell said The Post's investigation provided impetus for the bill.
Holly Baltz is the investigations editor at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Post reporters honored by FSNE for sports, investigative stories
