By Miriam Raftery

July 24, 2016 (San Diego’s East County ) – East County Magazine received five awards in the Society of Professional Journalists San Diego Pro Chapter’s 2016 Journalism Awards Contest.  Journalists honored include ECM editor Miriam Raftery, reporters Mike Allen and Janis Russell, and sound editors Ed Barrena and Leon Thompson.

Honors include the special First Amendment Award and a $100 prize for our series on county efforts to suppress free speech and first place in the multicultural category for our story on local Chaldeans’ efforts to obtain release of Iraqi Christians in an Otay immigration detention facility, including both written reporting for our website and audio coverage that ran on our radio show on KNSJ.

By Janis Russell

April 30, 2014 (Spring Valley)- Royal Family Kids Camp provides a  network of camps and mentor clubs for children of abuse, abandonment, and neglect. The vision is that “every foster child, ages 6-12, experiences a life-changing camp, club and mentor.” The mission is to “create life- changing moments for children of abuse.” The purpose is to “mobilize the faith community to confront child abuse.”