NWPPA Announces 28th Annual Excellence in Communication Winners

(October 20) The Excellence in Communication contest, which recognizes the top communication efforts from Northwest Public Power Association member utilities and associations, turned 28 years old this year and celebrated another spectacular year at the Northwest Innovations in Communications (NIC) Conference awards banquet at The Benson Hotel in Portland, Oregon, on October 13. 

“A tremendous thank you to the 46 utilities who submitted a record-breaking number of entries this year,” said 2021 NIC Chair Theresa Phillips from Lassen Municipal Utility District. “Members crushed the old record of 257 with 304 entries this year! Congratulations to everyone!” 

Categories are broken up into four groups: Group A utilities having the smallest number of customers and Group D having the largest. Nine local marketing and communication professionals volunteered their time to judge the entries. A complete list of the first-, second-, and third-place winners can be found at the end of this release. 

In addition to the Excellence in Communication awards, NWPPA presented the 2021 Tom Hougan Award for the best overall communication effort to Grant County PUD (Ephrata, Wash.). With an average score of 43.6 out of 50 points, which included six first-place awards and one second-place award, this is Grant’s first time winning the award. Public Affairs Officer Christine Pratt was on hand to accept the award on behalf of the PUD. 

The People’s Choice Awards in photography were also announced at the banquet. Earlier at Monday night’s opening reception, attendees voted on their favorite photo in each of three categories. Heber Light & Power (Utah) won Best Photo of a Child, Columbia REA (Wash.) won Best Photo of an Employee, and Chelan County PUD (Wash.) won Best Photo of Miscellaneous. 

See the attached press release for full list of winners

2021 EIC