The Tyee last night received two Canadian Online Publishing Awards, a gold for best online-only article or series of articles, and a silver for best news coverage.

The winning series, Growing the Local Bounty, written by Colleen Kimmett and Jeff Nield, with photos and video by Justin Langille, investigated challenges facing local food producers, highlighting solutions emerging in British Columbia and Ontario. The 17-story series was produced by the Tyee Solutions Society, which is a new model for funding and sharing first-rate solutions-focused journalism. Parts of the series were published as well by The Waterloo Region Record and Small Farmer magazine.

The silver in the articles category went to Neil MacDonald of CBC News for his report: Who killed Lebanon's Rafik Hariri. Other finalists in the category were The Tyee's Geoff Dembicki for his series The War over Oil Sands: Report from Washington D.C., and teams from CBC News: Special Report and the Vancouver Observer.

The Tyee's news coverage garnered a silver in a category crowded with Canada's top news organizations. The gold went to the CBC for its federal election coverage. Other finalists included The Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, The National Post, Cyberpresse (La Presse), Edmonton Journal and the Winnipeg Free Press.

The Tyee was also a finalist in the category of best online only site.

The Canadian Online Publishing Awards are produced by Masthead, which covers Canadian publishing industry news.

"Many, many thanks to Masthead and the judges," said Tyee editor David Beers. "All the finalists were strong and deserved honours. This is a gratifying affirmation of the commitment to excellence I see every day from my wonderful colleagues at The Tyee."

He added: "I think the fact that a small and scrappy organization like The Tyee is able to compete with the nation's best-resourced news organizations is a hopeful sign that there is room for more diversity and creativity in Canadian media. Let a thousand more online experiments bloom!"