Nose for News, By Sarah Stultz

It’s a busy time of year for us here at the Tribune as we get ready to send our next issue of Albert Lea Magazine to print and complete our last sections this week for our upcoming Progress edition.

As I have written about previously, this year our theme for Progress is “Investing in the Community.” We have interviewed, photographed and written stories over the last few months about people, businesses and organizations who are investing in the community — either through financial means, through their own time or other means.

Last Friday, a committee — including Publisher Crystal Miller, myself and four other members of the community — met to determine the recipient of our first-ever Citizen of the Year Award.

We reviewed the nomination entries that had been turned in and then voted on the winner.

The winner will be unveiled in the Community section of Progress with a story and photos. This person will also receive a plaque of recognition.

We are excited for you all to see the winner of this award and encourage you to check out our Progress edition Feb. 24 to find out who won.

We hope to make this an annual award, so we encourage you to think throughout the year of people who deserve to be recognized. We will ask for nominations again next January.

The process of reading the nominations and selecting the winner reminded me of all the good happening in our community. Though we received 11 nominations, including a few for one person, many others could have also been nominated.

We hope this award not only recognizes someone who is doing great things in the community, but also inspires you to do the same in your own circles.

On a separate note, it has been kind of fun this last week to have the attention of the nation and the world on Minnesota thanks to the Super Bowl. Many things were planned to showcase why Minnesota is a great place to live — despite our somewhat unpleasant temperatures. It made me proud to be a Minnesotan.

We were proud to be able to send our sports writer Tyler Julson to the game Sunday. Tyler started as an intern for the Tribune last summer and was hired on as a full-time employee a few months later. Talk about a great experience for a new reporter! He wrote about his experience in our Monday edition.

On another game-related note, congratulations to Tribune reporter Sam Wilmes and Circulation Manager Melissa Goodwin for a tie in the newspaper’s Football Prognosticators. It has been a fun season to watch these two!

Sarah Stultz is the managing editor of the Tribune. Her column appears weekly.