Awards are always sweet, especially national awards won competing with fellow professionals.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and the Los Angeles Police Department recently took top honors for their street safety strategy programs from the National Law Enforcement Challenge.

The Sheriff's Department won first in its category, for counties with more than 1,000 deputies, beating out San Diego, and the Police Department tied for first with San Francisco for municipalities with more than 1,250 officers.

The competition for safer street strategies is sponsored by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Association of Chiefs of Police. More than 530 agencies competed.

Among the rush of badness in the news, it's nice to see our side getting recognized for doing something right.