The Peninsula Press Club is changing the name of its annual contest to the Greater Bay Area Journalism Awards Competition so that the title correctly reflects the geographic reach of the annual event.

The contest is open to journalists in an 11-county region, yet the previous title, with the word “peninsula,” suggested the competition was confined to the West Bay.

In previous years, the contest has received entries from Santa Rosa, Napa and Santa Cruz, but directors said they will reach out to more journalists in outlying areas this year in an attempt to broaden the competition.

The PPC board voted to change the name at its Dec. 17 meeting, where directors also:

• Set Friday, Feb. 27, 2004 as the deadline. Entries are to be mailed to delivered to Executive Director Darryl Compton’s residence at 4317 Camden Ave., San Mateo, 94403-5007.

• Set May 28, 2004 as the date of the awards banquet, although the location has not been finalized.

• Decided that photo entries this year can only be submitted on CDs. Other storage media was permitted in the past.

• Left the categories from last year’s contest untouched with one exception, the deletion of “best photo — non dailies.” That will leave the photographers with six categories in which they can compete, including spot news, general news, feature, sports action, sports feature and photo series or picture story.

• Agreed to send out the annual “call for entries” on post cards rather than 8.5×11 brochures to save money. The cards will direct competitors to the PPC’s Web site, where an application form and more information will be available in early January.

• Allowed a company that wishes to submit more than 25 entries on behalf of its employees to pay $30 per entry.

Like last year, the entry fee is $15 for members and $55 for non-members. Membership is $35. That means that even a journalist with one entry is better off getting a membership.