August 2002
2002 SPJ National Convention
Staking New Frontiers
CBS News sent 20-year broadcast veteran Joyce King to cover the dragging death trials, and by the third trial she realized that small-town Jasper had changed in ways incomprehensible to outsiders. To find that part of the story, she quit her job and moved there while her journalist husband and two sons kept the Dallas household running. "Without the courage to look closely at these past horrors," she says, "we can forget about closure and healing." Random House published her book, "Hate Crime: The Story of a Dragging in Jasper, Texas." And she's just one presenter at the convention.
spjfw.org/convention/resources1.html
=================================================
MEETINGS
Next at IABC/Fort Worth ...
Getting Your Story in Print and on the Air
A panel of local in-the-trenches newspeople -- Terese Arena, assignments editor, KRLD-1080 AM; Clint Bond, assignments editor, KXAS-TV, NBC 5; and Richard Connor, editor and publisher, Fort Worth Business Press -- will discuss at the August meeting how a company can improve its press coverage.
* Time, date: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 13
* Place: Petroleum Club, Carter-Burgess Plaza, 777 Main St., 39th floor
* Parking: $2.50 in parking garage at Seventh and Commerce streets (get ticket validated)
* Cost: $17 members, $22 nonmembers, $12 students
* RSVP by noon Aug. 9: Dan Frost at (817) 735-6157 or frostdg@c-b.com
-----
Next at Greater Fort Worth PRSA ...
'Webifying' Your Story: How to Communicate Online
Getting an organization's message across online can be a daunting task. Where's the hook? Why should anyone care? Mick McCormack has the answers and at the next PRSA luncheon will define and detail stories for distribution on the Web, with emphasis on how to give them that precise online snap.
A veteran marketing strategist, McCormack specializes in corporate messaging and has consulted with some of the biggest names in business, including HarperCollins Publishing, American Airlines and 7-Eleven. He is vice president of Big Bad Wolf Creative Group and heads the company's e-learning wing, BBWeG, where he works with large and small Web operations and Web portal e-commerce sites.
* Time & date: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 14
* Place: Petroleum Club, Carter-Burgess Plaza, 777 Main St., 39th floor
* Parking: $2.50 in parking garage at Seventh and Commerce streets (get ticket validated)
* Cost: $20 members, $23 nonmembers, $18 students
* RSVP by noon Aug. 12: Lisa Albert at lalbert@ymcafw.org
-----
Next at Fort Worth SPJ ...
No meeting in August.
No meeting in August.
=================================================
Meaningful Information Exchange
Propels SPJ National Convention
Fort Worth SPJ members can rub shoulders with some of America's best and brightest journalists Sept. 12-14 at the 2002 SPJ National Convention. While participants arriving from across the country will face long airport security lines and transportation and lodging costs, all the locals have to do is register and hit Billy Bob's Texas for the opening-night reception, then the Renaissance Worthington Hotel for three full, action-packed days.
Journalists at all levels will find subjects of compelling interest in the 35 break-out sessions planned from Thursday through Saturday afternoon. Award-winning reporters and editors will share pointers for refining math skills, learning how and when to engage financial analysts, developing defenses against those who would manipulate the news, evaluating sources, finding stories in census data, covering terrorist threats to the earth, the oceans and the sky, and establishing rapport without losing control of interviews.
Author Vanessa Leggett will discuss her 168 days in jail, protecting notes from prying prosecutors. Wall Street Journal managing editor Paul Steiger will talk about editing a newspaper at Ground Zero. The Pew Center's Jan Shaffer will review a decade of civic journalism. Bob Schieffer of CBS's "Face the Nation" will be roasted to a fine Texas tan at the Legal Defense Fund luncheon.
Three physicians involved in biodefense will provide insight to challenges facing the country and offer suggestions for media involvement in covering attacks. Another medical panel will offer ways for journalists to recognize stress in their own lives before major health problems develop or personal relationships collapse.
"We have to learn how to suppress our emotions when probing for information in trauma situations without losing our own humanity," moderator Carolyn Poirot said. "The psychologist on this panel has helped a number of journalists recover from alcoholism, disassociation and burnout, and the psychiatrists have current research on the impact of stress on our physical and mental health."
One session will discuss the ethics of reporting on violent crimes and major disasters, while another will look at children abused in their homes before they can be rescued. Journalists will explain how they determine when news coverage is justified and appropriate.
Attorneys, journalists and government officials will address conflicts involving military security and FOI issues in five sessions, including "Journalists' Guide for Covering the War," with two reporters and a photographer comparing experiences with a Pentagon strategist in a candid exchange about the role of the press in wartime. Weapons will be checked at the door.
"It's generally agreed that the 'war on terrorism' is the most tightly controlled in terms of information and media coverage in American history," noted Ian Marquand, chairman of the SPJ Freedom of Information Committee. "Journalists who travel the war zone outside of U.S. military protection face danger and death. Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., the shadow of a revived Official Secrets Act looms in Congress." Added author and journalist Peter Y. Sussman: "When the nation goes to war, the press does, too." Sussman will conduct a Saturday-morning workshop on military issues related to the SPJ Code of Ethics.
More at spjfw.org/convention/resources1.html.
=================================================
STRAIGHT STUFF
News pros from the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Cox Newspapers and the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education -- addressing everything from narrative storytelling on a deadline, to pushing your writing beyond predictable prose, to transforming a beat story into an investigative series, to the nuts and bolts of covering political races -- will drive the Asian American Journalists Association's national convention Aug. 7-10 at The Fairmont in Dallas. Info at aaja.org/html/convention_html/convention.html. ... Postmark deadline has been moved up two weeks this year to Aug. 15 for the Stephen Philbin Awards, a Dallas Bar Association recognition honoring excellence in legal reporting. The presentation luncheon will be at 11:30 a.m. Oct. 25 at the Belo Mansion, 2101 Ross Ave. Go to www.dallasbar.org/philbin, or call DBA communications director Sue Cady at (214) 220-7477. ...
Dallas Area Rapid Transit's network of light rail and commuter rail lines, plus a fleet of nearly 1,000 buses, moves more than 200,000 passengers per day across a 700-square-mile area in 12 adjoining cities. From extending light rail, to new bus routes, to emission control, DART marketing VP Sue Bauman covers it all in a day's work, and she'll tell how at the Dallas PRSA meeting Thursday, Aug. 8, at the Park City Club, 5956 Sherry Lane. Registration begins at 11:30 a.m. Cost is $25 for members with reservations, $30 for guests and members without reservations. Register at prsadallas.org/lunregistration.html or call (817) 858-6088 by 5 p.m. Aug. 5. Identify if you are a member when making reservations. No-shows will be billed. Seating is first come, first served.
SPJ national update: 2 wins in higher education, one of them just up the road ... The Wichita Falls Times Record News won its suit against the Midwestern State University regents for holding a closed-door meeting June 11 in which they fired school President Henry Moon. Editor Carroll Wilson said the process was the issue, not the action taken; he called the four-hour meeting a flagrant violation of the open meetings law. The lawsuit asked that the regents' actions following the executive session be overturned. It also sought legal fees. ... The Iowa Supreme Court ruled last month that two Waterloo newspaper editors couldn't be forced to reveal confidential sources in a dispute over two closed meetings of the Hawkeye Community College board of trustees. The meetings resulted in the firing of the school's president. Afterward, two editors from the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier interviewed people who had been inside, promising confidentiality. The paper filed a suit alleging that the board violated the state open meetings law. In response, the college demanded that the editors name their sources and produce notes of their interviews. The dispute will return to state district court.
SPJ national update II: 1 high school warning ... Concerned about stories in the campus paper, a dean at Governors State University in Illinois called the printer one night. Patricia Carter, dean of student affairs at the state school in University Park, 30 miles south of Chicago, told him not to print any copies of the paper until she or a faculty member had reviewed the stories. Nearly two years later, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is considering a challenge to that move in a case that could test freedom of the press on campus. News industry groups such as SPJ, the Associated Press Managing Editors and the American Society of Newspaper Editors say there's a danger that the case could extend a 14-year-old U.S. Supreme Court decision that gives high school principals power to control student publications. "If the court adopts the argument the university is making, that very well could be an effective conclusion to meaningful First Amendment protection of college journalists," said Mark Goodman, executive director of the Student Press Law Center in Arlington, Va.
SPJ national update III: 1 shaky compromise, 1 attaboy, 1 cash-register call ... The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee in July adopted a compromise regarding Freedom of Information Act exemptions of records submitted to the proposed Department of Homeland Security. "We urge SPJ members, all journalists and friends of freedom of information to join us in keeping attention focused on this issue as it moves through the Senate and into conference with the House," said SPJ president Al Cross, political writer and columnist at The (Louisville) Courier-Journal. Exemption 4 of the FOIA already protects from disclosure some confidential information that private entities supply to the government. Ronald Dick, a senior FBI official, noted at a recent Senate hearing: "We believe that there are sufficient provisions in the FOIA now to protect information that is provided to us." ... SPJ has commended The New York Times for refusing to accept Sony Electronics ads designed to look like news stories. According to AdAge.com, the ads were written by free-lancers and read like news features, with sidebars to Sony's Web site. "As online publishing continues to evolve, professional journalists need their institutions to maintain bright, clear lines between advertising and editorial content," said SPJ ethics chairman Gary Hill, news director at KSTP-TV in Minneapolis. But such fuzziness is exactly what Sony intended. "We're trying to blur the line between the advertising and editorial boundary," said David Cohen, a Sony senior VP. The SPJ Code of Ethics calls for distinguishing between advocacy, advertising and news, and making certain that news content does not misrepresent. ... The Connecticut Department of Public Safety cannot charge The Hartford Courant $20 million for a copy of the state's criminal convictions database, a unanimous state Supreme Court ruled July 17. The newspaper asked for the database in 1999. Public safety officials had calculated the price tag based on a state statute that allows police to charge $25 to search for an individual file; the database contains 815,000 files. That decision was upheld by the state Freedom of Information Commission and, later, by a state Superior Court judge. But the high court said that charging $25 for every file in the database would undercut the spirit of the FOI law.
=================================================
Max and Helena Faulkner were the perfect hosts on the perfect evening in the perfect Berkeley back yard for Fort Worth SPJ's annual throwdown jolly-up, the Mike Cochran-named Summertime Beer Bust, Grape Gala and Burnt & Barbecued Ribfest. J.T. Rushing and Jeff Prince provided the entertainment, Ron Holcomb and Mike Holcomb the grub, Cliff Amos (via Henry Stewart) the spirits, Kay Pirtle the Goldfish and behind-the-scenes coordination, Wanda Conlin and Penny Cockerell the chips and dip, and Max's brother-in-law and a neighbor some tables and chairs. Young Sawyer Blackman and Katherine Faulkner supplied kid-in-a-tree-swing cute, and even Mother Nature contributed, with a breeze to slice the July Texas heat. In a word: perfect.
=================================================
PEOPLE & PLACES
As many as 50 large-scale images from Star-Telegram photographer and UTA Shorthorn ex Tom Pennington's Afghanistan portfolio will go on display at Tarrant County College Southeast in September. The exhibit, in the upstairs art corridor in the main building, opens Sept. 5 with a by-invitation preview. It opens to the public the next day and will also be a part of Gallery Night, Sept. 7. The exhibit runs through Oct. 11. Pennington covered the war in Afghanistan for the Star-Telegram and Knight Ridder from November last year through March. ...
Jane Schlansker and InterStar colleague Steve Roth just returned from a two-week tourism trade mission to Argentina. The marathon trip took them from spectacular Iguazu Falls on Brazil's northern border, where Steve literally "flew through the jungle," to the tip of Tierra del Fuego at the "end of the world." They'll start promoting tourism to Argentina soon. "It was winter in Argentina, so quite a contrast between Ushuaia (-7c) and Fort Worth," Jane writes. "One of the great challenges of my trip was trying to find a winter coat in Fort Worth in July!" ...
The Wise County Messenger won the Sweepstakes award for large twice-weekly papers in the annual Texas Press Association contest. Winners were announced last month. The paper took firsts in photography (Mitch Word, Skip Nichols), page design (Stacy Word) and sports (Mitch Word) and also won in advertising (Ken Roselle, Travis Ivy, Melanie Snitker, Ryan Cunnius), news writing (Mitch Word, Mark Jordan), column writing (Skip Nichols) and general excellence. Nichols' post-Sept. 11 photo of an American flag with the Wise County Courthouse in the background graced the front cover of the "Winners Circle" newspaper given to TPA convention delegates. The Messenger competes in a category for papers of 4,001 or more circulation. Sweepstakes second place went to the Hood County News in Granbury. ... Two photos and a story about the Lady Mavs volleyball team earned UTA Shorthorn staff members Matt Slocum and Pat Gillespie nominations for the national SPJ Mark of Excellence award. They were selected as finalists from more than 2,700 entries in 45 categories. Slocum's photos preserve UTA's celebration of Martin Luther King Day and the volleyball team's march through the Southland Conference tournament. Gillespie's story is an account of UTA volleyball's first trip to the NCAA tournament since 1990. Award winners will be announced during the 2002 SPJ National Convention on Sept. 12-14 in Fort Worth.
Kudos & Contracts ... City Center Development Co. has chosen Stuart Bacon Advertising-Public Relations to develop a campaign to attract tenants for the downtown office complex, build awareness of City Center among the Fort Worth business community and strengthen the company's image. City Center is a Class A office complex consisting of 1.5 million square feet in the 33-story Chase Texas Tower at 201 Main St. and the 38-story City Center Tower II at 301 Commerce St.
=================================================
WELCOME, NEW MEMBERS
PRSA ... Tracy Sturrock, Fort Worth Zoo ... Melba Ellmore, Carter & Burgess ... Jeff Hampton, Carter & Burgess ... Leslie Johnston, Weatherford School District ... Lance Looper, Fort Worth Sister Cities ... Catherine Burch Graham, LifeGift Organ Donation Center
SPJ ... Bill Lewis, editor, The Keller Citizen ... Leona Dalavai, communications director, National Association of Women in Construction
=================================================
COMINGS & GOINGS
Exits ... at the S-T: staff writer Bechetta Jackson, a fast hire who interviewed for the job in 1999 on the day of the Wedgwood Baptist Church shootings (managing editor Kathy Vetter immediately put her to work), leaving to teach fourth-graders at Como Elementary School
=================================================
GOOD READING
Introducing an intended-to-be-regular feature, a capsule take on current best-sellers. By no means an objective list. No pretense of balance. Want to review a book? A couple of hundred words, fame and glory? Send it in.
"Stupid White Men" /
Michael Moore / ReganBooks/HarperCollins
Remember when everything was looking up? When the government ran a surplus, pollution was disappearing, peace was breaking out in the Middle East and Northern Ireland, and the bridge to the 21st century was strung with Internet cable and paved with 401k gold? So much for the future. The provocateur behind "Roger & Me" and the best-seller "Downsize This!" returns to size up the big special-interest group that's pretty much in charge and therefore, you'd think, responsible: stupid white men. Whether he's calling for the United Nations to overthrow the Bush family junta, urging African-Americans to place whites-only signs at the entrances of unfriendly businesses or hoping that Jesse Helms will get kissed by a man, "Stupid White Men" is the author's manifesto on malfeasance and mediocrity. Written before Enron and WorldCom. Surely there's a sequel.
"Mount Vernon Love Story" /
Mary Higgins Clark / Simon & Schuster
The author's interest in George Washington was sparked by a radio series she wrote in the 1960s on American presidents. She published this biographical novel in 1969 under the title "Aspire to the Heavens," the family motto of Washington's mother. Its discovery by a Washington family descendent led to this reissue under its new title. In researching Washington's life, Clark found a tall, engaging man behind the pious legend, the best dancer in the colony of Virginia and a master horseman. She dispels the belief that although he married an older woman, a widow, Washington's true love was Sally Carey Fairfax, his best friend's wife. Martha Dandridge Custis was older, but only by three months. She shared his life in every way, crossing the British lines to join him in Boston and enduring with him the bitter hardship of the winter in Valley Forge.
========================================
PRESIDENT'S CORNER
Kristie Aylett, APR; GFW PRSA
I've always been a news junkie. I never considered it a chore to read the paper every day. I don't use an alarm clock, as my bedroom TV comes on every morning to the news. I read the Fort Worth paper before getting in the shower. If I get caught up in a story, then sometimes I have to rush to be on time, but I get to work knowing what's happening in the world. This interest in the news has enabled me to catch the wave of a national story and arrange for the local media to interview my expert commentators. I say it's all job related, but when I'm away from a local paper, I miss knowing what's going on.
When I started in PR, I began recognizing reporters and getting to know their beats, interests and styles. Now I know the sources, too. I see PRSA members frequently in the news. In early July, I awoke to the voice of Carolyn Bobo, APR, Fellow PRSA, as she updated NBC 5 on how Cook Children's was handling a broken water main and the loss of water pressure to the hospital. Soon after, the reporter interviewed Mary Gugliuzza from the Water Department about the incident. Not even 7 in the morning, and I already knew how these two PRSA members started their day.
When the America West story broke, I saw Jim Sabourin, APR, formerly of Burlington Northern Santa Fe in Fort Worth, everywhere. As the airlines' communications VP, he appeared on "Good Morning America" and several other national news shows. It was good to see him, but I'm sure he would have preferred to be doing something else.
On to other matters. Congratulations to the newest accredited members in our chapter -- Kelli Horst, APR, of TCU and Heather Senter, APR, of Witherspoon. Deadline to apply for the next testing cycle is Aug. 5; the exam is scheduled for mid-September. Contact accreditation chair Beth Solomon, APR, at bethso@cookchildrens.org, and I'd be happy to discuss it with you, too. I am a strong advocate for accreditation. It furthered my career, expanded my PR knowledge and strengthened my credibility as a professional.
The Fort Worth SPJ chapter is hosting the national convention Sept. 12-14, and our chapter will help sponsor a hospitality suite for the speakers and other VIPs. It's a great way for us to support SPJ and provide our members with access to the high-level journalists and officials speaking at the convention. We'll be there from 8 to 5 for the three days. If you'd like to help staff the hospitality suite and escort speakers around the convention, let me know (aylettk@yahoo.com).
-----
PRESIDENT'S PERSIFLAGE
Patrick Grady, IABC/Fort Worth
As much as I love the summer sun, I spend most of August in my office (as I'll bet most of you do, too). You'll be pleased to know that your board of directors is working in our offices and conference rooms to improve what is already a great organization -- IABC/Fort Worth. We're planning enhancements to the Web site and some fun twists in addition to our fantastic programs.
We all know that IABC isn't a way of life, but it is an extension of our professional lives. It's an opportunity to meet new people and learn new things. Sometimes, it's an opportunity to TEACH things, too. That's one of the good things about getting older (can't think of many others!). But in IABC, more is better.
So what does a better organization look like? It looks like consistent attendance by every member, plus several new guests each month. New people bring new ideas. And in our business, you can't live long on old ideas. Our programs are great -- our members tell us that. Our members are fun; just look around at the next meeting!
I know it's summer, and if you're REALLY on vacation the second Tuesday in August, then we'll have to understand, but we want you at every meeting. We want your friends and colleagues, too. Every member and guest in attendance adds to the value for each of us each month. That's why we're on this year-long membership and attendance crusade. Twenty-five people in a room? Let's go for 75! That's where the energy is! That's where the networking opportunities are! That's where the fun is!
So I have three questions. 1: What are you doing for lunch on the second Tuesday in August? 2: How many friends and associates are you going to bring? 3: Should we reserve a bigger room to contain all of our creative passion and extra people?
Don't forget, No. 1 is a trick question. The answer should always be: "That's IABC Tuesday!" See you there!
-----
OVER & OUT
John Dycus, Fort Worth SPJ
That snazzy Western-but-elegant invitation to the SPJ/Sigma Delta Chi board convention thank-you party comes from the Star-Telegram's Meda Kessler, with a little art tweaking from the UTA Shorthorn's Eric Gustafson. For that matter, without Wanda Conlin, Don Boren and Jim Conlin and their Greater Meadowbrook Shopping News underwriting the affair, there wouldn't be a party. They all have our appreciation. So many have stepped up to craft what will prove to be a most memorable event. We can never remember to thank them all. But we'll try. ...
An alert reader notes the occasional reference to UTA Shorthorn graduates (alright, more like two an issue) and asks if that's because I used to be the adviser. "Shameless plugs," he calls them. That would be correct. Speaking of whom, you read about Tom Pennington and current students Matt Slocum, Pat Gillespie and Eric Gustafson higher up, and that's another Shorthorn ex, Kathleen Carroll, who returned to the AP in May as its senior news executive after three years as Knight Ridder bureau chief in Washington, D.C. She also attended Dallas Baptist and wrote for The Dallas Morning News before joining AP Dallas in 1978. ...
Let's clone Tim McGuire, outgoing president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, who slammed the bottom-line focus of newspaper owners at the ASNE annual convention in Washington in April. The owners are "milking our companies of every last dime" and threatening the industry's future, said McGuire, editor of the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. "Layoffs, newshole cuts and short-term financial imperatives cast a long shadow over our work," he told the convention. "Editors today worry whether they can truly affect the direction of their newspapers because the balance of power has shifted away from editors." McGuire challenged editors not to take publishers' belt-tightening without a fight, while urging both newsroom managers and business-side administrators to work together. ...
As Helen Thomas' one-man blue light special -- she kissed me on the forehead once for buying a dozen copies of her book, "Front Row at the White House: My Life and Times" -- I smiled at the queen of the White House press corps' recent comments to Buffalo News writer Anthony Violanti: "The fact you are belaboring my age, rather than who I am and what I want to be, shows the mentality in this country. ... I get this all the time: 'How can she still be working? Why isn't she retired? Why doesn't she drop dead?' I just tell people to live their own lives and let me live my life. I love my work and want to be a better reporter. It's a constant learning game, and I'm still learning." Helen allegedly is retired. You believe that? I don't, either.