A new black newspaper in Tucson
The Vanguard is being put out by the local Black Chamber of Commerce with a 1000 print run, the AZ Daily Star says. The chamber’s president, Clarence Boykins, is the publisher.
Boykins, who said he put up the initial investment to start up the Vanguard, is publisher. He tapped Tucson freelance writer and editor Theda K. Rogers to be executive editor.
Boykins picked up the first 16-page edition, printed at Territorial Publishers, Friday and called it “a great beginning.”
He said the paper aims to improve communication for blacks who are dispersed around Southern Arizona, while increasing the understanding of black culture in the larger community.
6:00 AM
Nick Martin's "Beta Journalism"
Martin is one of the better reporters in town; you can see his grim piece on the third serial shooter in the most recent issue of Phoenix Magazine.
He was an EVT staffer let go in one of the recent rounds of layoffs, but his blog, Heat City, lets him follow a few of his reportorial hobbyhorses.
His latest posting is a proposal for a variant on some of the new thinking of how traditional journalism can take advantage of some of the power of the web.
The trouble to this point has been that traditional journalism has had a hard time letting go of the control it’s used to having in reporting and telling stories. Martin’s proposal:
This could be done by creating a new web application to make it all possible. Here’s how the app would work:
- A journalist writes a story and posts it online in “beta” form.
- The public can then log in to suggest extra sources, point out typos, critique for bias and upload media.
- The journalist or editor makes or approves changes, verifies facts and posts a final draft sometime later (maybe hours or days). The names of the people who helped in the process are included at the bottom of the story as named contributors, giving them ownership of the piece.
Beta Journalism (working title) would be that open-source application. The idea relies heavily on the concept of crowdsourcing. It embraces the knowledge of the community. It tells readers: This is a work in progress – please help us improve it.
You can read his complete idea here.
6:00 AM
Why does the Arizona Republic capitalize the words "white" and "black"?
The paper ran a recent AP story on the fallout of the Tiger Woods meltdown in the black community. Here’s a sample graf:
When three White women were said to be romantically involved with Woods in addition to his blonde, Swedish wife, blogs, airwaves and barbershops started humming, and Woods’ already tenuous standing among many Blacks took a beating.
(I can’t link to it because, as usual, the AZCentral web site doesn’t know what the paper prints.)
It got worse from there:
The darts reflect Blacks’ resistance to interracial romance. They also are a reflection of discomfort with a man who has smashed barriers in one of America’s Whitest sports …
“America’s Whitest sports”! Sounds like a variant of “American’s Next Top Model.”
Now, I know this style tic isn’t new. But to my knowledge it’s fairly unusual among major papers. Here’s a link to the original AP story on Tiger Woods, in which the words “white” and ‘black" aren’t capped, for example.
Now, despite the headline above, I know why the paper capitalizes “white” and “black.” While no serious news organization has ever done it, it became fashionable, decades ago, in some liberal and overly race-conscious circles to capitalize “black” in print as a sign of respect or pride when discussing racial issues.
Now, since Arizona has one of the smallest African-American populations in the country, you’d think this wouldn’t be an issue here. But apparently someone at the Republic decided, Yeah, we’ll capitalize “black”—but only if we capitalize “white” as well.
The years pass, and now it’s just another indicator of the paper’s lack of sophistication.
p.s. Why shouldn’t the words be capitalized? Because there’s no reason to. They aren’t proper names. Words like Hispanic are capitalized because they are derived from proper names. It’s just the way things are.
11:19 PM
Why is the Arizona Republic trying to bore us to death?
PHXated doesn’t understand how certain newspaper editors, as their industry crumbles down on their shoulders, just … give up.
Consider what I assume would be the half-dozen or so editors who have ultimate responsibility over page two of the paper’s “Valley & State” section. There’s Elvia Diaz, who is the assistant editor credited with oversight of the Phoenix news briefs section. I assume there is an editor to oversee that entire page of news briefs; and that that editor is topped by at least one deputy local editor, and then the top local news guy or gal.
That prestigious position probably still must report to some sort of assistant managing editor with oversight over local news; over that person is the managing editor, who in turn is answerable to the paper’s exec editor or editor in chief.
Anyway, here’s a sampling of what that group offered up to us the other day. I can’t link to it because, as usual, AZCentral.com doesn’t always know what the Republic publishes:
Community to host garage sale
PHOENIX— Residents of Kierland in northeast Phoenix are holding a communitywide garage sale from 7 a.m. to noon today.
This hot news story goes on for three more grafs, including this dulcet explanation of what a garage sale is, in case any mentally disabled people happen to be reading:
Neighbors will fill their driveways wth bargain-priced purchases ranging from furniture to clothes to chuldren’s items.
Everyone involved should take a moment to pat themselves on the back, for taking the time to research, write up, edit and print a little bit of news that under no circumstances could possibly give anyone a reason to subscribe to the paper.
PHXated’s previous breathless coverage of the paper’s intrepid news briefs editorial corps can be found here and here.
6:00 AM
More on the death of Marcia Powell
The Feathered Bastard goes into more detail about the disciplinary action against some 16 corrections officials here, contending among other things that the head of the department of corrections, Charles Ryan, should be among those resigning.
One unaddressed issue: Ryan ordered life-maintaining equipment removed from Powell after she had been brought into the hospital, even though she had a guardian who was legally empowered to make that decision.
More background on Powell’s almost unrelentingly miserable life here.
PHXated watched the CBS 5 news report on Powell this morning and was amazed at the superficiality of it. Among other things, the report said Powell was left out in 100-degree heat, where all the other reports say it was 107 that day; and it said the state would no longer be using the outdoor holding cells, but this is contradicted by the Republic’s story this a.m. says that it’s merely limited their use to two hours.
The report also didn’t even mention the possibility of criminal charges being leveled against those responsible, which of course is the big question.
On the other hand, the report did show a shot of what seemed to be a warren of the cells she was supposedly left in; that and the anchor’s assertion that she was left “without shade” answered a question I had in my mind after reading the other reports, which didn’t make it clear that Powell was literally left to roast alive in the sun without cover. (She ended up with second-degree burns on her body; that means her skin was literally blistering.)
6:00 AM
"I have been framed," he said, using a turn of phrase that equates a wooden adornment around a picture with a manufactured criminal charge.
From a 12 News report on the AZ Central web site:
One day after his arrest, Maricopa County Supervisor Don Stapley tells 12 News he is the victim of an “inquisition” by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, making a reference to a medieval tactic to scrutinize an individual without regard to his rights.
6:00 AM
Mayor Phil and his GF get into trouble
Turns out Mayor Phil Gordon has been dating one of his political consultants. The trouble comes because he’s been paying her for political work and has in the past nominated her to city boards.
Sarah Fenske in New Times has an in-depth story here.
Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon hasn’t needed to raise money since he waltzed to reelection in the fall of 2007, leaving a war chest stocked with $370,000.
Yet in the last two years, Gordon has paid his chief fundraiser big bucks all the same. Records show that Gordon paid fundraiser Elissa Mullany and her business partner, Cate Wunder, a total of $39,000 since January 2008. That’s a period in which the campaign hasn’t shown a dime of revenue.
Gordon says he’s been daing Mullany since his breakup with his wife; their divorce is not yet final. (Mullany’s married but separated too, Fenske says.)
It looks like the mayor had to put out a press release about the relationship after Fenske started nosing around. Here’s how the Arizona Republic plays it:
Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon on Tuesday asked the city attorney and a former Arizona Supreme Court chief justice to review his political ties to consultant Elissa Mullany, the woman he is now dating.
The request came after The Arizona Republic and another media outlet inquired about the relationship and whether Mullany was benefitting from any taxpayer dollars.
Note the lack of grace with which the Republic acknowledges its competition. My issue with this isn’t so much not naming the New Times as with the clumsiness. Good journalism should handle various issues consistently, and it shouldn’t leave obvious questions in readers’ minds.
A lot of stories are pursued by different news outlets at the same time. It’s appropriate to say, in those cases, “The mayor released the information after news organizations started querying the office about it.” But if they are going to note that one other outlet in paticular is doing the asking, the paper should name it.
Why did it not name New Times? Maybe it’s because Fenske had a lot more information.
The Republic trumpets its “review” of the matter … and shares it with readers in three paragraphs.
Fenske’s piece is 1500 words long, and more than forty paragraphs. And it has a lot of evidence of the positively continental attitudes of some of the major players in the story:
Mullany, who was then known as Elissa Peters, was divorced from her first husband, Aldon Terpstra, in December 1998. She married James Mullany five years later, in October 2003. She has two young sons.
A former City Council staffer, James Mullany now works for former Phoenix Mayor Paul Johnson at his development company, Old World Communities/ Berkana Townhomes. Thanks to an appointment from Gordon, he’s also on the city’s Deferred Compensation Board.
3:18 PM
How the Arizona Republic drives us nuts
Reason #42. Bad editing.
In too many stories, you just can’t figure out what’s going on based on the information the paper gives you. It’s the editor’s job not to let that happen.
Here’s a good example. Vernon Parker, the mayor of Paradise Valley, who might run for governor, has been accused of wrongdoing by the federal government and is now suing for $2 million in damages. Fine. But read this precis in the paper, emphases added:
Parker, who heads his private consulting firm, VBP Group LLC, was accused of using his political influence to obtain an SBA contract, the claim says.
The SBA Inspector General’s Office began an investigation into the contract. It later published a report on the agency’s Web site that said Parker was a federal employee with the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the time of the contract application, and that federal employees are prohibited by law from competing for government contracts.
[…]
“The SBA’s Inspector General’s Office accused my client of inaccurate financial statements and an untruthful application for certification. All of those allegations, save one, have been thrown out,” attorney Paul Charlton said.
The story continues for a half-dozen grafs, but never explains a) whether in fact Parker applied for the grant while he was working for the agriculture department, an easily acertainable fact; or b) which allegation hadn’t been thrown out.
The reporter, Ofelia Madrid, evidently talked to Charlton; why didn’t she just ask him whether in fact Parker was working for the department at the time?
6:00 AM
Did you know the East Valley Tribune won a Pulitzer Prize?
It’s funny to me how many people I ask who don’t know that. New Times story about it here. Part of the reason is the way the Arizona Republic, in an awesome example of journalistic poutiness, buried the news about the award last May.
Arizona seems to live in a dream world sometimes. The most popular politician in the state runs an organization so compromised a local paper wins a public service Pulitzer for examining just a small part of it—and it does not become part of the public debate.
I mention this only to note that the East Valley Tribune may be being sold, after a year that, despite the Pulitzer, has already seen a wrenching downsizing: 140 staffers let go, publication trimmed first to four days, and now three days, a week.
Freedom Communications, the national chain based in Orange County, is in bankruptcy, and the news at the end of last week is that it is asking the court to let it sell off some assets, among them possibly the EVT and a few smaller local papers—the Sun City Daily News-Sun and Ahwatukee Foothills News.
The EVT’s story about it here.
The more I read the EVT, the more I like it. Hard to argue with this account of the company’s financial problems:
In its bankruptcy filing earlier this month, Freedom listed debts of nearly $1 billion. Much of that was incurred in 2004, when the company bought out some members of the Hoiles family, which has controlled the company since its founding more than 70 years ago. Two outside investor groups financed the buyout.
In recent years, the company has seen a steep decline in advertising revenue and increasing competition from the Internet, as have most newspaper companies across the nation. The situation was made worse by the onset of the latest national recession. As a result, Freedom defaulted on its debt obligations.
Emphasis added. The lesson here is the insane amount of debt Freedom and so many media companies took on in the earlier years of this decade. People get sentimental about daily newspapers, rightly or wrongly, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that most of the daily journalism companies in true financial straits right now got there through bad business decisions unrelated to the current financial downturn or, truth be told, the decline of the industry overall.
More on that little hobby-horse of mine here.
Reporter Nick Martin, one of the staffers laid off earlier this year, writes in more detail about the issue here on his blog Heat City.
p.s. I realize the EVT has a lot of problems to deal with right now, but I feel I have to note it’s another one of the local papers whose web site is mighty glitchy. Here’s what I got when I used the site’s seach engine to find its story on the latest news about its parent company:
Here’s a closeup of the results:
And the links all resolve to weird Google Reader pages.
Search for the same thing through Google News, however, and it comes right up.
Similarly,when I searched for the word “arpaio” to get the link for the paper’s Pulitzer Prize-winning series, I got this:
The search engine should be key-worded so that any search for Arpaio should produce a master page with the series and recent articles nicely laid out.
Now, anyone at the paper would doubtless sigh when asked about this, making the valid point that with 140 recent layoffs, resources were stretched thin.
To which one would still have to reply: So why weren’t these basic web issues done before the operation borrowed a billion dollars to buy out its owners?
6:00 AM