This week I'm going to have to go over a few basics here in terms of reporting so that our local governmental officials understand the role of the reporter—or what it should be.
In this day and age of actual journalism being dead and buried, I think sometimes people get confused or they freak out when an actual reporter carries out the oddity of being precise.
You see, unlike the supposed journalists in the corporate media, I don't need access to these Councilmen and Councilwomen in order to “get a scoop” so to speak. I don't have to smooch the tuchas of a member of the Police Commission so that I can gather the story.
It is not my job to cozy up to any of these people, rather it is my task to hold local officials' feet to the fire and let the public know if shenanigans are afoot.
This is done with accurate reporting and not by making stuff up and pulling it out of the clouds. I'm currently livid as I type this. I thought I'd let you know. Is this a digression? OK.
First of all, it seems as though some do not understand that reporters/journalists are NOT supposed to be madly in love with the governmental officials that they are covering. We are not supposed to be necessarily adversarial either, but we ARE supposed to make sure that the public is aware of what is happening in the community. We are supposed to give a written account in terms of statements that were made during a meeting. Personally, it's not in my job des
cription to be overly concerned if Councilman X is angry with me. I will not trot up to him at the end of a gathering to make sure that he is not upset with something I said or reported. I will, however, be happy to answer any questions pertaining to a report that I placed in these pages.
Second of all, those covering the meetings do NOT and I repeat, DO NOT conjure the headlines. The editor goes over the report and then decides what headline to place atop the piece in question. I can't tell you the number of times that my fellow reporter and I have been “taken aside” and lectured about a headline that was supposedly too scandalous or some such. We are not in charge of that! (See, I'm even using one of these !) I'm sure that the chief (my boss, David) would be happy to speak with you about this scenario.
Clearly the exception to this is my column. I can put whatever I'd like atop this OPINION column—for the most part, of course.
Moving along, I need to state clearly and emphatically that I RECORD every meeting that I cover, or attend as a spectator, to make sure that an accurate report is the end result. (Clearly in the case of being a spectator it's so that I have some sort of record of what was said during an extremely long and mostly tedious gathering of governmental officials.)
If members of a governmental body find it necessary to glare at me whilst alluding to all the wrongs I've carried out during the course of my reporting, then there is nothing I can do about that. I think a better course of action might be to perhaps speak with me about this or ask to HEAR my tape recording of the whole meeting in question.
Allow me to explain for those who are totally lost at this point. When I cover the police meeting, for example, and a question is posed about the parking in downtown Conneaut Lake, I don't MAKE up the answer to said question and just plunk it in the report. I often use a direct quote that exited the lips of a member of said Commission. Crazy huh?
This was the case with my last report when I quoted most of the entire answer given to me by a member of that body. Are you following? Am I following?
Yet for some odd reason, a couple of the Conneaut Lake Borough Councilmen did not understand what quotation marks meant and more or less accused me of “stirring the pot.” If being accurate in reporting by utilizing a tape recorder for DIRECT quotes is now considered to be “stirring the pot,” then hand me a spoon.
People do not have attention spans these days and personally, I think it's part of some kind of evil plan in progress by those who think they rule the world or something. Many folk simply read headlines and don't bother digging through the whole piece to see what was said.
Other people I guess don't know what it means when a reporter says something like: When asked about selling tea in China, Person Y responded by saying, “I don't think it's a good idea to sell the tea in China, blah, blah, etc., etc.,” (NOTE: the quotation marks for this fake scenario?)
In closing and yes I know you are exhaling madly as my cats have become airborne, please read the reports thoroughly in this paper and in others. Please understand that these “” are there for a reason. I don't just pull things from the air and whip quotation marks around them all in the name of pot stirring. It sounds like fun but honestly, it's not good journalism—which actually matters to some, believe it or not.
THE END (Interstate Crosscheck, AIPAC Lobby, War is a Racket by General Smedley Butler)
P.S. - The biggest question I get from area citizens is about the proposed parking scenario in Conneaut Lake. That is why I ask about that at various meetings. I'm carrying the questions of the citizens TO the “officials” in question. Just thought I'd let you know.