Voice For Liberty

Tag: Wichita news media

  • Wichita Eagle’s GWEDC board membership in perspective

    What is the role in public affairs of a newspaper like the Wichita Eagle? Can it wear more than one hat — making news as well as covering it?

    This is not a hypothetical question.

    Consider that Pam Siddall, president and publisher of the Wichita Eagle is a member of the steering council of the Greater Wichita Economic Development Coalition, an important, partially tax-funded board, that plays a significant role in Wichita.

    Should this make any difference to you?

    When the Eagle’s editorial board grants the president of the Greater Wichita Economic Development Coalition space on its pages, should readers be aware of this connection? (Vicki Pratt Gerbino: Invest in recruiting, preserving area jobs, February 15, 2009 Wichita Eagle)

    When the Eagle’s editorial blog writes a fawning post titled GWEDC crucial to attracting, retaining jobs, should readers be aware of this connection?

    When Eagle reporters write a story that can be characterized as critical of anyone who questions the need for the GWEDC — the story starts with “The hard-won balance between the city, county and business leaders over economic development is wobbling a bit after some comments last week.” — should readers be aware of this connection? (See Sedgwick County commissioners question economic development funding, February 17, 2009 Wichita Eagle.)

    The nature of the connection is that the Eagle is an “Investor” in the GWEDC, which means they contributed at least $5,000, at least some in the form of advertising. The Wichita Business Journal is also in the Investor class.

    I asked the heads of the two organizations involved — Vicki Pratt Gerbino, president of the GWEDC, and Pam Siddall, publisher of the Wichita Eagle — if they thought there was potential for conflict of interest when a news organization covers an entity it has made contributions to. Ms. Gerbino said no, there’s no conflict of interest. Ms. Siddall said the same, citing the separate news and business functions at the Eagle.

    In conversations I’ve had in the past with a few Eagle reporters, they’ve cited the “wall of separation” between the main functions of a newspaper, which are news, editorial, and the business of the newspaper.

    But this wall may not be as tall and wide as it seems. In an excerpt from Knightfall: Knight Ridder and How the Erosion of Newspaper Journalism Is Putting Democracy At Risk, Davis Merritt, former editor of the Eagle writes “The notion of strict separation between the business and journalism functions of newspapers is relatively recent in terms of the whole of American newspaper history, and judging by current practice, it may be only a passing phase.”

    It is difficult for an outsider to be able to know if the Eagle’s news and editorial judgments are influenced by its relationship with the GWEDC. That’s why people and organizations are often advised to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest.

    Could the GWEDC survive without the publisher of the Eagle on its steering committee and without the Eagle’s financial contribution? I think they could. Then, without this connection, readers of the Eagle wouldn’t have to worry so much about the Eagle’s news and editorial independence.

  • Wichita Tea Party News Coverage on KSN Television

    The Wichita Tea Party protest as covered by KSN Television, February 27, 2009. A very good job by reporter Josh Witsman.

    “Someone needs to go and cut up Congress and President Obama’s credit card, because it’s not their credit card — it’s our credit card.”

  • Editorial Board Pen Names at the Wichita Eagle

    Some comment-writers to this blog make very good points that deserve more visibility. This is the case with the following comment left anonymously to the post In Wichita, let’s disclose everything. I mean everything.

    It looks like Wichita Liberty has broken another unreported story and has exposed the fact that a portion of the Wichita Eagle’s editorial board operates under a pen name.

    Perhaps “Ms. Holman’s” editorials should be placed next to the equally anonymous opinion line comments. I must note that the anonymous comments appearing in the Eagle are usually much more pointed than the signed editorial commentary.

    I wonder how conflicts of interest by employees and their families are handled by the newspaper? If “Ms. Holman” was married to a school administrator that might be a very useful fact to know when evaluating her credibility on government school spending issues.

    What if she was married to an attorney involved in suing the state over school finance? Full disclosure can lead into a number of interesting places.

    There was very little publicity provided to the very salient fact that the Wichita Eagle was a donor to the group backing the 2000 Wichita school bond issue with a sizable donation. I’ll have to ask Wichita Liberty to look into any news media contributions to either side of the 2008 Wichita school bond issue campaign.

    In response to the question posed at the end of this comment: The campaign finance report for groups involved on both sides of the Wichita school bond issue in 2008 showed no contribution by the Wichita Eagle.

    Is this issue of Rhonda Holman not using her real name a substantive issue? My name was in the Wichita Eagle quite a few times last year in my role as an opponent of the Wichita school bond issue. What would have been the Eagle’s response — in both the newsroom and editorial board offices — if I had used a pen name? What would the use of an assumed name indicated about my willingness to be held accountable for the things I said and wrote?

  • In Wichita, let’s disclose everything. I mean everything.

    A follow-up post is at at Editorial Board Pen Names at the Wichita Eagle.

    In an Wichita Eagle Editorial Blog post, Rhonda Holman calls for more disclosure for groups that send mailings that “dodge campaign finance disclosure law by deftly telling people how to vote without using the words ‘vote for’ or ‘vote against.’” (Treat campaign ads the same)

    A few points:

    Holman’s target is quite selective. As shown in my post On the Wichita Eagle Editorial Board, Partisanship Reigns from right before last election day, she’s willing to overlook the Eagle’s own political contributions and the use of taxpayer money to fund election campaigns when she agrees with the causes.

    And, why the need for a law when, as Holman writes “Kansans aren’t fooled by the ads and mailings”?

    Then, wouldn’t a lot of Wichita Eagle readers like to know some of the financial details behind the Eagle’s political endorsements, say perhaps Holman’s salary? Heck, I’d be satisfied if she’d start using her real — or should I say entire — name when making political endorsements.

  • A Share of McClatchy, or a Copy of the Daily Newpaper

    Yesterday the price of a share of The McClatchy Company, the parent company of the Wichita Eagle, closed at 50 cents. That happens to be the newsstand price of a copy of the Eagle, although to buy a copy of the paper, you’ll have to add sales tax.

    McClatchy stock price

    The decline in this company’s stock price — from over $70 four years ago to less than one dollar today — illustrates the magnitude of the crisis in the newspaper industry. While there are some who take delight in the financial difficulties of mainstream newspapers, I believe that newspapers are still an important institution. I hope they will find a way to survive.

    The plight of newspapers does raise an issue or two, however. When the editorial page dishes out advice on fiscal issues, for example, should we pay any attention?

  • Articles of Interest

    25 random things about covering a capital murder trial. Wichita Eagle reporter Ron Sylvester offers surprising insights into covering a capital murder trial in a small Kansas city.

    The Misdirection of Resources and the Current Recession. From a talk given by Mario J. Rizzo. “I believe that recent experience supports the claim that the economist and political philosopher Friedrich Hayek made in The Road to Serfdom in 1944. Democracy and central planning are incompatible or, at least, in deep tension.” Also some good explanation of the cause of the crisis from an Austrian perspective.

    Evidence against the multiplier (Russell Roberts at Cafe Hayek). The multiplier is what’s supposed to make the stimulus work. It’s also a favorite argument of interventionism by local governments and their boosters in the field of economic development. But does it work? “The large and growing peer-reviewed economics literature on the economic impacts of stadiums, arenas, sports franchises, and sport mega-events has consistently found no substantial evidence of increased jobs, incomes, or tax revenues for a community associated with any of these things. Focusing our attention on research done by economists, as opposed to that of scholars from public policy or urban development and planning departments, we find near unanimity in the conclusion that stadiums, arenas and sports franchises have no consistent, positive impact on jobs, income, and tax revenues.” I wish we’d known of this before we built the downtown Wichita arena. Wait … we did know it. See Economic Justification of Arenas and the Downtown Wichita Arena, one of my first blog posts from October 2004.

    Economic Miracle (Walter E. Williams) “The idea that even the brightest person or group of bright people, much less the U.S. Congress, can wisely manage an economy has to be the height of arrogance and conceit. Why? It is impossible for anyone to possess the knowledge that would be necessary for such an undertaking.” A fine explanation of how our economy is so complicated that it can’t be managed centrally. It’s the price system and self-interest that do the work.

    Fed Up: The popular uprising against central banking (Thomas E. Woods Jr.) “It’s not surprising that arguments against the Fed are finally resonating. Since the crisis began in 2007, Fed Chair Ben Bernanke has engaged in all manner of emergency activity, much of it unprecedented and of such dubious legality that even some of those who may reject or be unfamiliar with arguments against the Fed have begun to wonder about the unaccountable power this institution wields over the economy.”

    Obama Takes On Auto Crisis Without a ‘Czar’ (New York Times) “President Obama’s decision to act as his own ‘car czar’ means that in the next few months he faces decisions no American president has made since the invention of the automobile. … Even for an administration that is becoming the de facto decision maker for many of the nation’s financial institutions, it is a huge step. … In the meantime, the auto industry — like the financial industry — will essentially be run from inside the Treasury.” More nationalization of American industry. Will you buy a car designed and built by the President and Congress?

    An Invitation to Debate the New Deal (Amity Shlaes). The author of The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression responds to criticism of her book. “The gist of ‘The Forgotten Man,’ which has been out for nearly two years, is that neither Herbert Hoover nor Franklin D. Roosevelt promulgated policies that worked, especially not in the sense that we use the word ‘work’ today.”

  • Derby Reporter Gives Up

    The Wichita Business Journal reports that the Derby Reporter is going out of business. (Derby newspaper shutting down)

    The cause of this is attributed to Sedgwick County’s recent decision to print its legal notices in the Wichita Eagle instead of the Derby newspaper. This quaint practice of publishing legal notices in newspapers is mandated by state statute. The best thing to do, of course, would be for Sedgwick county to post its legal notices online, something it could do right now at very low cost. (I don’t think they have them online. At least I can’t find them.)

    The county should also post these notices online in a way that search engines such as Google can find them. The way the legal notices are posted in the Wichita Eagle is very difficult and inconvenient to use. My experimentation also tells me that the notices are not visible to Google and other search engines.

    This means that the residents of Sedgwick County — and the City of Wichita too, as its notices are published the same way — are missing out on a very useful way of reading legal notices. Also, they’re not able to use tools like Google Alerts. This very useful tool can automatically notify you when something appears on the Internet that you’re interested in. I make extensive use of these alerts.

    But this is not the entire story. The decision of the county commissioners went against the recommendation of the Board of Bids and Contracts. The vote was three to two, with commissioners Kelly Parks and Gwen Welshimer in the minority.

    Estimates are that the switch to the Eagle will cost the county about $50,000 more each year. So what was the reason for the commission voting against this board?

    The reasons stated by commissioners Dave Unruh and Tim Norton and former commissioner Tom Winters in the minutes of the meeting had to do with increasing the visibility and readership of the notices. As I’ve shown above, the best way by far to increase readership and visibility is to post the notices online. The county would still, it appears, have to publish them in a newspaper, which means that the Derby Reporter would be best, as it is the low-cost provider of this service.

    So this reasoning strikes me as a little hollow. Put the notices online, if the commissioners want to really increase their availability.

    There may be two reasons why this switch was made. First, sources tell me that the Eagle hired former commissioner Ben Sciortino as a lobbyist. Here’s how the Eagle’s now-defunct Hall Monitor blog described Sciortino’s new business venture on April 25, 2007:

    Former Sedgwick County Commissioner Ben Sciortino is now working from the other side of the commission bench. The man who lost his seat in November to Commissioner Gwen Welshimer is now starting up his own lobbying business: Sciortino & Associates. … “After eight years in the county, I have a very good idea of how things work,” Sciortino said. “I have maintained excellent relationships with the electeds on both sides of the street. If a company needs help with a zone change or help lobbying a particular item, that’s what I’ll do. … Probably more companies than everyday citizens because I probably won’t come real cheap,” Sciortino said with a chuckle.

    Then, there’s something potentially more disturbing. Around the time of this decision, Sedgwick County Manager William Buchanan was in contention for the job of Wichita City manager. The Wichita Eagle strongly endorsed Buchanan for this job on its editorial page.

    Could the Eagle’s endorsement of Buchanan be related to the county’s decision to switch their business to the Eagle? At least one person thinks so. In a news story Derby paper considers suing county, KSN television reporter Jessica Oakley reports this:

    Bush [Derby Reporter publisher Kent Bush] believes it’s all politically motivated.

    “After an endorsement of Bill Buchanan on a Sunday, the next Thursday he goes to the bid board, which he appointed, and made a 10-minute presentation on behalf of The Eagle,” he said.

    It’s important to remember that Bush has an agenda, perhaps even an ax to grind. Both Buchanan and the Eagle have denied a connection.

    The Wichita Business Journal has more reporting in the story Wichita Eagle beats out Derby newspaper for county contract, but fight is brewing.

  • Wichita city hall: more evidence of lax procedures

    Wichita Eagle reporting from yesterday (Past client: Developer admitted embezzling) provides more evidence of the need for improved procedures and greater accountability at Wichita city hall. In this story, investigative journalist Dion Lefler reports that Grant Gaudreau admitted stealing money from a business partner. This comes to light just after the City of Wichita nearly became a business partner with Gaudreau.

    Past articles on this website and in the Wichita Eagle (Wichita’s Faulty Due Diligence, Sharon Fearey Doesn’t Appreciate the Wichita Eagle, Wichita TIF Developer’s Ownership Restructuring not Very Reassuring, and Wichita City Council: Put Better Procedures in Place Before Proceeding) document the specifics. But a few new developments and questions have arisen.

    First, it’s been reported that Gaudreau has a warrant for failure to pay $12,332 in income tax. I asked Wichita police chief Norman Williams if Gaudreau was subject to arrest because of this warrant. He said yes, he is.

    Second, it’s unclear whether Joe Kramer and Len Marotte of the real estate firm Joel LLC were aware of the entire scope of Gaudreau’s problems when they teamed with him to develop the Renaissance Square project. It’s clear, however, that they knew a lot. Their business judgment must be questioned.

    Mayor Carl Brewer asked city staff to develop new procedures for vetting potential partners. The problem is that city hall is occupied with some transitions. A new city manager will start work in just about a month. The assistant city manager (now the interim manager) has been looking elsewhere for jobs, and given the mayor’s public treatment of him, I think he’s smart to do so. Three council seats are up for election in the March primary. The city botched a public hearing, but calls it “leadership.”

    My recommendation is that the City of Wichita stop participating in public/private partnerships. Instead, work on improving the business climate for everyone, across the entire city. But when the city considers partnering with someone, I recommend that the city hire an outside firm to conduct an independent investigation of potential partners. This is how we can have confidence in the procedures the city is developing.

  • Newspaper journalism in Wichita: we need it

    Printing presses at the Wichita Eagle

    It’s almost impossible to overstate the dire economic condition in which newspapers find themselves. Falling circulation, reduced advertising, and a generational shift add up to bad news for this unique and important industry.

    In his book Knightfall: Knight Ridder and How the Erosion of Newspaper Journalism Is Putting Democracy at Risk, former Wichita Eagle editor Davis Merritt describes the difference between newspaper journalism and everything else we call news:

    • Its content is not shaped by a limiting technology, such as broadcast with its time strictures and, in television and online, bias toward the visual and against permanence.
    • Its usefulness is based far more on completeness and clarity than immediacy.
    • Its claim on credibility is based on its length and depth, which allow readers to judge the facts behind a story’s headline and opening summary paragraph and then look for internal contradictions.
    • It has intrinsic value and relevance to people rather than merely amusing or entertaining them.
    • Opinions and analysis are labeled as such and are presented separately.

    In Wichita we have recent examples of how newspaper journalism has influenced events. Recently the Wichita Eagle uncovered problems in the past of a person the City of Wichita was about to partner with on a real estate development. (See Wichita’s Faulty Due Diligence and Sharon Fearey Doesn’t Appreciate the Wichita Eagle for coverage.) Without the work of Wichita Eagle reporters, the deal would have happened. No other news outlet in Wichita had the resources or wherewithal to do the investigation necessary to report the story.

    It appears that we don’t quite know how to support newspaper journalism in the age of the Internet. Let’s hope soon that someone develops a business model that lets journalism thrive in the future.

    Additional resources:

    News You Can Lose (The New Yorker)
    Do Newspapers Have a Future? (Michael Kinsley, Time Magazine)
    Who killed the newspaper? (Economist.com)
    The Newspaper of the Future (The New York Times, from 2005 featuring the Lawrence Journal-World)
    The Elite Newspaper of the Future (American Journalism Review. “A smaller, less frequently published version packed with analysis and investigative reporting and aimed at well-educated news junkies that may well be a smart survival strategy for the beleaguered old print product.)