The public's right to know has always been important to me, but apparently some do not share my high opinion of that concept.
In his most recent edition of E-Cat News, Diamond R-4 Superintendent fails to mention the drug testing proposal which was one of the big ticket items at the most recent meeting of the R-4 Board of Education. Of course, there was also no mention of drug testing on the meeting's agenda. So much for the public's right to know.
It's arrogant for elected officials and the administrators they hire to determine they alone know what is best for the people and they will go along with it if all dissent is stopped beforehand.
It is not always elected officials to keep the public from knowing all of the information. Recently in The Turner Report I compared the coverage of the Neosho R-5 Board of Education meeting as written in The Joplin Globe and The Neosho Daily News. In the Globe's version, the dissent within the Neosho community concerning any financial proposal presented by the school board and administration was played up, while in the Daily's article it was barely touched on.
The same type of widely differing coverage was evident in the two newspapers' recent articles over the Carson and Barnes Circus visit to Neosho. The Globe mentioned that the circus was being criticized by PETA, an animal-rights organization for causing the death of a five-year-old elephant.
No controversy was mentioned at all in any of the Daily's coverage of the event. In fact, it appears that a top of page one article about the circus the day it was in town was written by circus publicists.
The tell-tale clue is the use of the phrase "From staff reports" for the byline. If it had truly been written by someone on the Daily's staff, it would have had a reporter's name attached to it.
The phrase "From staff reports" almost always indicates that it is a news release, written by someone who wants totally favorable coverage of whatever organization or activity is involved.
Sometimes, not a single letter of the news release is changed, but that phrase The only addition is the three words, "From Staff Reports" to make it look like the staff actually played a role in gathering the information for the story.
And it read like a press release with its circus is coming to town p.r. flack tone.
News releases play a valuable part in putting together newspapers. There is no way reporters can cover everything. My rule of thumb at The Carthage Press and The Lamar Democrat about news releases was that I would run them, but I would make it clear that the information was being provided by the organization or company. I would insert a few "according to a news relase from" in the story. The public needs that in order to be able to judge the source of the information.
Obviously, a press release from Carson and Barnes would not include any information about the allegations that had been leveled against the circus.
The allegations have mostly been made by animal rights groups, so that has to be taken into consideration, but the public can fairly judge if it is provided with all sides. The animal rights activists have publicized the fact that the USDA is investigating the circus for the death of Jennie, a five-year-old Asian elephant that contracted elephant herpes virus.
There are websites that note the USDA has investigated the circus a number of times for more than a decade, usually for allegedly not providing veterinary care to animals that needed it.
In July 1997, Cindy Machado, an investigator for the Marin, Colorado, Humane Society wrote in her report, "This is the worst case of neglect I have seen in my 12 years as an investigator. I watched animals become injured with blood dripping down their legs without being treated. There were ponies and horses with open, draining saddle sores, that were still being ridden."
Ms. Machado also noted that she saw elephants with "soccer ball-size boils" and a hippopotamus that had no access to water.
These allegations of violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act, some of which were noted in the Globe story, were pieces of information that the people of Neosho had a right to know so they could make an informed decision on whether to increase the profit for the Carson and Barnes Circus.
Instead the readers of the hometown newspaper were presented with a story either largely or completely written by a person whose job is to rake in every buck possible for the circus.
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Efforts to keep the public from having access to information appear to spreading all over Newton County. www.senecaforums.com , a website operated by the same people who give us www.neoshoforums.com and www.diamondtownforums.com , has reported the dismissal of a school employee there, allegedly because she posted items on the board. The website also mentions that a coach's decision to close middle school basketball practices and not allow parents to watch them will be discussed by the school board in closed session. That not only goes against the public's right to know, but if that information is accurate, it is a blatant violation of the Missouri Open Meetings Law.
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The third quarter report for Carthage-based Fortune 500 company Leggett & Platt has been issued and everything is upbeat. The company's news release (that's how you are supposed to do it) says it set an all-time record of $1.34 billion in quarterly sales, up $181 million and 16 percent over the third quarter in 2003.
Quarterly earnings were at a record 41 cents per diluted share. The news release credited "higher sales, ongoing consolidation, and cost reduction efforts."