Cincinnati Professional Chapter
 Online OnPress

 June 13-19, 2004 ▪ A weekly online newsletter

 enews@cincyspj.org ▪ 550 subscribers and growing

SPJ begins online newsletter

 

Welcome to the first issue of Online OnPress, a compliment to our print-version monthly newsletter. Please bear with us as we explore a new way to communicate to our members, as well as with the Cincinnati and Dayton journalism community. If you’d rather not receive these updates, it’s not our intention to clutter your inbox. Please visit http://www.cincyspj.org/onlineonpress.htm to remove your e-mail from our list. If, on the other hand, you know others who might benefit or would like to receive these updates, please pass along the link. It’s easy to sign up (or be removed).

 

We hope you enjoy this new benefit and hope you find it useful. If you’d like to contribute an item or have comments on the new forum, please e-mail enews@cincyspj.org. We look forward to hearing from you.

 

Awards of Excellence winners announced, Hall of Fame gains three

 

Winners have been announced in the SPJ local contest. To see the complete list of Cincinnati Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists Awards of Excellence winners and a banquet wrap-up, plus view all judge’s comments visit our web page, http://www.cincyspj.org.

 

Freedom of information isn’t so free-flowing, audit finds

 

An audit of various government agencies around Ohio found nearly half had difficulty or failed to comply with state open records laws. In the largest project of its kind ever in Ohio, 90 reporters from 43 newspapers, two radio stations, the Associated Press, and two universities visited all 88 counties on April 21. They all asked for the same six documents -- all public records, according to the state's attorney general. Half the time, they went away empty-handed.

 

Here’s a little of what the audit found:

  • A school district in the Dayton area took down the license plate of a citizen who had asked for the treasurer's phone records.
  • A small-town police department flatly refused to provide access to reports, saying it was too much of a "headache."
  • Another demanded not only the requester's name, but social security number.
  • The mayor of Youngstown personally accosted someone asking to see his travel records -- and tape-recorded the conversation.
  • The Genoa police chief demanded identification and charged $2 for a woman just to look at the police log. After all, he said, the records were "not for just anyone who walks in off the street."
  • And two weeks ago, the Plain Dealer reported that Parma had established -- and quickly scrapped -- a policy requiring city employees to keep dossiers on people requesting records.

 

A complete look at the survey can be found on the Ohio Sunshine Project web page, http://www.spj.org/ohfoi/weblog/. You can also contact the Cincinnati Pro Chapter’s FOI chairperson, Gregory Korte at foi@cincyspj.org.

 

New York Times editorial page editor Gail Collins to speak

 

Cincinnati native Gail Collins will return to speak at 7 p.m. Monday in the Mercantile Library, 414 Walnut St. in downtown Cincinnati. Collins is editorial page editor at The New York Times. She’ll be speaking as part of the library’s second annual Harriet Beecher Stowe Lecture series and will be discussing "Writing to Change the World.” Cost: $20, includes hors d'oeuvres and wine. Call (513) 621-0717. www.mercantilelibrary.com

 

ArtWorks seeks person to work on literary project

 

ArtWorks is a non-profit organization that provides job training and employment for teens in arts-related fields. Each summer ArtWorks hires close to 150 teens from all over the Greater Cincinnati area to learn job skills and work on art projects with meaningful and tangible outcomes.

 

ArtWorks has one position left which needs filled for this summer’s session.  ArtWorks is seeking a Project Manager for a literary arts project called ISSUES. The program lasts six weeks: June 21 – July 30, 2004 (Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.). For more information contact Colleen Stanton, ArtWorks’s program director at (513) 333-0388 or artworks.colleen@fuse.net. Or visit www.artworkscincinnati.com

 

Next SPJ Board Meeting:
12 p.m., Friday, June 25,2004
Cincinnati CityBeat offices
811 Race St., 5th Floor

July board meeting:
12 p.m. July 23, 2004
Main Cincinnati Public Library 800 Vine Street, Meeting Room 3B

About SPJ

The Society of Professional Journalists works to improve and protect journalism. For more than 95 years, SPJ has been dedicated to encouraging a climate in which journalism can be practiced freely and fully, stimulating high standards of ethical behavior in the practice of journalism, and perpetuating a free press as the cornerstone of our nation and our liberty.

Board Meetings, fourth Friday every month (except August)


Meet the Board: http://www.cincyspj.org/board.html
To contact the entire chapter board at once: board@cincyspj.org
Join SPJ: http://www.cincyspj.org/join.html
National SPJ: http://spj.org
Cincinnati’s chapter: http://www.cincyspj.org

This message was sent from the Cincinnati Professional Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. Periodic messages are sent as a way to communicate to its membership and other journalists about programs, news and events related to their field and the local SPJ chapter. If you would prefer not to belong to this list please visit this link to be removed: http://www.cincyspj.org/onlineonpress.htm. For more information about SPJ or to contact a member, please send an e-mail to info@cincyspj.org.