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The latest on Alcoa
posted at 2010-08-04 21:07 | Last modified 2010-08-04 23:12
Whoops…
For a week there, it looked like WRAL was jumping on the FOIA bandwagon with Alcoa. On July 27th, reporter Bruce Mildwurf and assistant news director Aysu Basaran filed a public records request to UNC-TV (that’s here), asking for copies of all emails to or from the station in regard to the series on Alcoa.
That seems an odd move by a station whose owner and CEO, Jim Goodmon, has been a high-profile critic of UNC-TV’s decision to comply with state lawmakers’ records request in the first place.
Today, something even odder happened: the station withdrew its public records request. I asked WRAL News Director Rick Gall why.
“We took another look at the request, and upon further review, decided that there’s the potential that that request could run contrary to the reporter shield law, which we feel very strongly about. And upon reviewing that, decided to withdraw the request so there wouldn’t be that conflict.”
Internal emails show UNC-TV was preparing to comply with the request, but Gall doesn’t think the station has sent over any records yet. “I know there’s been some documents that Eszter [Vajda of UNC-TV] had gathered. And I think Bruce has some of those and has looked at them to some extent. The extent to which I’m not sure.”
Is that why the request was filed?
Gall says the request was made as the station was trying to figure out how it would cover this complex story. “Alcoa’s requesting something, and it’s our thought, if that’s going to be released publicly, well, in the interest of trying to cover this story and its many layers, should we not have that?”
“We tried to narrow our request so it wouldn’t [conflict with the shield law],” he went on, “but after giving it some more thought, decided there’s that potential that, depending what’s in the e-mail correspondence that we requested, there could be a conflict. So after reviewing that, we decided, wait a minute, let’s take a step back. And hence the decision to withdraw, because we feel very strongly about the shield law.”
Did Jim Goodmon play any part in that decision?
“I’ll let Jim speak for Jim.”
Jim Goodmon confirmed he’d been involved in the decision to file the request, as well as the decision to rescind it. “We only asked for the emails,” he said, pointing out that the station’s request was far narrower than Alcoa’s. “But the more I thought about it, the more I thought it was encroaching on the reporters shield law,” he said, adding, “I didn’t want my name in there with Alcoa.”
Not just UNC-TV
Meantime, just about every news outlet in Raleigh got a copy yesterday of a draft review of the Alcoa series by UNC Journalism school professors. The sender? A PR rep for Alcoa. From the e-mail:
“Because the UNC-TV series is being distributed widely by Alcoa’s opponents, we believe it is important for people to understand that independent journalism experts have raised serious concerns about the credibility of the stories. Viewers need to know the series has serious flaws and should not be taken at face value.”
The report is here, and as I’d mentioned before, it’s not gentle.
What struck me as odd was where Alcoa GOT this draft report. It wasn’t from UNC-TV. Alcoa got the report as the result of a records request made to the UNC J-school last week. The author of that request was Hugh Stevens.
If you’re interested in First Amendment issues, that name probably ought to ring a bell. Stevens is Counsel Emeritus for the NC Press Association. But he’s also the immediate past president of the NC Open Government Coalition – and he’s managing what he described as a raft of open records requests on Alcoa's behalf. He confirmed he had made the journalism school request at Alcoa's behest.
On its face, this one’s a head-spinner: The counsel emeritus for the NCPA is filing a public records request against an NC news outlet? But in the context of open records, there’s logic to it. As Stevens pointed out to me, UNC-TV opened that door when it complied with the Sen J2 request to produce its records as a government agency. They could have fought it, and Stevens thinks the station probably would have won. But instead, station management decided to capitulate.
So if you were wondering whether UNC-TV's decision would set any precedent or affect anything, well, there you go.
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