Blogtown, PDX

Monday, February 4, 2008

Media Oregonian Wins Another Bullshit Award

Posted by Matt Davis on Mon, Feb 4 at 9:54 AM

Editor & Publisher magazine has named the Oregonian’s Editor Sandy Rowe and Executive Editor Peter Bhatia “Editors of the Year.”

I’ve stuck with the paper largely because of the job that they’ve done,” says Richard Read, a 26-year Oregonian staffer and a Pulitzer winner. “Sandy and Peter had always put a great emphasis on a beat approach, expertise on a beat as opposed to having a lot of GA’s around.”

In my experience, that’s not true. Of course, Read would know better, having been gathering cobwebs at the paper over a quarter of a century. But it’s incredibly rare that I’ll see an Oregonian reporter at any “pivotal” meeting. Take, for example, the mayor’s racial profiling committee (they’re yet to send one down, in over a year), the controversial Street Access For Everyone committee, which this year made it illegal to sit or lie on downtown’s sidewalks (again, no reporters at any of the committee meetings) or the ongoing meetings in Old Town to decide where to site a day access center for the homeless (nope, nada…).

How this embodies “an emphasis on a beat approach,” I’m not sure.

The reality is this: The Oregonian is a booster paper for Portland. Its editorials are written with boosterism in mind. Its reporters are kept in the dark about their beats, and moved on whenever they become too knowledgable and as such, a threat to their editors. The worst thing is, they all know it. But what’s a reporter to do?

The reason the Oregonian never sends any reporters to any committee meetings is because it knows the outcome of those committees in advance. It’s running “democracy” in this town. And everybody knows it. If you’d like to blow the whistle on the Oregonian’s bullshit newsroom, call me on 503 294 0840. I won’t mention your name and you won’t need to, either.

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Comments

Congratulations! You've become Willamette Week! Enjoy your slide into irrelevance. And do keep us posted on the office potted plant.

Posted by Gadget | February 4, 2008 5:06 PM

You're right.

[cries. shoots self.]

Posted by Matt Davis | February 4, 2008 5:23 PM

Wow, Matt, could you possibly sound any more petty?

Don't worry. We all know Read knows better.

Posted by Dan Ravaged | February 4, 2008 8:45 PM

Well, Rich Read did win a Pulitzer a couple of years ago, but I guess that is bullshit when compared to having a perfect attendance record at City Council meetings.

Posted by Bob | February 4, 2008 8:52 PM

Few in this town are going to defend The Oregonian, including myself. It has, like most papers in this nation, been slowly devolving into little more than a local TV news show in print.

Nonetheless, calling The Oregonian a booster for Portland is about as ludicrous as it gets. Have you actually read The Oregonian in the past few years? It doesn't sound like it from this rant.

Posted by Booster Seats For Portland | February 4, 2008 9:16 PM

I'm underwhelmed by how thin The O is. If you take out squibs, wire copy and syndication, there really isn't a whole lot of staff-written pieces in it. This isn't something unique to The O, every local daily in the country is contending with the challenge of very big profit margins becoming only big profit margins, and investors who don't like that direction. Still, it just looks kind of sad to see big type and big photos on narrow sheets with lots of filler, as though it were written by a student trying to pad a one-page essay with only six sentences.

Posted by James X. | February 4, 2008 10:44 PM

bob: What use is a Pulitzer if you can't get an erection?

Posted by Matt Davis | February 5, 2008 7:40 AM

Matt,

Even as an Oregonian contributor I don't feel motivation to defend the paper per se. But I've been to lots of committee meetings at which there was an Oregonian reporter and no Mercury reporter. And that's not the only way to measure reportage anyway.

I also disagree about the O being a mere booster for Portland. If anything, I'd like to see the paper take stronger stands on the issues.

What James says in the last comment has some validity: It's too bad the paper has to rely on wire services. But again, that's the case at any paper. What I think we'll see in the future that isn't necessarily so bad, though, is fewer staffers and more freelanced work. That's not a loss of journalistic integrity. It just means they're not paying so much in benefits.

Posted by Brian Libby | February 5, 2008 10:13 AM

Aww, come on, give the Oregonian a break. ANY newspaper that uses sports as headlines knows what really maters, right?

Posted by Dale | February 6, 2008 5:37 PM

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