Slain Photog’s Husband Found Guilty
“After four days of deliberation, an Alameda County jury today found a 41-year-old Oakland man guilty of second-degree murder in the slaying of his wife, Luci Houston, an award-winning photo journalist at the San Jose Mercury News,” the Mercury News reports today.
“Raymond Houston, who has been jailed since his arrest nearly two years ago, faces up to 40 years to life in prison. He was also convicted of the use of a gun, a charge that carries 25 years to life in prison.”
Posted October 22, 2003
Hampton U. Seizes Student Newspaper
The administration of Hampton University seized the press run of the student newspaper, The Hampton Script, this morning after the students did not place a letter from the administration on the front page as the administration requested, editor Talia Buford told Journal-isms.
At 10:53 a.m., she said, two people from University Trucking Services came to the student newspaper office and loaded the 6,500 copies of the paper on handtrucks and took them away, presumably to a storage facility, she said.
At an evening news conference off campus, Buford said the administration offered the students only one alternative at a meeting late today: to republish the paper with the administration’s letter on the front page. The student staff decided not to distribute the publication at all if that were the only alternative, she said.
Faculty advisers to the paper could not be reached for comment.
The incident began after a city health inspection of the university’s cafeteria found more than 30 health code violations and the cafeteria “was about to be shut down,” as the local newspaper, the Daily Press, reported.
By Thursday, Hampton Health District officials found just five violations, four of them noncritical, and “‘the city applauded us for a job well done,’ said Charles A. Wooding, who oversees HU’s cafeteria operations,” the paper reported.
On Friday, Buford said, she received a call from a faculty adviser to the paper saying that Acting President Dr. JoAnn W. Haysbert wanted “a letter to the HU community” on the cafeteria issue on the front page of The Script. Buford said she asked another adviser the policy about running letters on the front page, and was told that only news stories go on that page. So the students put the letter on page 3, with an alert to readers on page 1. Buford said she was then told that the issue would be pulled, and this morning it was.
The Scripps Howard Foundation committed $2.3 million for the development of journalism at the historically black Virginia university and funded a new journalism building there. Last year, professor Charlotte Grimes left, saying, “There were fundamental differences between me and the president [William R. Harvey] over the mission, the vision and what we should teach and my role in it.” Harvey, who Grimes had said told her a mission statement for the school “should reflect his view that journalism is ‘to do good, not muckraking,'” insisted there was a misunderstanding and that he, too, wanted the school to produce quality journalists.
The student newspaper does not come under the school of journalism, however.
Harvey has since gone on sabattical and a director of the school, Christopher Campbell, was chosen this summer.
A news conference was later scheduled for 8:30 p.m. at 110 Pembroke in downtown Hampton. The Hampton Script can be reached at (757) 728-6215.
University statement on cafeteria violations
Navajo Paper Awaits Vote on Independence
The weekly Navajo Times in Window Rock, Ariz., is expecting a vote from the Navajo tribal council on Thursday on whether the newspaper can fulfill the dream of many Native journalists — independence from the tribal government. Publisher Tom Arviso Jr. says he is “pretty optimistic” that the vote will go his way.
“They realize a government shouldn’t be running a newspaper,” Arviso told Journal-isms.
The weekly newspaper has had little recent interference from the tribe, he said, but “as long as you’re owned by the nation, there’s always that suspicion,” Arviso said.
The Gallup Independent in New Mexico reported last month that the tribe’s Economic Development Committee “passed a resolution 6-0-0 supporting the Times’ request to become a private enterprise, with a $500,000 investment from the tribe.
“The Times incorporated cannot be bought by any other company and the tribe would see dividends from its investment, said Tom Arviso, Jr., the paper’s publisher,” the Independent reported.
“Currently, the Times brings in $1.8 million in revenue, with expenditures topping $1.5 million.”
Arviso said many on the tribal council were hoping that the paper, which has a full-time staff of 14 and a circulation of 22,500, would become a daily that would compete with the Gallup Independent, which he said “just sensationalizes all the Navajo misery.”
Zambia’s Founder Asks Better Africa Coverage
Dr. Kenneth D. Kaunda, the founding president of Zambia who held office from 1964 to 1991, urged U.S. journalists last night to appreciate that “Africa is not a country,” but a continent of more than 50 nations, and that “Africa is more than the sum of its problems.”
Kaunda, who is now the “African President-in Residence” at Boston University, addressed the William Monroe Trotter Group of African American columnists after dinner at Swett’s restaurant in Nashville, the city where the group held its annual meeting.
The tendency to treat Africa as a single entity was illustrated perhaps most famously in President Bush’s State of the Union address, when he said, “The British government has learned Saddam Hussein has recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa,” when the country in question was Niger.
Kaunda told the group that, “The whole picture of Africa is a portrait of a place that is more about hope and opportunity than war and famine, or disease and despair. Stories about the facts and figures of Africa’s shortcomings as well as stories about fatalities from war and famine have been written about ad nauseum. There is another side to the story and it is that Africa is on the move. How far and how fast it moves will depend on a number of factors, principal of which are leadership on the continent and cooperation from other countries.
“We do not have to be propagandists, as the story of Africa’s potential is strong enough to stand on its own,” he continued. “What we do need is journalists committed to being ‘fair and balanced,’ not in the Fox network sense, but in the spirit of Monroe Trotter,” the early-20th century African American publisher of the Boston Guardian who challenged Woodrow Wilson during a White House visit.
Kaunda, who has set up a foundation to help AIDS orphans, applauded the Bush administration’s $15 billion commitment to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in Africa, and concluded his speech by singing, as he has on other occasions, “in the name of great Africa/We shall fight and conquer AIDS.”
The Boston University “president-in-residence” program has been criticized as a vehicle for giving shelter to onetime dictators. However, the university drew six former African heads of state to the campus in April to discuss attracting capital and business to the continent. Another “African Presidential Roundtable” is scheduled for April 27 and 28.
Marc Morial Wants Voting Rights Act as ’04 Issue
Marc Morial, the former New Orleans mayor who this summer became president of the National Urban League, urged African American columnists to help make extension of the Voting Rights Act, a key provision of which expires in 2007, an issue in the 2004 presidential election.
“We need that to be an issue in 2004,” Morial told the William Monroe Trotter Group Monday at the Freedom Forum’s Diversity Institute in Nashville. “It will be like the affirmative action debate. Do you need it? Why do you need it?” The issue can be used to educate the public on the conflicting state laws on whether ex-felons are permitted to vote, he said.
“When Congress amended and strengthened the Voting Rights Act in 1982, it extended for 25 more years–until 2007–the preclearance requirement of Section 5, the authority to use federal examiners and observers, and some of the statute’s language minority requirements,” as the Justice Department explains . “So, for those sections to extend past 2007, Congress will have to take action.”
Meanwhile, Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., has worked on a bill that would allow released felons to vote in federal elections.
“According to David Bositis, senior analyst for the Joint Center for Political [and Economic] Studies, the leading think tank on minority voter politics, 13 states practice felon disenfranchisement, with a current prison population, largely in the South, that is 54 percent African-American,” the Baltimore Sun has reported.
Such voters could change the outcome of elections in those states, Morial said, urging a debate on establishing a federal standard for voting eligibility.
Also from the Trotter Group meeting:
Study to Show Why More Blacks Die from Cancer (Black America Web)
Tonyaa Weathersbee: Patriot Act Could Prove Costly for Blacks (Black America Web)
Akron Editor Asks “Respect” for Same-Sex Unions
The Akron Beacon Journal announced that Wendy Horowitz and Julie Bowers exchanged vows last month. And as the paper’s public editor, Mike Needs, noted, “Dozens of dailies, including many big-city newspapers, print these announcements, but few in Ohio have taken this step.”
Debra Adams Simmons, named editor of the paper in July, said in Needs’ column that by running such announcements, “We are neither judging nor condoning. We are the messenger, acknowledging a celebration in the lives of a local family. It’s important for a newspaper to respect the community it serves, and that community includes gays and lesbians.”
Needs went on to quote a number of readers who disagreed with the decision.
But, he concluded, “As Wendy Horowitz and Julie Bowers celebrate their union, they ask only that it be treated with dignity and respect. I believe compassionate, welcoming readers will do just that.”
Tracy Townsend Leaves Chicago CBS Station
“With Diann Burns finally ensconced at WBBM-Channel 2, it’s over and out for Tracy Townsend after nearly three years as an on-again off-again news anchor at the CBS-owned station,” Robert Feder reports in the Chicago Sun-Times.
“Townsend, 38, who lost her 5 and 10 p.m. anchor seat when Burns signed on from WLS-Channel 7 earlier this month, had been off on vacation while she considered her options. Channel 2 officials said they were hopeful that she would agree to stay on as a special-projects reporter and fill-in anchor.
“But on Tuesday, Joe Ahern, president and general manager of Channel 2, confirmed that through her agent, Peter Goldberg, Townsend had asked for and was granted an early release from her contract,” Feder reports.
According to her station bio, “Townsend joined CBS 2 Chicago in January 2001. Previously, she worked at KCTV, the CBS affiliate in Kansas City, Mo., where she had served as the 6:00 PM and 10:00 PM anchor since 1994. Townsend joined KCTV as a weekend news anchor in 1993 and had reported on everything from Democratic and Republican conventions to the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton, Colo.”
New Republic Editor Fired From ESPN Job
“New Republic scribe Gregg Easterbrook has joined Rush Limbaugh in an exclusive, if not sought-after, club. He became the second head to roll at ESPN after making racially insensitive comments,” columnists Rush & Milloy report in the New York Daily News.
“Easterbrook was accused of anti-Semitism over remarks he made in a review of Quentin Tarantino’s latest Miramax film, ‘Kill Bill.’ In his blog on the New Republic Web site, Easterbrook said that ‘Jewish executives’ like Miramax’s Harvey Weinstein and Disney CEO Michael Eisner ‘worship money above all else.’ Disney owns both Miramax and ESPN, for whose Web site Easterbrook wrote a football column, ‘Tuesday Morning Quarterback.’ “
ESPN called Easterbrook’s remarks “highly offensive and intolerable,” and a network representative said the decision was made in-house, and not on Eisner’s instructions, the columnists reported.
J-Lo Likely to Appear on Sister’s Talk Show
“Jennifer Lopez is lousy at keeping secrets,” writes Richard Huff in the New York Daily News.
“Weeks after word surfaced that she would produce a one-hour daily talk show, Universal Television has officially revealed the program.
“As first reported by The Daily News, Lopez’ untitled series will be a ‘View’-like show for younger female audiences and have her sister Lynda as co-host. It’ll launch in fall 2004.
“Lopez, who recently had to deal with fallout from her postponed wedding to Ben Affleck — another poorly hidden secret — may occasionally appear on the weekday series as well.
“‘When her schedule permits, she may appear,’ said a Universal spokesman. ‘She’s very hands-on with all of her projects.'”
Calif. Paper Plans Hispanic Lifestyle Magazine
The Desert Sun in Palm Beach, Calif., is the latest daily to make a special effort to reach Hispanic readers.
The paper advertised within the Gannett Co. for an editor and a design/graphics editor “for a new monthly lifestyle magazine for the Hispanic community.”
Applicants were urged to contact Executive Editor Steve Silberman.
New Era Seen for Hispanic Publishers
The announcement that the Lozano family wants to buy back the 50 percent stake that Tribune Co. owns in the Los Angeles Spanish-language daily La Opinión represents the end of an era for Hispanic newspapers, writes Mark Fitzgerald in Editor & Publisher.
“Increasingly, Hispanic publishers no longer rely on intuition alone to grow their business, but augment their insights into the community with hard-nosed database marketing.
“Perhaps the biggest sea change for Latino papers, though, is their independent access to capital. Investors are increasingly willing to sink serious money in Hispanic papers,” Fitzgerald writes.
Bernard Goldberg Back With “Arrogance”
Former CBS correspondent Bernard Goldberg, whose “Bias” book accusing the news media of a liberal predisposition became a best-seller, has a follow-up called “Arrogance.”
“But unlike in his first book,” writes Howard Kurtz in the Washington Post, “in which Goldberg mounted an argument — a very personal argument, when it came to CBS — that journalists lean to the left on many issues, ‘Arrogance’ has a smug, us-and-them tone captured by its subtitle: ‘Rescuing America From the Media Elite.'”
“There’s no question the media elites salivate more when they’re going after Republicans and conservatives,” Goldberg writes, according to Kurtz, saying they would probably admit it “after a few drinks.”
Gore’s All-News Channel Won’t Use L-Word
“Former Vice President Al Gore and a group of investors have plans to launch an all-news channel, but it won’t be a liberal alternative to Fox News. Instead, it will be aimed at the under-25 crowd,” Richard Linnett wrote last week in Advertising Age.
“The Gore-led group of investors is about two weeks away from forming an agreement with Vivendi Universal Entertainment to acquire Canadian-based cable network Newsworld International for about $70 million, said an insider at Universal Television Networks, the Vivendi unit that currently operates the network,” Linnett’s report said.
Solutions Sought for “Bad, Ugly” Image of Africa
A four-hour meeting during the Congressional Black Caucus Legislative Conference “brought together media professionals from a wide range of outlets, including the BBC, AllAfrica.com, Pacifica Radio, and Voice Of America, along with community activists, and policy groups” to discuss the image the news media presents of Africa, reports Malik Russell on blackcommentator.com. “Journalists from African American and African news organizations were eager to increase exchanges of news, resources, and content.
?’The image we have of Africa is the bad, ugly and the gruesome,’ said Dr. Inonge Mbikusita-Lewanika, Zambian Ambassador to the United States. ‘Anything good, beautiful, or progressive, no one (in media) will cover that,’ she said, dryly.”
George Curry, editor of BlackPressUSA.com, “called for more African Americans to ‘go to Africa,’ noting that he receives trip offers every week to visit other nations. He also called for African Americans to move beyond the current political paradigm that thrusts the majority of responsibilities for all of Black America?s ills, including negative media portrayals, upon Civil Rights groups. ‘There are enough other groups’ of educated and organized African Americans ‘to work through to become more effective,’ said Curry,” Russell reported.
“The participants also agreed to establish an annual forum for journalists, publishers, and news media organizations that provide media coverage of Africa and Black America. Additional projects include increased news training and exchange opportunities between African and African American media, as well as development of an organization that will syndicate broadcast journalism programs catering to the African and African American communities.
“While many at the roundtable focused on the media?s incessantly negative portrayal of Africa, or the progressive media?s lack of resources, Black media expert Dr. Todd Burroughs offered a different perspective. ‘I?m very optimistic,’ he said. ‘WHUT (Howard University Television), has the potential to have five channels on the digital spectrum. We could have a Black C-Span just on one of those five channels,’ said Burroughs,” according to the report.
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