But New Hampton J-Dean “Kowtows to No One”
Tony Brown, the longtime host of television’s “Tony Brown’s Journal” named yesterday to become dean of Hampton University’s Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications, said in local newspapers today that he hoped to avoid “altogether the sort of personal conflicts that have touched the school recently,” as Kerrie Frisinger put it in the Daily Press of Newport News, Va.
The last two heads of the Hampton journalism program left after clashes with Hampton President William R. Harvey, whom they termed a micromanager who discouraged journalism that put the university in a less-than-favorable light.
But Brown said in the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot: “I don’t share any fears, don’t have any doubts, about the backing of Dr. Harvey.”
And in the Daily Press he said, “I just want people to focus on one thing: Are we going to help these students and the families who sent these people to Hampton?”
Some observers told Journal-isms that they viewed Brown’s personality as at least as strong as Harvey’s, and predicted a short-term relationship.
Abiyi R. Ford, a film professor at Howard who was hired by Brown, was not one of them. But he said, “They picked up on someone that they can’t manage. Tony Brown is not an easy fellow to handle. He is steadfast in his beliefs. He thinks outside the envelope and he kowtows to no one,” Ford said.
At Howard, where Brown was the founding dean of the School of Communications, a post he held from 1971 to 1974, he “set precedents, he was a good promoter, he knew how to play to the eyes and ears of those who had power,” Ford continued. “He danced. He did not compromise his principles, but he used whatever was available to get his point across,” Ford said.
In today’s papers, Brown was taking more of conciliation.
“Brown said he was impressed by the support that Harvey and the Scripps Howard Foundation gave to the school,” Frisinger’s story continued.
“He said he saw opportunities to branch into online learning, satellite systems and feature films.
“‘I must confess that I’m tempted by the enormous resources to play around with some innovative possibilities,’ Brown said.
“The new dean said he would continue to produce his television and radio programs,” Frisinger wrote.
In the Pilot, Matthew Bowers added this:
“Brown said that while the mission of his new post is to turn out competent journalists, broadcasters and advertising professionals, the media world is changing, and predominantly black universities such as Hampton should be in the thick of things.
“‘Every day, there is a new Bill Gates born in America, who can take new technology and existing technology and create a technology weï¿œve never heard about,’ Brown said. ‘It’s a whole new world.'”
Journalists in Survey Say Standards Have Lowered
Nearly eight out of 10 participants in a union-sponsored survey of 400 television, newspaper and radio journalists said that media consolidation has led to a lowering of journalism standards, with the most serious problem facing the industry being too much emphasis on the bottom line, in the view of 83 percent of the participants.
The sponsoring unions were The Newspaper Guild, the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians — both affiliates of the Communications Workers of America — the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and the Writers Guild of America, East.
Congressional Democrats such as Maurice Hinchey of New York cited the study yesterday in urging the Federal Communications Commission to hold the line against mergers.
“Other top concerns in the survey include the influence of ratings or circulation on coverage and programming (82 percent); a loss of credibility with the public (79 percent); a declining quality of community coverage (74 percent); incomplete reporting and errors (73 percent), and too little focus on complex issues (72 percent), a news release said.
“Many of the survey participants cited understaffing (73 percent) and lack of time and resources to do a professional job (68 percent) as trends that are threatening quality news reporting today. More than half said that employee morale has worsened at their news organization within the past two years.”
The full report was to be made available at http://www.dpeaflcio.org.
Denver TV Station Joins NAHJ Parity Project
” KCNC-TV Denver, a CBS owned and operated station, announced today that it is the first TV station in the United States to partner with the National Association of Hispanic Journalists’ (NAHJ) Parity Project, a program to help increase diversity in television news coverage and newsrooms and to develop future minority broadcast journalists,” NAHJ announces.
“The NAHJ Parity Project aims to increase the number of Latinos in U.S. newsrooms and improve overall media coverage of the Latino community. Recent census figures show that 32 percent of Denver’s more than 500,000 residents are Latino. According to a recently released Radio-Television News Directors Association (RTNDA) survey, the percentage of minorities working in local television and radio news last year returned to previous levels above 20 percent.
“CBS 4 and NAHJ will co-sponsor community forums with many of Colorado’s Latino social and civic leaders to learn about local issues and opportunities affecting their communities. Community representatives will also work with the CBS 4 staff to offer recommendations on what it can do to improve coverage of Latinos.”
Chuck Stone, founding president of the National Association of Black Journalists, professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and former columnist for the Philadelphia Daily News, among other accomplishments, turns 80 today.
“In honor of his 80th birthday, a day of festivities at the library has been planned for former Daily News staffer Chuck Stone, one of the city’s most popular newspaper columnists from 1972 to 1991,” the Daily News wrote.
“Stone will appear at the Free Library today and this evening to sign copies of his new children’s book, ‘Squizzy the Black Squirrel: A Fabulous Fable of Friendship,’ which recently won a Skipping Stones Magazine Honor Award.
“‘Squizzy’ tells the story of a 7-year-old African-American boy who befriends a black squirrel in Fairmount Park and learns that people shouldn’t be judged by their color.
“. . . Years later, in 1980, Stone related this story in a letter to his son, Charles Stone III, after the boy faced racial discrimination at his summer camp.
The newspaper wrote this editorial yesterday:
“Former Daily News columnist Chuck Stone turns 80 tomorrow.
“Eighty. Can you believe it? To celebrate, he’ll be in Philadelphia to read and sign copies of his children’s book at the Free Library. Next month, he’ll be inducted into the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame.
“For 19 years here, he created Elysian pandemonium for his fans, wherein the excremental excesses of fulsome beliefs purveyed by others failed to traduce his insight.
“In other words, Chuck didn’t take no bull.
“He has permanent residence in our heart.”
Dissident Cuban Journalist Says U.S. Revoked Visas
“A Cuban dissident said the U.S. government revoked his visa after granting him political refugee status, prompting other opponents of Fidel Castro’s communist government to express concern they are losing support from the United States,” the Associated Press reports.
“Bernardo Arevalo Padron, a journalist, was granted asylum by the United States after being released earlier this year from a Cuban prison, where he served a six-year sentence on a contempt charge against Castro and Vice President Carlos Lage.
“Yet last week, the dissident said, he received a letter from the U.S. Interest Section in Havana, saying his visa had been revoked.”
“The letter accused him of cooperating with Cuban security officials, he said.
“Arevalo, who was a Cuban intelligence agent before he became a dissident in 1990, denied he was still working for Castro’s government.”
Hotline to Legal Help Set for Democratic Convention
“Almost every major political event in the last few years has had one thing in common: the arrest of, interference with or outright assault on journalists covering the news. To prevent or at least minimize these disruptions during the Democratic National Convention in Boston next week, a hotline has been established to ensure that cost-free legal assistance will be only a telephone call away,” announces the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
“In cooperation with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, attorneys with the law firm of Prince, Lobel, Glovsky & Tye LLP have volunteered to operate a 24-hour Media Hotline for credentialed journalists covering the convention. Police and other officials will cooperate with Hotline lawyers to minimize problems for journalists arrested or detained during demonstrations or other disturbances that occur during the convention.
“The Hotline number is (888) 428-7490, and will be available to all journalists carrying Democratic National Convention credentials throughout the convention.”
NAHJ to Honor Bailon, Portillo, Balli, Caruso-Cabrera
Gilbert Bailon, publisher and editor of Al Dia, the Dallas Morning News Spanish-language publication; Ernesto Portillo, Arizona Daily Star columnist; Cecilia Balli, staff writer of the Texas Monthly, and Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, anchor/reporter at CNBC, have been chosen for special honors by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
The winners are to be honored at NAHJ’s Noche de Triunfos Gala Sept. 16 at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Washington.
Bailon, winner of the Leadership Award, was “chosen for his leadership in the Hispanic community as well as in the mainstream media community,” an NAHJ release says. Portillo, who won as Frank del Olmo Print Journalist of the Year, “was chosen for his thought-provoking columns that are known for sparking debate on issues affecting both the Latino and non-Latino communities in Tucson, Arizona,” and Balli, winner of the Emerging Journalist of the Year Award, “was selected for her outstanding writing and reporting, particularly about the political history of the South Texas borderlands and the music and culture of the region.”
Caruso-Cabrera was chosen “for her outstanding writing and reporting as well as her polished and professional demeanor on camera. She was CNBC’s first Hispanic anchor in 2001 and is a regular contributor to Telemundo and NBC News.”
The news release also lists winners of NAHJ’s annual Professional Journalism Awards.
El Diario Claims to Outsell Hoy 2-to-1
New York’s Spanish-language El Diario La Prensa outsells the Tribune Co.’s Hoy 2 to 1 on newsstands, El Diario’s publisher, impreMedia, LLC announced today.
“A sample of 1,500 newsstand dealers in the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and Manhattan were asked to participate in the survey. A total of 969 newsstand dealers agreed to participate and to sign affidavits attesting to the average number of daily sales of each newspaper. The results of the survey showed an average of 12,180 daily sales for El Diario La Prensa and an average of 6,271 for Hoy at these newsstands.
“The results are surprising considering Hoy is claiming to have about twice the daily paid circulation of El Diario La Prensa,” said Douglas Knight, chairman and CEO of impreMedia, in the release.
Hoy is one of many efforts by English-language media to compete for the Spanish-language newspaper market.
At a panel in April at the joint convention of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and the Newspaper Association of America, Rossana Rosado, publisher of El Diario/La Prensa, seemed bemused by the attention from the English-language media.
“Newsrooms in the mainstream aren’t ready to cover our community,” she said. “It seems to me that’s an easy one to fix — easier than starting a new paper. . . . It takes cojones to come into a market where you are doing a poor job covering this community in your mainstream paper.”
Louis Sito leaving Tribune Co. after scandal (Newsday)
Julie Chen Reported Ready to Marry the Boss
Gossip columnist Liz Smith reports that Julie Chen, the host of CBS’s Big Brother series as well as co-anchor of CBS’s The Early Show, and Viacom co-president and co-COO Les Moonves, who heads the CBS and UPN networks, have decided to get married, although not in the next few weeks, and have purchased a home together in Beverly Hills,” reports RealityWorld.com.
“The romance between the on-air TV personality and her boss became public when Les Moonves’s wife Nancy filed for divorce last year.”
Cincy’s Courtis Fuller, Michelle Hopkins Reassigned
Courtis Fuller, the Cincinnati anchor and former board member of the National Association of Black Journalists who ran unsuccessfully for mayor but could not get his old job back, becomes primary weekend anchor at 6 and 11 p.m. in a shakeup at WCPO-TV, Jim Knippenberg reports in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
In another move at the station, four-year veteran Michelle Hopkins moves from mornings to noon anchor and a new position on the 5 and 5:30 p.m. news. “She’ll be a viewer advocate,” says news director Brennan Donnellan in the story. “She’ll be doing stories that answer viewers’ concerns or respond to viewers’ problems. We’re looking for that to be the cornerstone of the 5 and 5:30 newscasts.”
Greg Moore Weighs Appeal of Kobe Case Ruling
“The Colorado Supreme Court on Monday ordered that the transcript of a closed hearing in the Kobe Bryant case not be published, saying that the privacy of the alleged victim and the importance of preserving the state’s rape-shield law outweigh the media’s First Amendment rights,” Sean Kelly and Howard Pankratz report in the Denver Post.
“The Post is considering an appeal of the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. Post editor Greg Moore said the paper may appeal on principle because it opposes prior restraint.
“Whether the transcript is newsworthy and whether The Post would publish it is a separate issue, he said.”
“Moore said senior editors at The Post were ‘surprised and disappointed by the state Supreme Court’s decision. We believed precedent was on our side; it is rare for a court to dictate what a newspaper can and cannot publish. We are considering an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court based on the principle of journalistic independence.'”
Clinton Says Cosby Comments Help Race Dialogue
Former president Bill Clinton, promoting his memoir, “My Life,” says Bill Cosby’s recent comments about the behavior of some African Americans helps America’s racial dialogue. He was interviewed on racial issues by Senior Vice President Cassandra Butts of The Center for American Progress, described as “a nonpartisan research and educational institute dedicated to promoting a strong, just and free America that ensures opportunity for all.”
Butts asked:
“The comedian Bill Cosby’s recent remarks about personal responsibility in the African-American community have caused some controversy. Do you think such a discussion helps or hurts the broader discussion of race in America in its various complexities?
Clinton replied: “Absolutely helps. It helps because it helps for two reasons. First of all because I think that whenever you’re blaming other people for your problems — I know I’ve been there — whenever you’re blaming other people for your problems, even if you’re right, and in this case, non-blacks are responsible, or at least the history for a lot of the problems of the black community, you still have to be careful because it diverts your attention from what you can do to improve things.
“So what Cosby did was really good for the black community, because whether you agree with exactly how he said it or not, he said, okay, suppose we got a lot of problems that are other peoples’ fault, what about what we can do to fulfill our responsibilities, so it was a big plus.
“The second reason it was a plus is it is good politics because it removes an excuse from the members of the white community, who might not want to do more for black children, or for black economic development, who say, well they’re not trying to help themselves. Cosby takes the excuse away. So it was good in two ways. Cosby did a service to black America and to all Americans by doing that, by focusing black Americans on what they can do for their future and reminding white Americans that most black people are doing the very best they can to do everything they can and therefore we all ought to be working to overcome these disparities.”
