Minneapolis (August 16, 2007) - The Minnesota News Council upheld a complaint today that the Minnesota Daily was unfair in using local artist Mari Newman to introduce a review of the play "The Mad Woman of Chaillot." The vote was 10-4. The News Council also voted 11-3 to uphold a complaint that the review was unfair in how it described the character and activities of Ms. Newman.

Newman, known for her colorfully decorated home in South Minneapolis, complained to the News Council after she saw the May theater review that contained what she said were offensive descriptions of her character. Newman complained that her inclusion in the article was "politically incorrect" and "cheap." Newman also complained that the use of her first and last name, as well as the location of her residence in the article was unnecessary.

The News Council denied a third complaint that the use of Newman’s first and last name, as well as the location of her residence in the review was unfair. The vote was 10-3, with one abstention.

The publishers of the Minnesota Daily attended the hearing, and defended their inclusion of Newman in its review of "The Madwoman of Chaillot." "The author, Sarah Miller, drew parallels to real life, where readers could relate to the play and its message… Miller used people from the Twin Cities, including Newman to speak critically about societies that label people ‘crazy,’ " said Editor-in-Chief Emily Banks. "The words used to describe Newman were subjective and intended to communicate nonconformity, or extreme eccentricity," noted Banks.

"There’s an underlying negative tone to this review, it goes beyond colorful creativity," said media member Kerri Miller.

Banks, defending the review, told council members that the review, taken as a whole is meant to celebrate eccentric, colorful women, like the play’s main character. "The article wasn’t meant to attack Ms. Newman," said Banks.

The council members agreed that Newman, whose home and art has been featured in past news coverage, is a public figure. "Newman’s history of being in the media spotlight made her a public figure subject to public critique," commented Banks.

However, most Council members believed that the inclusion of Newman in the theater review was unnecessary.

"I always tell my journalism students ‘Never forget that you’re writing about real people,’ " said media member Steve Schild. "I don’t think the Daily did that here."

Al Zdon, a public member who voted to deny all three complaints, did not think the review was unfair. "I don’t see a problem with what the Daily wrote," said Zdon. "Perhaps it was not well-written, but that’s fairly common in journalism."

April 19, 2007

News Council denies complaint that Bemidji Pioneer was unfair in running news story about a full-page ad the same day it appeared, but upholds complaint that the story on Red Lake Reservation was unfair to those who ran the ad

MINNEAPOLIS - The Minnesota News Council denied a complaint today that the Bemidji Pioneer newspaper was unfair in running a news story about a same-day, full-page ad that said DFL politicians were buying votes from Red Lake Reservation residents by funneling state financial support to them. The vote was 10-3.

The News Council upheld a complaint that the page-one news story was unfair in not including views of those whom opponents of DFLers who were interviewed about the ad and who said, among other things, that critics of the relationship between the state and the reservation were racist. The vote was 9-4.

The complaints came from a group calling itself Citizens for Truth in Government. The group said it was non-partisan. The ad and news story ran on October 25, 2006, two weeks before the last election. The group said the newspaper was unfair charging it for ad space and then giving free expression in the news story to those the ad criticized.

The News Council strongly backed the newspaper’s right to exercise its judgment in doing a same-day story on an ongoing controversy. The Council also criticized the newspaper’s failure to do a balanced story. Several members said that the news story included a gratuitous editorial opinion that the ad’s indictment of DFL candidates "undermines its statement" that the group is non-partisan.

The Pioneer’s editor, Molly Miron, who wrote the news story, acknowledged that she "should have" allowed the placers of the ad to respond to accusations that they were racist. She said she called the head of the group but was not able to reach him.

Public member Tom Forsythe, a communications executive at General Mills, said the newspaper could have delayed publishing both the ad and the news story until the reporter could gather material that would provide balance.

Media member Dave Beal, retired business columnist of the Pioneer Press, said the news story served readers well by appearing on the same day as the ad: "It functions as an ad for the ad." Several members said the news story stated the ad’s main points more clearly and briefly than the ad did. But public member Tom Peterson, a Minneapolis attorney, said that people who read the news story before reading the ad could come to the ad thinking it was filled with errors.

The News Council’s determinations carry no sanctions; they are advisory, and the hearing process is voluntary. The Council was founded in 1970 and is an independent nonprofit organization with 24 voting members, half of them journalists, half laypersons. All members represent only themselves.

More info:
Sarah Bauer, Interim Director
(612) 341-9357
sarah.bauer@news-council.org

Minneapolis (Feb. 15, 2007) - A complaint against the Ely Echo by two Ely school officials over a Halloween party photo was denied by the Minnesota News Council today. A separate complaint by two Winona State University professors against the Winona Post and Shopper was upheld.

Ely School Superintendent Thomas Bruels and Ely High School Principal Joselyn Murphy complained after the Echo published a photo of local children at a Halloween party that included a caption in which the children described themselves as a "dead superintendent," "a superintendent and principal killer and victim," and a "dead principal." Bruels and Murphy said the Echo should not have published the photo and caption, which referred to them directly, in light of recent national incidents of school violence.

The Echo did not attend the hearing, but Editor Anne Swenson wrote in a Nov. 11, 2006 editorial that "the significance of publishing this photo and caption was to bring awareness to the community of the potential for violence which exists in the world and this community."

News Council members voted 9 to 1, with one abstention, to deny the complaint. Several members said while not unfair to Murphy and Bruels, the photo and caption were published in poor taste.

"The paper acted in poor judgment using the quotes," said public member Cathy Kennedy.

Media member Larry Werner was the lone dissenter. "There is no question in my mind that it is ‘unfair’ to the only superintendent and [high school] principal in Ely to run a picture depicting children dressed as a dead superintendent and principal."

The News Council also heard a complaint by two Winona State University professors, Susan and Tim Hatfield, against the Winona Post. The Hatfields complained after a Sept. 6, 2006 story challenged the validity and credibility of a survey prepared by Susan Hatfield to evaluate the performance of Winona School Superintendent Paul Durand.

The Post published quotes from two people, stating that the Hatfield survey was "plagiarized," and did not meet academic research standards. The Hatfields, although interviewed for the story, were not informed of the plagiarism claim, and did not have the opportunity to respond to the charge before the front-page story was published. They asserted that the survey was not plagiarized, but rather adapted from a standard superintendent evaluation used by several school districts. The Hatfields said the paper acted unfairly by failing to investigate the accusations made against them and by failing to ask them to respond.

Responding to the Hatfields’ complaint, Winona Post Editor Fran Edstrom wrote in a letter, "The role of the reporter is to report that there is an argument and explain it to the public, acting as a medium for both sides of the issue, not to attempt to verify that one side is correct and the other is not." Edstrom maintained that the story was reported fairly and accurately. The Winona Post did not attend the hearing.

The News Council voted 9 to 1 to uphold the Hatfields’ complaint.

"The reporter had an obligation to tell the Hatfields there was an allegation of plagiarism during the interview," said media member Wendy Wyatt. "If Susan’s quotes had been in the story, it would have read quite differently," said media member Kerri Miller. "The reader would have known there was a dispute regarding the charges of plagiarism."

ST. PAUL (Dec. 14, 2006) - A complaint against the Star Tribune by the former mayor of Roseville, John Kysylyczyn, was denied today by the Minnesota News Council. The vote was 11-to-0 with one abstention.

Kysylyczyn, mayor of Roseville from 2000 to 2003, said that the Star Tribune unfairly editorialized in a July 23, 2006 news story when it used the word "antics" to characterize his administration. The news story focused on current hostility between elected officials in the City of Maplewood.

The Star Tribune eliminated two other complaints by Kysylyczyn, acknowledging that it should have called him for comment in stories that criticized him. The newspaper also said it has told its staff to call Kysylyczyn whenever a future story casts him in a negative light.

Representing the Star Tribune, Kevin Duchschere, team leader for the paper’s St. Paul bureau, justified the use of the word "antics" to characterize Kysylyczyn’s time in office by noting that the newspaper used the word in the past to describe the behavior of former Governors Rudy Perpich and Jesse Ventura, former Minneapolis City Council Member Barbara Carlson and form U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone. The newspaper said the word applied to "colorful, controversial and unorthodox behavior by a political figure."

Most council members found no fault in the Star Tribune’s use of the word "antics" given several examples the newspaper offered at the hearing. At a rally criticizing him, the newspaper said, Kysylyczyn paraded through the crowd with a sign that read: "The mayor is a bard" and "Death to the mayor." He also tried, the newspaper said, to have himself appointed editor of the Roseville newsletter, so that more news of the city council would be published.

News Council member Jane Berg, a public relations specialist, said she thought the Star Tribune should have published one such example, to support the use of "antics." The story offered none.

The Star Tribune used Kysylyczyn’s name in the story, said Jeff Rush, editor of the newspaper’s north suburban section, to reflect a time when Roseville’s city government was in turmoil. Duchschere said that three years after Kysylyczyn left office, his name is still synonymous with controversial leadership, and Roseville is an easy reference point for reporters writing about contentious suburban politics.

CONTACT:
Sarah Bauer, Interim Director
P: 651.341.9357
E: sarah.bauer@news-council.org

Minneapolis (Oct. 19, 2006) - Two complaints by the Minneapolis City Council about a KSTP-TV news story that said the city wrongfully demolished a house in the East Phillips neighborhood were upheld today by lopsided votes at a Minnesota News Council public hearing.

The complaints said that the story about the demolition process was inaccurate and that the story unfairly identified City Council Member Gary Schiff as having "spearheaded" the demolition. The News Council vote on the first complaint was 16-3, and on the second, 16-3.

The house - designated as condemned - was bought nonetheless by Dan Larson, who has a small business buying, rehabbing and selling homes. Plans he submitted for fixing this house were rejected by the City Council as recommended by the city inspection staff. The staff estimated that proper repairs would cost $240,000 and that Larson was proposing to spend $140,000.

The news story was broadcast on August 23, almost five months after the demolition order from the city, and a month or so after the demolition itself.

The story said that the city had its own plans for the property. Schiff said that when the reporter interviewed him she accused him of conspiring with a developer to clear the way for upscale housing. He said she refused to look at documents that he said would explain the demolition process.

Schiff told the News Council that the city had no plans, it merely dealt with a condemned property in a routine way. The committee he serves on considers three to six demolition cases a month, he said: "We get only the worst of the worst of the worst." He said that the police had received 52 calls to the property in the year past, and that the city staff rated Larson’s work substandard, pointing to Larson’s having covered windows with aluminum siding, for example, in previous projects.

In the news story Schiff told the reporter he had photos of Larson’s other work. At the hearing he said he offered to show them to her, but said she declined to look at them. He said she seemed in a hurry to leave. In a letter to the city communications director, a copy of which was filed with the News Council, the reporter said she had asked to see the photos but was denied access to them.

News Council members with TV reporting experience doubted that the city would deny them, since the photos apparently supported the decision to demolish, and they questioned the reporter’s refusal to take time to see the photos when Schiff mentioned them, since TV reporters always look for pictures, they said, to strengthen their stories.

News Council members noted that news coverage of government has suffered with the decline of beat reporting. Generalists, they said, are just not equipped to deal with the complexities of government processes.

News Council member Karen Boros, a former TV news reporter and now a journalism teacher at the University of St. Thomas, said, "I would be terrified if I were a reporter [given this kind of story to cover] and I didn’t know how things worked at city hall."

Kerri Miller, a former TV reporter and now the host of a Minnesota Public Radio talk show, said, "There were omissions in this story. The reporter had ample opportunity to get more information. The story is misleading, and because it is misleading it is inaccurate.

"Someone calls the station with a tip [that the city is robbing a homeowner of his dream house]" she went on, "and you sit around the newsroom saying, ‘That’s going to be a good story.’ But when you go out to report it you don’t close your eyes. You say, ‘Let’s see those pictures, and where’s the list of things that the city said needed to be done to the house?"

News Council member Lorin Robinson, a former journalism teacher now in public relations at 3M, questioned the framing of the story, saying that it smacked of populism: the city is hurting the little guy, and the TV station is out to protect the little guy. Another member pointed to a line in the narration that said Larson "was trying to build a community, thwarted by its own leaders."

Neil Neddermeyer, a retired deputy sheriff, said, "The story should have been about fact; instead, the reporter made it about passion."

Since the story was broadcast, KSTP has done another story, revealing that the city had failed to mail Larson the required notice that demolition was scheduled. News Council member Reed Anfinson, publisher/editor of the Swift County Monitor-News, in Benson, Minn., said, "After sitting through 20 years of city council meetings and condemnation proceedings, [I can tell you] there’s no way Larson could not have understood his building was going to be torn down."

Larson is suing the city for what he says is its failure to notify him and his mortgage lender of the demolition.

The News Council, in its 36^th year, is an independent nonprofit agency that promotes fair, vigurous, and trusted journalism.

News Council narrowly upholds complaint that KSTP-TV inaccurately reported that Maplewood City Council had stalled progress on an area redevelopment plan

Minneapolis (Sept. 21, 2006) - A complaint from three Maplewood city council members that a KSTP-TV news story in July inaccurately reported that the council had stalled progress on an area redevelopment plan was narrowly upheld today by the Minnesota News Council. The vote was 6 to 4.

The news story focused on an area of Maplewood known as Gladstone, where existing businesses and housing have been described as tired and deteriorating. Proponents of change have differed on how many housing units should be built, and that has slowed progress.

The outcome reflected the difficulty news council members had in sorting through the views of the complainants and of their critics on facts about the redevelopment project. Critics say the city council has done nothing since receiving a proposal from a task force last fall. The complainants pointed to several official council and city staff actions to show that there has been progress.

News Council members generally agreed that both the complainants and the station deserved some criticism. Members learned that the KSTP story was produced live on the night of a special city council meeting to consider a felony allegation against the city manager. When the charge proved unfounded, the reporter decided to do a story on bitterness over the redevelopment project, even though it was not discussed that night, and she interviewed a critic of the council but no council members.

News Council members also learned that the main complainant, Council Member Erik Hjelle, called KSTP the day after the story appeared to object to its conclusions. He acknowledged that the station offered to do a follow-up story and asked him to grant an interview, but he declined, saying he wanted a story that was more comprehensive than an interview with him would be.

Several News Council members asked Hjelle how he could know how the station would use an interview with him in a story, and they observed that he had been mistaken to refuse the offer.

But most of the News Council’s concern focused on the news story, which members said combined unrelated matters to craft a tale about conflict without making any of the threads clear. News Council member Karen Boros, a former WCCO-TV and CBS News reporter now teaching journalism at the University of St. Thomas, said, "If one of my students had done this story we’d be having a serious talk right now."

News Council members expressed appreciation to KSTP for its co-operation in the proceeding. As has been KSTP’s practice, no station representative attended, but the news department did prepare a detailed response to the complaint and sent it to the News Council, something it had not done in the 36-year history of the News Council.

Minority Opinion
Todd Peterson v. The Roseau Times-Region
October 20, 2005

Submitted By: Lorin Robinson, Jane Berg

On October 20, 2005, by a vote of 8-4 with 1 abstention, the Minnesota News Council denied the complaint of Todd Peterson, Roseau development coordinator, that an opinion columnist with the Roseau Times-Region based his opinion columns on inaccuracies that were misleading to the public and unfair to the city administration.

In the spirit of ongoing discussion about this and other issues, the above names members of the news council wish to provide a countervailing point of view.

The Complaint

The opinion pieces written by Roseau Times-Region columnist Jeff Olsen contain many inaccuracies and his criticisms are thus unfair to city officials.

It is our contention that the errors/inaccuracies in Mr. Olsen’s columns were substantial/significant and that they clearly had a negative impact on the public’s understanding of the issues and on the public’s perception of the competence of the city administration.

The following five examples illustrate errors or inaccuracies that Mr. Peterson brought to the council’s attention:

• That the city was charging for information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) "as high as $300 or more." December 8, 2004 (The fact is that the city will charge a fee only if the documents requested under the FOIA are not available and the city must spend an inordinate amount of time/money securing/copying the documents. Also, the FOIA does allow for an institution to charge for requests.)
• That the city was inept in its dealing with local flood recovery projects. July 30, 2005 (Information was corrected the next week in an article written by a reporter Tim Holmseth specifically to set the record straight.)
• That they city should conduct a referendum on the issue of the location of the new civic center. August 6, 2005 (The fact is that the city is not empowered by state law to conduct such a referendum.)
• That a building built by the Roseau EDA should be used as the new city offices instead of the civic center. September 24, 2005 (The fact is that the building was built with funds earmarked for commercial/retail only. It cannot be used as a public building.)
• That multiple buildings for city operations would have been cheaper than the single building that was constructed. September 24, 2005 (The fact is that city architects and engineers did the requisite study and found that multiple buildings would be 20-25% more expensive. Actually, it is fairly common knowledge that a single large building is cheaper than to build several smaller ones because there’s only one roof and one infrastructure resulting in economies of scale.)

The Role of Facts in Opinion Articles

Some of the discussion centered on whether and to what extent opinions expressed in opinion articles should be based on fact. It was pointed out that the role of opinion columns is to incite or excited debate/discussion, promote a point of view and/or to entertain. No disagreement.

But the discussion went no deeper. We heard that every newspaper (news medium) has the right to have a "curmudgeon." We heard the question, rhetorical as it turned since there was no discussion on the point, "How do you balance an opinion?"

We submit that these are not the real issues.

Yes, every news medium has the right to have an Andy Rooney, Studs Terkel or Jeff Olsen. And they have every right to practice their "curmudgeonry." But Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press, as was pointed out, comes with responsibilities. One of those responsibilities, we contend, is to ensure everything printed or broadcast in a news medium is based on accurate information-even pieces marked "opinion."

Mr. Olsen seems to hold Studs Terkel in high repute. We, too, read Terkel. There’s no question what his "worldview" is. But there’s also no question from whence his worldview comes. It comes, in the main, from exhaustive and meticulously recorded and reported interviews with thousands of "common people." (It does not come from a second or third-hand source such as a radio station report or a construction worker who talks to a newspaper photographer who talks to the columnist…)

We submit that the best opinion writers ground their work in fact. For an opinion based on a chimera will simply collapse and evaporate under scrutiny. The writer’s opinions will have no credibility. And, without credibility, the writer has no currency.

Are we suggesting that an opinion writer’s opinions be balanced? Of course not. We are questioning how it is that opinions are generated.

We all know that two perfectly rational, honorable individuals can view exactly the same facts and come to a diametrically opposed opinion or view about what those facts mean and what their implications are. This is why there are "liberals" and "conservatives." And, in microcosm, this is why we rarely have a unanimous decision in news council deliberations.

We all view facts with our own sets of filters. But, in the best of worlds and the best of opinion pieces, opinion writers are viewing the facts. Articles of opinion based on fact rise from diatribe to discourse.

It is our contention that the real issue concerns whether these opinions/statements in Mr. Olsen’s columns are based in fact and, if they are not, what is their impact on public discourse and the public’s perception of city government. Is or is not that impact negative? Does this or does this not constitute a significant problem that needs to be redressed?

From the testimony received, it is clear that the opinions/statements in question are not based in fact. We also believe that these factual errors are significant. It is, therefore, our contention that the readers of the Roseau Times-Region and the city administration were ill-treated as a result.

Setting the Record Straight

Much discussion focused on whether Mr. Peterson had made a sufficiently concerted effort himself to correct the record on these and other allegations through writing letters to the editor or offering to write countervailing opinion pieces.

While these discussions were interesting, we submit that they were not germane to the complaint as filed and should have not had bearing on the outcome. Actually, it might have been our recommendation to Mr. Peterson, in framing his complaint, that he consider raising the issue of gaining meaningful access to the Times-Region.

From conversations with the publisher during the questioning period, it seemed evident that the paper lacks a coherent policy concerning letters and opinion pieces. When asked if she would consider running a regular column providing points of view other than those of Mr. Olsen, she said "yes," but that no one had come forward to offer such a column. Since Mr. Olsen’s columns seem consistently to cause her difficulty (e.g., The Minnesota News Council’s earlier finding that Mr. Olsen’s March 11, 2000 column was problematic.), one might think she would proactively seek other points of view to take off some of the heat.

We are also sympathetic to Mr. Peterson’s contention that, based on the way in which a recent letter writer (Adam Erdmann, August 13, 2005) was treated at the hands of Mr. Olsen, that paper "chills" letter writers who express contrary points of view. Olsen used his "bully" and unassailable "pulpit" to browbeat Mr. Erdmann-who has the temerity to disagree with him-into apparent submission. And Mr. Olsen was disingenuous enough to feign surprise that Mr. Erdmann didn’t write back to continue the "dialogue."

Mr. Peterson also pointed out that reporter Tim Holmseth took it upon himself to correct errors in one of Mr. Olsen’s columns one week later. But, he asks-and rightly so-does a correction a week or two after the fact in a news story, letter or column have the same impact as the original misinformation? Findings in communications research indicate that "primacy" is crucial. In other words, the information or misinformation received first has the most impact.

Summary

Based on the facts, as the abovementioned council members see them, it is our opinion that the complaint should have been upheld.

We hope this additional consideration of Todd Peterson v. Roseau Times-Region will be helpful and stimulate further discussion.

 Minneapolis (Oct. 25, 2005) - A complaint against the Roseau Times-Region newspaper by a city official has been denied by the Minnesota News Council. The vote was 8 to 4 with one abstention.

Todd Peterson, the city’s development coordinator, said that columns by Jeff Olsen, a freelance reporter and opinion writer for more than 20 years at the newspaper, were inaccurate, misleading to the public and unfair to city officials. Peterson noted that Olsen writes about city business without attending meetings or checking with officials on verifiable facts.

The News Council majority applauded the newspaper’s inclusion of a strong opinion column, and they urged the newspaper to seek out vigorous rebuttals. They also urged Peterson and other city officials to more aggressively seek to get their views published in the newspaper.

Council member Reed Anfinson, editor/publisher of the Swift County Monitor-News in Benson, lamented the fact that so few rural weeklies run editorials or opinion pieces. He said readers need lively exchanges to inspire them to participate in local public affairs.

Olsen, the columnist, apologized for having mistakenly written that the city ought to occupy office space in a new building. Peterson pointed out that funding for the building was intended for commercial development and did not allow governmental use.

But Olsen insisted that he has never written maliciously about anyone and that he uses what he considers misguided city actions as a basis for offering his readers civics lessons. And he said he does not attend meetings because he hears news about city activities on the radio and reads official minutes.

"I don’t have to by physically present to write about Mr. Bush in Washington," Olsen said, claiming his right and ability to do the same in Roseau. He said he lives out in the country, teaches school during the day and uses the phone at night to gather material for news articles and columns.

Peterson and the publisher, Jodi Wojciechowski, appeared to have resolved the matter recently when she would require Olsen to talk with city officials before writing about them in his column, though he could choose to disregard their views when expressing his opinion.

But the agreement unraveled when the very next Olsen column appeared without the publisher’s having discussed the settlement with him. Peterson reinstated his complaint.

The publisher said she had no time after the agreement and before the newspaper’s deadline to confer with the columnist, and so his next column appeared without his having consulted city officials. Several News Council members said the publisher should have at least called Peterson to advise him that the agreement would go into effect the following week.

Another council member suggested that the publisher could have held Olsen’s column that week and run it the following week, next to a counterpoint from a city official.

"Every paper should have at least one curmudgeon," said media member Benno Groeneveld. "Every paper should have an Olsen."

Public member Jane Berg said she was concerned about Olsen’s use of a radio news report as the basis for his opinion: "It’s possible [using a secondary source instead of going to city officials themselves] to perpetuate misinformation. Facts can and should be verified."

Olsen agreed, but he said he did not make up facts, he wrote opinions based on the facts as he understood them.

Media member Mollie Hoben, founder of the Women’s Press, said none of the participants was taking a strong initiative to improve the quality of information: The columnist should be checking his facts, Hoben said; the publisher should more actively solicit responses to Olsen’s columns and city officials should write their own views for publication instead of waiting for someone else to write in the behalf.

Publisher Wojciechowski said she runs almost all letters to the editor. Peterson said he thought a letter from city officials taking issue with an opinion piece was not an effective way to combat misleading information. Council member Lorin Robinson, a former communications professor, agreed: Information that is published first, he said, stays uppermost in readers’ minds.

Peterson said the newspaper did not cover enough news about the city government. The publisher said she welcomes any story ideas, which she said are often hard to generate in a small town.

The News Council, an independent group, is in its 35th year of promoting fair, vigorous and trusted journalism. Half the complaints heard have been upheld, half denied. Council members, half journalists, half laypersons, represent only themselves.

Minneapolis (Sept. 23, 2005) - The Minnesota News Council has denied three complaints by Prior Lake’s former mayor and two city council colleagues against the Prior Lake American newspaper.

The complaints grew out of news articles and editorial comments about the former officials, who the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled had violated the state’s open meeting law.

Former Mayor Wes Mader and council colleagues Mike Gundlach and Jim Ericson contended that the newspaper had published false statements that it had never sought to recover legal fees and have fines imposed on them in the lawsuit that reached the supreme court. They also complained that the American showed bias against them by portraying their executive session in 2000 as a “secret meeting” and the current city council’s more recent executive session as a “closed session.”

The News Council voted 11-6 and 13-3 for the newspaper on the two complaints concerning legal fees and fines, and 15-2 for the paper on the complaint about bias.

Publisher Laurie Hartmann wrote in an April 2005 editorial column that the newspaper had never sought fees and fines against the three officials. Mader pointed to official court documents that said the paper did seek such remedies.

The American’s attorney, Mark Anfinson, persuaded the News Council majority that the paper’s request for fees and fines was a technical filing that the newspaper never pursued when the case was resolved. Hartmann said that she could have phrased her column differently, to make it clearer that the paper never filed a motion in the end for fees and fines.

Public member Jon Austin, a public relations specialist, said, “Words are not used precisely in conventional conversation or in editorials. You can take the column to mean, ‘We never did intend to seek damages.’”

News Council member Pat Berg, a journalism instructor at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, asked, “What is more important for a community newspaper: to be precise in what it means by ‘never’ or to hold public officials accountable? The far greater good is that the news media hold officials’ feet to the fire, and if the media make a mistake once in a while, well, democracy is messy.”

As to bias, Mader objected to what he called the newspaper’s treatment of the current city council’s conduct of an executive session, compared with the paper’s treatment of his council’s decision. He said his council voted to close a meeting to consider a threat of litigation against the city. The current council, he said, closed a meeting without taking a vote, facing no threat of litigation. Hartmann said the newspaper has also objected to the recent closed session.

Susan Ihne, editor of the St. Cloud Times, applauded the American’s position: “They pursued an illegal closing the first time [in Mader’s case], and they’re pursuing it the second time. They are protecting the First Amendment.”

Mader said, “Considering the freedom and independence that newspapers have been given, there should be some accountability not to abuse that privileged position.”

Mader also complained that the newspaper has repeatedly relied upon a disputed deposition in the lawsuit as factual when many other participants in the executive session, Mader said, signed affidavits challenging the allegations of the deponent, former councilman Peter Schenck.

Schenck said that the city attorney had advised Mader and his colleagues not to go into executive session. Mader said about 10 people who signed affidavits denied that. He also objected to the publisher’s referring to what she called “cover-ups” in connection with the violation of the open meeting law, recalling the Watergate scandal.

Public member Karen Runyon, a forensics specialist, said, “I’m always uncomfortable when I read something that is someone’s personal opinion. The word that comes to my mind is ‘snarky’ [meaning irritable or short-tempered]— I can see why someone would feel it was biased.”

Media member Karen Boros, a journalism teacher at the University of St. Thomas, said that the opinion pages are the right place for writers to sell their views to the reader: “There’s snarkiness on both sides. I have no problem with ‘secret meeting’ being in a signed column.”

Publisher Hartmann told the News Council that a newspaper should have wide latitude to express its opinions and to publish the opinions of citizens and public officials. She said Mader’s administration had given her reason to be harshly critical, and she pointed out that Mader had been given space 17 times to express his opinion in the American’s editorial pages.

Mader asked why the paper had published a letter to the editor without verifying a charge that he had voted himself a 50 percent increase in pay. He said it was not true and that the editor should not have run the letter without knowing if it were.

News Council member Jay Furst, managing editor of the Rochester Post-Bulletin, asked Mader if he had asked the newspaper to run corrections on the mistaken letter and on the publisher’s comment that the paper had “never” sought fees and fines. Mader said he had not asked for corrections, but preferred to write letters to the editor for publication. Not all his letters were published.

The News Council, an independent nonprofit agency founded in 1970, has upheld half the complaints it has heard, and denied half. Its 24 members — 12 journalists and 12 lay persons — represent only themselves.