Americans tend to trust local news media more than national or regional outlets, and that trust has led many to reach out to local papers or stations in the pandemic for help with a wide range of requests that aren't in a journalist's job description, such as helping elderly viewers make vaccine appointments.
Ashley Alvarado of Southern California Public Radio says listeners have asked her team "about unemployment benefits, about whether or not they should cancel a family wedding or if it was illegal to hold a graveside service for a relative who died," David Bauder reports for The Associated Press. Alvarado said her team frequently gets calls that result in potential new stories, which she shares with reporters. However, Alvarado said she's trying to be protective of the mental health of colleagues who answer the phones and repeatedly hear traumatic stories.
Lisa Krieger of the Mercury News in San Jose "has spent nights and weekends answering messages. She speaks to church groups and her newspaper has set up online seminars," Bauder reports. "She realizes that her first responsibility is to report and write stories, but said management has supported her efforts to help readers."
To Krieger, it's an opportunity to show the paper is worthy of readers' trust. "This is payback time for us . . . These are readers who are very loyal and they need us. The least we can do is return their calls and emails," she told Bauder. "Over recent years we’ve been told that journalism is dying and is becoming obsolete . . . It’s gratifying to be a comfort to readers and provide them with information they literally can’t get anywhere else. It’s so rewarding and it’s why we’re in this business."
"There’s nothing wrong with doing your best to help people with information, Kathleen Culver, director of the Center for Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin, told Bauder, who writes: "But it’s wise to avoid situations where you learn someone’s medical records, or make a specific medical appointment or recommendation, she said."
Chauncey Glover of KTRK-TV in Houston has invested a lot of time in trying to convince the city's Black and Latino communities that the vaccines are safe, including through televised town hall meetings, Bauder reports.
C.C. Davidson-Hiers, a reporter for the Tallahassee Democrat in Florida, has helped many elderly readers readers navigate online vaccination sign-ups, but told Bauder she worries about the ethical implications of setting up the appointments for the readers (which she has done a few times), since journalists are trained to observe and not get involved in their stories.
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