The Washington Post's first Freedom of Information Act director explains how to find important information

Image by Marissa Vonesh, The Washington Post

Nate Jones of The Washington Post reveals how he finds the materials others don't want found in his "Revealing Records" series. Below is an excerpted version of his first installment.

"Few things make a journalist happier than receiving a manila envelope full of internal government records. These days, a large email attachment is pretty good, too.

"As the Post's first Freedom of Information Act director, I work to ensure that our entire newsroom receives as many of those envelopes and email attachments as possible. Those documents have helped us publish stories that have exposed government waste and wrongdoing, and led to congressional hearings and new laws. Successful requests take strategy, creativity and a tenacity for overcoming bureaucratic resistance. Now, I'm writing a periodic column about how I do it.

"The federal Freedom of Information Act is one of a reporter's most powerful tools. Commonly known as FOIA, this law requires federal agencies to release records to the public upon request — unless the records are exempt for privacy, national security or other reasons. Each state also has its own version of the federal law that applies to state and local governments. When agencies refuse to produce the records, the laws allow those making the requests to sue.

"Unfortunately, the Post has had to turn to the courts to force state and federal agencies to follow FOIA laws. As a newly barred attorney, I research the chances of succeeding in a lawsuit, then work with The Post's legal counsel and outside lawyers to file a suit.

"Generally, the Post only sues when we believe we can make a strong case. When we do prevail, the agencies often have to pay our attorneys' fees. That is a cherry on top of any records the agencies are ordered to produce. 

"More often, we are able to use public records laws to obtain documents without going to court. After Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011, many people saw the famous photo of President Barack Obama and his aides tensely watching the raid on bin Laden's compound, one of just nine photos taken by the White House photographer that day and released on the official Flickr page. But I wanted to see what else was photographed that day, including pictures that might counter the official White House narrative.

"The Freedom of Information Act doesn't apply to records of presidents still in office. . . . At the time of the bin Laden raid, Obama was running for reelection. If he won, I would have to wait until 2017 to start the five-year clock to request his presidential records. So I marked my calendar. . . . On Jan. 20, 2022, five years to the day after Obama left office, I filed a slew of requests — including one for all official White House photographs taken the day bin Laden was killed. . . .After a year, the National Archives processed the request and provided a 161-page PDF of thumbnails and file names for all White House photographs taken between May 1 and 3, 2011. . . . These photographs — like all internal government records — are powerful because they help reveal what actually happened within our government, not just the view officials want to present.

"These manila envelopes and email attachments do not always come easily. Post reporters are constantly thinking and inquiring about the government documents behind public statements and official actions. I've helped them file requests for records in the federal government and every U.S. state, district and territory. Without public records laws, they would not be able to tear open the envelopes, download the attachments and share the stories of the documents within."

Public employees' freedom to talk with journalists depends on widely varying local and state policies and court rulings

Reporting on police, fire and other government services can be difficult in states that increasingly limit the ability of public employees to speak freely with journalists.

The disparity was brought to light by Andrew Wolfson of the Louisville Courier Journal, who began his story by noting the law in several other states, then writing, "No court in Kentucky has ever ruled that restricting public employees' speech violates the First Amendment, which leaves local and state agencies free to gag the very people who may know best whether those agencies are doing their jobs."

Wolfson notes, "Researchers at the University of Florida’s Brechner Center for Freedom of Information have found that courts in at least 20 jurisdictions have thrown out rules restricting public employees from spilling information to news outlets, on the grounds they violated the free speech rights of those workers. He gives some examples:

"In Connecticut and Nevada, courts have struck down rules requiring state troopers to get permission before talking to reporters, saying they violated the First Amendment. In Texas, a federal appeals court invalidated a sheriff’s policy forbidding comments to reporters on any topic 'that is or could be of a controversial nature.' . . . In Michigan, a federal district court struck down an ordinance with criminal penalties that required firefighters to send all media inquiries to the fire chief."

Wolfson reviewed 35 Kentucky agencies' policies and "found that 70% restrict or prohibit employees from talking to news outlets − some in ways that legal scholars say are unconstitutional," he reports. The state community-college system tells employees to refer news-media calls to the marketing and communications unit, even if faculty are called about topics not related to the system.

News-media roundup: Oregon paper closes; broadcasters worry about police radio encryption; others should too

UPDATE, Jan. 31: Newspapers from other Oregon towns are now in "an old-fashioned newspaper war" to serve Jackson County, reports Brier Dudley of The Seattle Times.

Jackson County is on the California border. (Google map)

The Medford Mail-Tribune, which went digital-only last fall, announced Wednesday that Friday would be its last day of publication. "The Mail Tribune’s closure will result in a dramatic loss of news coverage for the biggest population center in southern Oregon. Jackson County, where Medford is the county seat, is home to nearly 224,000," The Oregonian reports. "Travis Moore, publisher of the Daily Courier, a newspaper serving Grants Pass and the surrounding area, said Wednesday that his company would move to hire some Mail Tribune journalists and expand its coverage in nearby Jackson County."

UPDATE, Jan. 17: Medford's KDRV updates its audience on the Courier's plans.

"Police departments across the country are encrypting their radio scanner communications with an increased and frightening urgency," the Radio Television Digital News Association tells its members. "Though encryption is not a new issue, it is rapidly accelerating . . . These encryption policies look different from department to department — with some opting for a delayed release of information, others decrypting for media personnel, and many choosing to encrypt communications entirely. Was there a moment where your lack of access to radio communications led to a loss of real-time information sharing? Has your newsroom been impacted by scanner encryption? Why is it important to keep this resource available to the public, including journalists? Help us build our case by sharing your newsroom’s experience with encryption. Read more about police encryption and RTDNA's approach here."

PR for journalism: “Even if the media industry takes urgent steps like diversifying newsrooms and empowering local media, the populist media bashing won’t go away. Ignoring it is not a sustainable way forward,” Cambridge University Ph.D. student Ayala Panievsky writes for Nieman Lab. “Journalists must start campainging for journalism. . . . promote and explain journalism as a flawed-yet-necessary social institution. As media-savvy journalists should know, vague arguments about 'saving democracy' or 'checks and balances' won’t do; they’re too abstract and carry little sentimental resonance for many.”

Seek solutions: "It is not enough for stories to expose problems to societal problems; they should explore how people tackle those problems," Lauren Kessler writes for Nieman Storyboard, promoting the concept of solutions journalism, as defined by the Solutions Journalism Project: “rigorous, evidence-based reporting on the responses to social problems,” the mission of which is “to transform journalism so that all people have access to news that helps them envision and build a more equitable world.” Or, as the late Molly Ivins said, “Listen to the people who are talking about how to fix what’s wrong, not the ones who just work people into a snit over the problems. Listen to the people who have ideas about how to fix things, not the ones who just blame others.”

Constructive Institute table, adapted by The Rural Blog, shows forms of journalism and their differences.

Chevron exploits news deserts in the Permian Basin, where it pumps much oil, with propaganda disguised as news

Map detail with county-level data from "The State of Local News 2022" with an overlay of the Permian Basin in green

"The dire state of local journalism in the U.S. has been well documented in recent years, as the closure of hundreds of local newspapers has created American 'news deserts' where people struggle for information on local politics and happenings," Adam Gabbatt writes for The Guardian, picking up an Aug. 18 report by Molly Taft of Gizmodo. "It has also created openings for companies and political groups to swoop in, serving up a mixture of local news and propaganda, with the latest being Chevron, in Texas’ news-starved – and oil-rich – Permian Basin."

Logo, from banner on home page

The Permian Proud site, launched in August, does say it's sponsored by Chevron, "but at first glance, the sponsorship seems like a benevolent grant," Gabbatt writes. "On Wednesday, Permian Proud’s front page included stories about an upcoming air show and a storytelling workshop – typical local newspaper fare. But interspersed with news of livestock sales and processions is a series of stories lauding Chevron’s achievements in the Permian Basin." The "news" stories are written by PR-firm employee Mike Aldax, who's written for a Chevron-funded site in California since 2014.

The site says, "Our focus will be on news and information that makes us all proud to live here. Permian Proud will highlight and uplift such efforts, not just for its community partners, but for anyone wanting to get the word out to the public on local events, fundraisers, initiatives and more."

The site is a milder, corporate example of "pink slime journalism," named for the beef additive, which has flourished in recent years to exploit growing news deserts to spread disinformation, often about politics and politically relevant topics. Such sites are more often funded by conservatives than liberals. "Locality Labs and Metric Media, both operated by the same ex-journalist, have opened hundreds of 'news' sites, which purport to represent local communities, since 2019," Gabbatt reports. "The sites, which include the Great Lakes Wire and the Illinois Valley Times, masquerade as local news outlets, but in reality are funded by Republican and conservative groups."

Subscribe Sunday is a social media campaign encouraging citizens to subscribe to their local newspaper; let's join it!

By Al Cross

Director and Professor

Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, University of Kentucky

Today is Black Friday. Tomorrow is Small Business Saturday. Next week come Cyber Monday and Giving Tuesday. There's a gap, and you can fill it with Subscribe Sunday on Dec. 1.

Unbranded GIF is free for anyone to use

#SubscribeSunday is a social media campaign encouraging citizens to subscribe to their local newspaper or its digital equivalent. The Boston Globe came up with the idea, the New England Newspaper and Press Association is promoting it, and so is The Rural Blog and its publisher, the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues.

Subscriptions are becoming the lifeblood of journalism because so much advertising has moved to the digital space. That phenomenon has finally reached rural newspapers, which have been slow to get into the digital space. But that is where the audience is going, and #SubscribeSunday could be a good way to make citizens think about where they get their information.

I keep saying "citizens" because a target audience for such appeals should be people who have a sense of civic responsibility but don't fully appreciate the role of newspapers in democracy: the chief fact-finders, the independent watchdogs, those who speak truth to power, and help a community have a conversation with itself and set the public agenda.

It's also an opportunity to remind citizens who prefer to get their news from social media that they need to consider the sources of their information. The readership of news stories is driven mainly by social-media referrals, and such readers may not appreciate the difference in those secondary and primary sources.

They need to understand the three major types of information media. News media pay for journalism, which practices a discipline of verification; we determine facts and tell you how we know them. Social media have no discipline and no verification, and are mainly about opinion, not fact. Strategic media (advertising, public relations and marketing) use the other types and sometimes masquerade as news media when they try to sell you something: a good, a service, an idea, a cause, a politician, etc.

If citizens understand these basics, they should be more likely to subscribe to their local newspaper or its digital equivalent. One pitch of #SubscribeSunday is this: "As you plan your purchases for the big holiday shopping weekend, please consider investing in a strong democracy. Support independent local journalism and subscribe to your local news organization or give a subscription as a gift. Share your purchase on social media using hashtag #SubscribeSunday."

For more information on Subscribe Sunday contact Janelle.Nanos@globe.com or Heather.Ciras@globe.com.

Journalism schools advise students to embrace all types of work, expand their job searches beyond metro areas

"The news business is on pace for its worst job losses in a decade as about 3,000 people have been laid off or been offered buyouts in the first five months of this year," Gerry Smith reports for Bloomberg. "The cuts have been widespread. Newspapers owned by Gannett and McClatchy, digital media companies like BuzzFeed and Vice Media, and the cable news channel CNN have all shed employees."

The trend has been driven by several factors: "Local newspapers have seen much of their advertising revenue vanish as readers move online. They’ve also struggled to attract many digital subscribers after past rounds of layoffs and buyouts eroded their quality," Smith reports. "Digital-media startups, funded by venture capitalists seeking growth, aggressively hired journalists, then scaled back to focus on profitability. Almost everyone is struggling to compete with Facebook and Google, which accounted for three-fourths of U.S. online ads sales last year."

The changing market has led journalism schools to adjust their instruction. Researchers interviewed 113 faculty, staff and administrators from 44 U.S. journalism programs, and found that J-schools have been increasingly encouraging students to not think of journalism as "coherent career path," Amy McCaig reports for Futurity, a nonprofit university research news site. "The post-Watergate media era, where you would work for a local paper or TV station and work your way up to retirement with a nice pension, is behind us," study coauthor Max Besbris of Rice University in Houston told McCaig.

Instead, Besbris and coauthor Caitlin Petre of Rutgers University found that journalism professors are advising students to accept the fact that they may need to do temporary or freelance work for news organizations, or work in public relations, McCaig reports. Students are also advised to hone their skills in photography, social media, graphic design, editing, and recording. Such skills can make students more marketable, especially if publications are looking for a "one-man-band" journalist.

Any edge can help in such a tight journalism job market. Al Cross, a University of Kentucky journalism professor and director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, which publishes The Rural Blog, advises job hunters to widen the scope of their search beyond urban areas: "Many people looking for journalism jobs should consider small newspapers. We still get inquiries from them, looking for staff. And refugees from metros should consider buying a small paper if it’s financially viable. Many have closed because they couldn’t find buyers. There are some bargains out there, and the non-financial rewards of community journalism can be great."

News media need to keep explaining how they work; many people don't understand the 3 types of information media

By Al Cross, Director and Professor
Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, University of Kentucky

At last week's Knight Media Forum, conservative author and commentator Charlie Sykes offered considerable wisdom. Two points stood out for me: The news media need to do a better job of explaining what they do, and how they do it; and they are often too imprecise with terminology. We need to say "We are journalists, this is media; we are not the same thing."

The proliferation of media has left many Americans confused about what journalism is, or what it is supposed to be. That was driven home by a Reuters-Ipsos poll taken in December for Columbia Journalism Review. It found that 60 percent of Americans (54 percent of Democrats and 70 percent of Republicans) believe reporters are sometimes or very often paid by their sources. The question may have been suggestive, but when even a substantial share of Americans don't understand a fundamental principle of journalism, we're in trouble.

Typically, journalists have explained their craft in high-flown language about dedication to truth and service to democracy. We need to espouse those aspirational values, but we also need simpler points that are easier to understand and more likely to be believed -- lines that can fit on a bumper sticker and an elevator speech.

Here's a bumper sticker, aimed at reminding people that someone has to pay for journalism.

Here's an elevator speech about what journalism is, or should be:

We practice journalism, which reports facts. To do that, we verify information, or we attribute it to someone else. That is called the discipline of verification, and it is the essence of the news media. There are two other types of information media: social media, which have no discipline, much less verification; and strategic media, which try to sell you something: goods, services, ideas, politicians, causes, beliefs, etc. 

Newspapers once relied on one form of strategic media, advertising, for most of their income. Today, social media get more of the ad money, so newspapers must get more income from the only other reliable place they can get it: their readers, in the form of subscriptions or single-copy sales. As you might guess, we prefer subscribers, so we hope to earn your respect and loyalty. 

How do we do that? By being honest and straightforward about our business. 

That means we must separate fact from opinion, reserving our own views for the editorial page. Of course, our views have some influence over what news we choose to cover, so if you think we’re not covering what should be covered, or have failed to separate fact from opinion, or make another mistake, we want you to tell us.

There's more; you can read the rest in my latest monthly column for the National Newspaper Association, which suggests that news media keep such an explanation on their websites as a button labeled “How We Work,” and that newspapers run shorter versions of it in print every day, usually on the editorial page. A longer version could be a letter from the editor, ideally using timely local examples. If we demand transparency from officials and institutions, we must practice it ourselves.

From rural schools to U.S. bureaucrats, interviews are chilled by 'minders' from official PR offices

The Kentucky New Era in Hopkinsville had a great community story Aug. 30 by Zirconia Alleyne about a fifth-grade teacher who held a mock funeral to bury bad writing habits, allowing students to rip up index cards with improper sentence structures and words like "ain't" and "gonna" and put the papers in graves, hoping to forever say goodbye to bad grammar. (Alleyne photo: Students burying bad grammar)

But just getting stories like this one from the county school system have been an uphill battle for the 10,000-circulation daily newspaper. In an editorial, opinion writer Jennifer Brown wrote: "It has become almost impossible to tell these kinds of stories from the Christian County Public Schools. Over the past couple of years, the central office has insisted that the district’s community relations director be present for all interviews between a New Era reporter and a school employee. Over and over, we’ve been told it is the district’s 'procedure.'

"We want to get along, but district administrators fail to understand that using a media handler puts a chill on the natural conversation that should happen between a news reporter and a story subject. Although it might not be intentional, there is stiffness to an interview that is observed by a public relations employee."

Brown points to the recent Society of Professional Journalists convention, where "Sonny Albarado, projects editor for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and the outgoing SPJ president, spoke about 'roadblocks' journalists encounter when they are trying to gather information for the public," Brown writes. Albarado said, “There’s … the pernicious practice at all levels of government of cutting off journalists’ access to public officials and agency experts by forcing all queries to go through a public affairs officer or public information officer. And, of course, the PAO has to monitor the interview, if by chance you are granted an audience. This further chills the prospects for candid conversation and an informed citizenry.”

Incoming SPJ president David Cuillier, journalism-school director at the University of Arizona, "said he’ll be advocating this year for the First Amendment, press rights and freedom of information," Brown reports. Cuillier said in a speech: “I’m also going to push back against excessive controls by government to manage the message, manage reporters." (Read more)

Nascar (or, if you prefer, NASCAR) tries to add younger, urban and multicultural fans to rural base

Stock-car racing, which developed from moonshine runners in the hills of Southern Appalachia and still has a base of "older, rural white men," wants "younger, urban and multicultural" fans, Stuart Elliott reports for The New York Times. Fans will start seeing that this week on social media and in a big way at Sunday's Daytona 500 (where for the first time the pole sitter is a woman, Danica Patrick; photo by Jonathan Ferrey, Getty Images).

The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, which is no longer an association but keeps the name, perhaps to keep the name of the privately held company entirely in capital letters, changed advertising agencies last summer, moving from a firm in St. Louis to "a Madison Avenue giant, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, known for sophisticated work for blue-chip brands like American Express, Dove and I.B.M.," Elliott writes.

Kim Brink, managing director for brand, consumer and series marketing at Nascar, told Elliott that the agency's main office in New York is developing “a new brand direction and a new creative platform,” including Spanish-language commercials and greater emphasis on Nascar’s online offerings. "Nascar drivers are to contact fans and followers this week in social media like Facebook and Twitter to alert them the effort is coming," Elliott reports.       

Monsanto gets a lot of attention in one bundle today, including gift for agricultural communications chair

The Society of Environmental Journalists gathered a few stories about the multinational biotechnology firm Monsanto Corp. in its headline digest today. In the roundup, the journalism group highlighted current reportage from international and domestic sources. The topics range from the St. Louis-based company saying it has new herbicides for "superweeds," to its funding of a University of Illinois agricultural communications chair, to revealing details about how much the company spends lobbying Washington to approve genetically modified seeds and other decisions that help it.

Monsanto and the university say the goal of the endowed chair "is to help graduates better convey the challenges and technologies of modern farming -- which, the agriculture business believes, aren't reaching the American public," the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. "The university's new position comes as the agriculture industry is going on the offensive, waging a public relations campaign to win the hearts of American consumers who are increasingly distrustful of large-scale agriculture and concerned about the lack of transparency in the food system."

The university said the company won't influence who is hired and what is taught, but Ken Cook of the Environmental Working Group, who spoke at the univresity's first agricultural communications symposium last year, told the Post-Dispatch, "If you're concerned about presenting a view from a corporate standpoint, the demise of journalism is great news. My fear is that this is another way for Monsanto and big companies to begin to influence, quote, 'ag communications.' I didn't speak to any student while I was at that conference who was interested in becoming a journalist."

"Too often, 'agricultural communications' does not mean journalism, but public relations for agribusiness, sometimes masquerading as journalism," said Al Cross, director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, publisher of The Rural Blog. The institute is based at the University of Kentucky, one of many schools with a major in ag communications. It's in the UK College of Agriculture, not the School of Journalism and Telecommunications, where Cross works. At Illinois, the chair "will run a recently formalized degree program between the university's College of Media and College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences," the Post-Dispatch reports.

Here's another Monsanto link: our story reporting that Derry Brownfield, who founded and sold a radio network for Midwest agricultural and rural news, was taken off the network and sister networks because of repeated rants against Monsanto's restrictive seed-corn patents and fears by the network's owners that the company would reduce its advertising. "He thought they were bad for farmers, too big for their britches and generally bad for America," said Clyde Lear, who co-founded the network with Brownfield and fired him. Brownfield's obituary is here.

To slow down illegal immigration, U.S. funds PR campaign in Mexico, Central American

The federal government is attempting a more proactive approach to stopping the flow of illegal immigration from Mexico and Central America: trying to tell the dangers of crossing the border on and in Mexican and Central American television stations and newspapers. Paloma Esquivel of the Los Angeles Times reports the outreach was initially shunned, but is now being embraced. Newspapers in some Mexican states and El Salvador and Guatemala are now running stories about boarder-crossing dangers.

Esquivel reports the efforts have been so successful that the stories have been circulated in U.S. cities with large immigrant communities. The goal is to get residents to convince family back home to not make the trip, especially across the Arizona border. "Our message is: If you do decide to come, don't come through Arizona," said Border Patrol spokesman Andy Adame. "We're seeing a big increase in smuggler abuse; robberies with AK-47s and pistols, knives; rapes of women, more physical abuses — not only in the desert but in safe houses where people are tied up with duct tape."

The effect the campaign will have on migrant workers is unclear, but the number of apprehensions at the border is down to 340,000 last year from 1.6 million in 2000. Many experts say the drop is because fewer people are trying to cross the border. Some critics denounce the campaign for lack of transparency, but officials contend it has been successful. (Read more)

Farmers & Ranchers Alliance partners with Discovery Networks to boost farmers' public image

From Nov. 14 through Dec. 25, the networks of Discovery Communications will air multiple documentary-style videos to educate consumers about agriculture's commitment to healthy food choices and build trust of farmers and ranchers among consumers, Marlys Miller, editor of Pork Magazine reports for the DairyHerd Network.

The year-old U.S. Farmers & Ranchers Alliance and Discovery have partnered to produce three 60-second videos and one longer video featuring farmers, ranchers and U.S. consumers who "have real questions and make real decisions about the healthy choices they make for themselves and their family," USFRA officials told Miller. (Read more) To view the videos online, click here.

Fracking puts gas industry on the defensive

The public backlash against hydraulic fracturing is being felt throughout the oil and gas industry. "Protests across New York state have temporarily banned the practice," Steve Hargreaves of CNN reports. "Unfavorable coverage in the media and a scathing documentary film that was nominated this year for an Oscar also seem to have scared the industry." One gas company executive recently noted during a fracking discussion at a recent conference, "We've done a terrible job at getting our message out to the public. Now we're locked out of New York."

In fracking, which millions of gallons of water, sand and chemicals are injected into wells drilled into dense shale formations, releasing natural gas or oil. Critics worry that the process may taint drinking water sources. At the conference, sponsored by energy consultant IHS CERA in New York, the Oscar-nominated documentary "Gasland" and a recent fracking series by The New York Times both were mentioned as examples of poor publicity for the industry. Despite the increased focus on fracking, no representative from a drilling company that is fracking was included on the panel. "Typical," said one attendee from a water purification company. "Put the environmental guys in a room and let them talk to each other." (Read more)

Rural reporter gives school district some advice about public relations, or public information

Some rural school administrators who already have plenty of responsibilities sometimes spend too much time worrying about the image of their school systems, which, of course, means their own image as well. That can cause problems for rural journalists, and Allison Hollon smelled that coming last month when the school board in Adair County, Kentucky, unveiled a draft public-relations plan.

"I applaud you for making the effort," Hollon, left, wrote in a column, but urged officials not to adopt a policy that school-district employees go through a public-relations person before speaking to the news media. "Employees of any school district already have reservations about speaking to the media," she wrote. "I strongly believe if the school district develops a system where employees have to go through a public relations department before they can speak to me or any other media, it will increase that fear."

Hollon, who has had classes in public relations, also questioned the school superintendent's plan to have "print ready" press releases. "When I receive a press release in 'print ready' form, the first thing I do is come up with a way to change it that makes it unique to our publication," the weekly Adair County Community Voice, Hollon wrote. "Any good journalist worth their salt would do the same thing." The Voice competes with the weekly Adair Progress.

Hollon said a role model exists right there in Columbia: Lindsey Wilson College. "I can call just about anybody at LWC and have an on-the-record conversation. ... Developing a relationship with the media is more than just sending out story tips or press releases. It’s also about developing an open line of communication between the media and janitors, teachers, bus drivers and administrators." (Read more)

Hollon has it better than some. Lisa Gross, the director of the Division of Communications and Community Engagement at the Kentucky Department of Education, told us in an e-mail: "I recently talked to an editor at a newspaper in Eastern Kentucky, who told me that the superintendent of the school district he covers had informed him that he’d no longer be receiving press releases or news items from the district, because the paper had reported (truthfully) on some negative issues at a local school. When I talk to school district PR folks, I remind them that their local media outlets are not there to serve as 'cheerleader' for their school systems – media can be helpful, but they should not expect to only see the good things covered and not the 'bad' things." That's good advice that rural journalists need to remember, and on occasion share with school folks.