The headline below is inaccurate and the story is poorly written and lacking in balance. The very first sentence is value-laden and shows the reporter's bias about the role of dissent in democracy.
If the St. Augustine Record covers a meeting where a no-bid contract is discussed, it needs to report the no-bid contract.
If the St. Augustine Record covers a meeting where an environmental policy is discussed as a result of possible poisoning of bald eagle nests (and illegal takings in violation of federal criminal laws) , the issue deserves more than once sentence.
Jennifer Edwards' article didn't even state the words of Commissioner John Sundeman's motion,which was adopted 3-2, requiring that the District protect bald eagles, other protected species, and humans from pesticide spraying.
As Tom Wicker’s journalism professor at the University of North Carolina said, “if you’re telling a story about a dog, bring on the dog.” Jennifer Edwards is a mediocrity, one who is already being manipulated by Mosquito Control Board staff and the Sheriff’s Department to write propaganda.
I attended the Anastasia Mosquito Control Board meeting last night.
I watched Jennifer Edwards when she was in the meeting, and left a message for Peter Ellis predicting the kind of story she would write.
Reading Jennifer Edwards' news stories reminds me of what Tom Wicker wrote in "On Press" about how biased some reporters are to government sources and government handouts.
Jennifer Edwards left the AMCD meeting early, thereby not reporting on AMCD's cleanup of the contaminated Ponte Vedra substation, which was discussed before the meeting ended at 9PM. In sharp and marked contrast to the City of St. Augustine, which refuses to discuss environmental issues maturely, AMCD is proactive and mature, due to Commissioners Sundeman and Moeller and Bequette being persistent and asking the staff questions, and due to the AMCD attorney having a background in environmental law. As a result, AMCD discusses government official wrongdoing and tries to correct it.
The Record does not report this news. When then-Commissioner candidate Jeanne Moeller told the Record there was environmental contamination during the 2006 interviews, it kept the secret. The Record is good at keeping secrets in our town.
When the City of St. Augustine dumps solid waste in our Old City Reservoir and sewage in our San Sebastian River and the St. Augustine Record barely even covers the issue, never digging for facts and failing to editorialize in favor of criminal prosecution.
The Record puts government officials on a pedestal and environmental concerns in the ashcan.
What Jennifer Edwards does well is accept government handouts, whether from the Sheriff or Mosquito Control managers who want an expensive new building and haven’t justified it.
Jennifer Edwards did not discuss the background and need for the environmental policy, which was given only one sentence in her story. She does not mention organophosphate pesticides being sprayed in and around bald eagle nests. She does not mention the official county map of bald eagle nests that Commissioners (and Jennifer Edwards) had in their hands when the Board adopted the policy in response to public concerns.
Jennifer Edwards does not report public concerns expressed in meetings -- she treats dissent with opprobrium and disrespect.
Jennifer Edwards in “covering” the meeting sat bored, yawning, taking few notes (while giving me the hairy eyeball). When I complained to her editor this morning, about her leaving early and failing to report accurately what happened in the meeting, Jennifer Edwards threatened me and ordered me never to complain to her editor again. This is pathology, not journalism. I will never speak to this bumpkin reporter again. Why bother? She's not a real journalist.
When Jennifer Edwards went to her first AMCD meeting recently, I tried to give her background afterward about the prior Board and its history of abusing police powers to harass citizens engaged in First Amendment protected activity -- including AMCD Chair Barbara Bosanko’s meretricious effort to arrest former Army Captain Don Girvan for criticizing purchase of a $1.8 million luury no-bid helicopter. Jennifer Edwards ran away, saying she was on deadline. I asked her to call me later and she never did. In her story on that meeting, she engaged in false light invasion of privacy by claiming that a Sheriff’s Deputy was there to keep an eye on Commissioner John Sundeman and I, as if we were threats to national security.
I've been watching reporters -- good and bad -- since I was a freshman intern working for Senator Kennedy. Bad reporters are bored because they are boring -- even the young ones act like know-it-alls, and they are not scholarly in their approach. That's Jennifer Edwards.
In fact, Jennifer Edwards is the same reporter who apparently accepted false law enforcement handouts, leading to a racist, badly botched front page sensationalistic story the Saturday of the Lincolnville Festival, with some 30 photos of persons arrested for drugs, many of African-Americans, falsely claiming that most had violent criminal histories. This may be defamatory. Examination of court records of the first line of photos suggests she erred -- none of the people had violent records.
While the Record ran a prominent article the first day of the Lincolnville festival, tourists who picked up the Record on that Saturday got no information on the Lincolnville festival, but copious quantities of racism and defamation emanating from Jennifer Edwards’ poison pen.
It is well-known that St. Augustine Record reporters often leave meetings early, resulting in a lack of accurate news coverage. Rather than gavel to gavel coverage, Record reporters decide what the news is before they arrive at a meeting, usually in response to public relations spinmeisters. Watching government officials manipulate Record reporters reminds us that newspaper reporters are supposed to uncover facts, not cover them up.
Since St. Augustine Record reporters so often leave meetings early after they obtain their preconceived "story," some government officials know that by putting important issues at the end of the meeting or on the consent agenda, they can avoid news coverage.
Last night, after Jennifer Edwards left without reporting the Ponte Vedra contamination cleanup, I put on the record of the AMCD meeting the fact that the Record reporter left early. From now on, I will do so at every opportunity when attending meetings.
By leaving early, the Record's readers were deprived of information on an environmental cleanup of several million pounds of contaminated soil in Ponte Vedra.
Perhaps it's only fair that there be a "Reportercam" TM at public meetings, aimed at the St. Augustine Record's reporters, so Editors and stockholders can watch and so everyone may watch how fawning, uninformed, bored St. Augustine Record reporters sit, yawning, not taking notes, failing to learn the news and failing to report it.
What do you reckon?
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