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July Fourth is about Oakhill, too
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By Todd Franko (Contact)
Pardon me — on this day of celebration and independence — for wanting to take one last volley at explaining why I care about Oakhill Earthquake 2010.
And actually, if I write these next 15 or so paragraphs properly, it’ll conveniently come back to independence and America, as it should, on this important day.
We are at a loss of critical leadership in America at this time — from Washington to Oakhill.
We have leadership, but it comes without the amount of purity we once treasured.
To be sure, even our historic public and private leaders — Washington, Franklin, Roosevelt, Truman, Morgan, Carnegie, Ford, to name a few — were leaders who had faults. But the level to which their leadership amassed public good surpassed their individual challenges.
Today, it’s less inspiring.
I generally like President Obama, but I become more concerned by the day.
When he salutes stimulus tax dollars that sustain more government jobs and do not generate as many private-sector jobs, I’m uninspired. And when he drops by to honor a major company effort and salute himself and his other political leaders and the $20 million they generated, but undersells the $650 million from the company, I’m uninspired.
Enron and British Petroleum hardly evoke the lasting images of the Ford Motor Co. and U.S. Steel.
So as I was saying, Oakhill ...
The Vindicator’s been knocked by some county workers for holding on to the news that Oakhill was among the very, very few government offices between here and Ottawa to close.
“Let go.” “Come on.”
In fact, on Thursday, I was “tablacked,” if you will.
County Administrator George Tablack left a two-minute-long voicemail, which included him chiding us for hanging onto this story and not pursuing another story he deemed more important. He complained reporter Pete Milliken’s work contained a fact error. He threatened legal action. And, the kicker: He said The Vindicator was creating a poor impression of things at the county.
Here are a couple general rules I’ve been taught over the years:
If mad, don’t leave a long, whiney voicemail. Leave a short message announcing your concern and leave a phone number. That did not happen with Tablack. My machine logged his home number. I called, and George asked if he could call back. And there’s been no callback.
Do not hyperbolize. Milliken’s “error” was a fact attributed to Anthony Traficanti, who did not call claiming he was misquoted. Also, don’t threaten legal action. Most legal action I’ve been part of, I was never forewarned. Most legal action I’ve been threatened with has never happened.
Shifting to another story, as suggested by Tablack, is what too many of us have done for years.
We’ve let go in America.
You see it when government jobs are the leading “new employment” sector.
You see it when government pensions and health- care plans for public servants are healthier than private workers.
We let it happen.
Tablack was correct at one point in his message: There are more-important things to report. There are.
But we – as citizens and as newspapers – have fallen for that too many times.
We get hot over something. We wait for an answer. We allow officials to not explain what the public deems bad decisions. Then we move on to something else.
I’m not ready for that yet.
America was launched when citizens finally fought back.
That civic courage — that we can be better tomorrow than we are right now — is sorely needed today when we are surrounded by government officials who look out most for themselves and their jobs.
Comments
Tablack is the master of misinformation and Traficanti always mistates the "facts" like when he says WE, meaning his office, is doing their part to sacrifice during these tough times and no other ofices are in county government.
The public employees and a growing number of voters understand this. While it has taken the Vindicator a while to catch on it is never too late.
Tablack needs to go or Mahoning County Government will never be reformed for the better.
"And, the kicker: He said The Vindicator was creating a poor impression of things at the county."
The Vindicator? More like 99.9% of the public.
The county commissioners and their friends have to go, period!
Good column.
Todd:
Just curious. How often do public officials call or e-mail and complain, whine and threaten legal action over what the newspaper writes? And who is the worst offender?
It seems that you would have to be pretty juvenile to do that understanding the nature of their positions.
The only "gripe" I have with your article is the "leaders" you mentioned. Your Democratness is showing! I thought Independence Day was secured by soldiers of both major parties who fought in all our wars. Some one known as Abraham Lincoln inherited a deteriorating political situation which resulted in his being sworn in during mid-March of '61 and in April, the siege of Ft Sumter took place. So Republicans have no reason to celebrate Independence Day? And we buy newspapers, too.
Otherwise, your commentary is well taken. Both parties, today, have lost their moral compasses. You are right. Whether it's national or county, either party isn't likely to do what's best for the people. Character does matter.
Tablack got one thing right - for some time now, the Vindicator has been creating a worse impression of the Valley than actually exists. I'm not saying for one minute that anybody should ignore the bad, but the Vindicator goes out of its way to make certain aspects of the Valley appear as bad as they can, to the point of leaving out the good things. The constant hammering on YSU, for instance, while snubbing that same institution when it comes to in-depth explanations of things the paper covers, gives the impression that there's nothing worthwhile here. The Vindy routinely uses 'wire' news stories to explain physical phenomena such as eclipses, earthquakes, and so on. Does nobody at YSU know anything about any of that? When yet another in our long line of crooked politicians is caught, do we seek out the YSU Political Science faculty to learn what the charges actually mean? The list of examples is endless. The Vindicator snubs YSU at every opportunity.
Then there is their treatment of non-YSU public employees in the area. It appears that the Vindy believes all public employees should work for minimum wage or less, with no benefits, no sick time, no vacation time, no nothing. Local governments have learned that the Vindy will print their version of contract negotiations issues as if they were gospel. This allows the administration to sway public opinion in their favor, which gives them a great unfair advantage. It's unethical, but this is the Mahoning Valley. Who cares about ethics? When people outside the Valley read the Vindy's version of events here, all they see is negativity. Who wants to relocate to an area where all the public employees are pariahs?
The problem, NoBS, is that your BS on our coverage of YSU can be easily disproved simply by typing "Youngstown State University" into the search field. There you can relatively easily scan the thousands of stories published on YSU. Do it yourself and see whether "The constant hammering on YSU, for instance, while snubbing that same institution when it comes to in-depth explanations of things the paper covers, gives the impression that there's nothing worthwhile here" is valid.
Just in the last couple of months expertise cited at YSU included:
http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/jun/06...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/jun/05...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/jun/03...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/may/06...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/apr/30...
There are scores more... Try it!
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
To Exposed:
Calls and emails with general complaints are pretty frequent, which I encourage. The reporting process is not perfect. Many callers have valid points.
"Smash-and-grab" venting like George's is not that common from titles such as his. (Not a first, but not common.) Most leaders want an exchange -- even if it's in disagreement. They want to be heard and they want to hear.
The winning "complainer" (if you will), as my memory serves me, is Mayor Jay. We had a disconnect between our reporting and a subsequent editorial. Our reporting and editorial could have been tighter that day.
Jay called. (No long voicemail or email.)
His call was simple: He had a complaint. He wanted to sit down with whomever had a stake/role in the disconnect.
Jay came by himself. (Most government bosses need to come with a power supply of staffers — 1, 2 or 3 people. Most times, that power supply sits silent.)
Five of us (as I recall) listened to Jay nail a timeline of events regarding our work. He was factual. He was without hyperbole. He was succinct and without arm flailing, verbosity, voice raising and finger pointing.
The five of us -- all pretty skilled in various ways of defending a situation -- nodded our heads and agreed with our "complainer." Jay was correct.
The losing "complainer," again as memory serves me, is Tom Letson and his Valley racism episode during Obama's campaign. He said it to us. He's on Gerry Ricciutti's video saying the same. Yet he ran to the Trib-Chronicle saying we got it wrong. Letson showed up for an edit board with us a couple weeks later and explained himself much in a way that actor Gary Busey would.
Todd
BTW: George followed up his lengthy Thursday voicemail with an email Sunday morning before my coffee was even ready. Like his voicemail, his email was absent and invite or interest in sorting this out face to face, or at least voice to voice.
But he closed the email with "sincerely."
So I got that going for me.
Mr. Sweetwood,
Some of those examples you linked to simply illustrate my point. A golf-for-women seminar at the Lake club where the YSU womens' golf coach is quoted isn't at all what I was talking about. Neither is a blurb about the Mahoning Valley Taskforce on Crime and Violence that was held at Choffin Career Center. A seminar on the subject of modifying mens' behavior to prevent battering women that happens to be held in Kilcawley? Please. How much of the Vindy's 'coverage' is simply press releases from Ron Cole's office? And if those are your definition of "in depth" you need to research that concept.
What about my charge that the Vindy provides one-sided, administration-favoring coverage when it comes to issues concerning public employees? Unless you read very closely a recent story or perhaps editorial about YSU's compensation to certain non-union administrative staff, the implication is that the APAS union received a 5.5% raise. This is false - they received no such raise. Close scrutiny shows that the actual allegation is not made, but at first glance the implication is there.
When is the last time the Vindy even gave the labor point of view in their coverage of any contract negotiations? I mean fair coverage, not some editorial about "those greedy so-and-sos."
NoBS: Well, if you are going to change your argument...
You first wrote: "...the Vindicator has been creating a worse impression of the Valley than actually exists ... the Vindicator goes out of its way to make certain aspects of the Valley appear as bad as they can, to the point of leaving out the good things. The constant hammering on YSU, for instance, while snubbing that same institution when it comes to in-depth explanations of things the paper covers, gives the impression that there's nothing worthwhile here."
So, I just grabbed a few headlines from recent weeks during my holiday weekend to show the Vindy including YSU as a positive, worthwhile institution. Then you change the argument to: "What about my charge that the Vindy provides one-sided, administration-favoring coverage when it comes to issues concerning public employees?"
My larger point is that if you search the university on our Web pages, you'll literally find thousands of entries. Some will likely bolster your argument; some will contradict it. But until you do that – and settle on a single argument – it's hard for me to provide context and the other side of the exchange.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Great that you respond to such a question, and as in depth as you did. Good job.
"Letson showed up for an edit board with us a couple weeks later and explained himself much in a way that actor Gary Busey would."
Classic. However, didn't the Vindy go ahead and endorse Busey anyway?
1970mach:
I can't really give you a great answer for that. It's not in my realm.
The board has its reasons.
And in other instances, they're very charitable.
Not sure which for Busey, er, Tom ...
Todd
Todd,
any chnce of posting the e-mail or VM from King George.
The way you make it sounds, it could be funny. I could use a laugh.