FEATURE

Don’t you just love it when every once in a while Canadians crawl out from under the shadow of Uncle Sam?

It happened one drizzly, fall day at a recent conference of Canadian and American reporters in Vancouver. The conference was hosted by the Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ) and the Missouri-based Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE).

Crossing the 49th: Investigative Journalism Techniques from Both Sides of the Border ran on a weekend at the Tony Pallisades Hotel in Vancouver’s downtown core. There were 10 sessions jointly hosted by reporters, lawyers, and broadcasters from both countries.Sometimes it was hard to tell session
leaders apart.

The great equalizer for Canadians and Americans turns out to be none other than ‘due diligence’. Getting information in both countries is like fighting an uphill battle every step of the way.

School tells me that statutory provisions for access to government records are pretty much entrenched in both countries.But at the workshop reporters say
they are not entirely happy with the provisions.

Perhaps I’ll be a working journalist in the future, but for today’s student there seems to be so much out there — so many Web sites, so much data and
public records,so, so,so many story ideas. I’m going learn to be dissatisfied with my access to information if I’m going to fit in at the workshop war rooms.

In what the hotel refers to as the Banquet Foyer, outside the two double doors of the meeting rooms, couple of pals from Kwantlen join the small talk and handshakes over coffee.

While the hotel calls this little area in front of the look-alike convention rooms the Banquet Foyer, reporters I speak with don’t fit in with the ‘banquet foyer’ mentality. These are definitely the soldiers of mass communication in our two countries; they occupy the Alberni and Jervis rooms, and the little front ‘hallway’, and swarm the five coffee machines, bleeding them dry.

Three sessions, four ‘hallway’ breaks and five cups of coffee later, I return to report on the encounters’ progress. Full of directives from the pros, and with a few business cards from friendly Americans, I find myself eager to join the
Resistance.

Sure, the hotel was offering valet parking, overnight shoeshine and safety deposit boxes. But the reporters milling about the place aren’t as obliging.The news machine is strategizing.

“It’s time for reconnaissance,”says Robert Cribb CAJ president and reporter with The Toronto Star.

The troops agree.

When Cribb says Canada’s relationship between government bureaucracy and the media is adversarial, especially compared to what’s happening in the U.S., heads in the crowd nod in agreement.

And just when I reassure myself that as the law becomes more and more entrenched in both the real world and in journalism schools things will improve,
bam! I’m shot down.

The default position in Canada is so very ‘British,’ admonishes Cribb.

In the States there’s a cultural predisposition toward open government that’s stronger, agreed a media scholar I called in New York a couple of days
after Crossing the 49th: Investigative Journalism Techniques from Both Sides of the Border.

“The inclination is for debates about access and privacy to trade off a little further to the freedom side,”says Alasdair Roberts,director of the Campbell Public Affairs Institute at Syracuse University, and former professor at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

Meanwhile, back at the conference in Room B, Paula Lavigne Sullivan of The Tacoma News Tribune is arguing that Canadians need to “educate” our
record keepers.

(Hey! Who’s getting educated here?)

Don’t take an immediate no for an answer because the person you ask assumes the information is not available to you, Sullivan maintains.

“Although the spirit of the (American) law is wonderful,” she says. “It’s not always easy to get public officials to do what they’re supposed to do without some negotiation.”

Later in the afternoon, following a little more coffee in the hallway referred to by the elite as ‘foyer,’ Cheryl Phillips of The Seattle Times teams up with
The Hamilton Spectator’s Fred Vallance-Jones to tackle some current issues surrounding the Web and computer-assisted reporting.

The plan is to continue a relentless penetration of the enemies’ databases.

Access laws apply to public records in any format, the two remind their audience.Our tactics should include the whole lot. Request a printed
document, a computer file, a map, graphics, or photographs – don’t hold back, advises Phillips.

As usual, find out which agency has the records. But both put fresh emphasis on finding out something else.Who in the bureaucracy is filing and organizing information? Which computer geek is familiar with the original data? That information technology manager soldiering on and on under all the incoming figures is not your enemy, advises Vallance-Jones, he’s a friend to journalists. Ask the bureaucrat what data are there when asking for information or filing an access to information request. A key vocabulary tool is the words “Including, but not limited to.” Commit the words to memory.

“The next time the city budget comes up as a story and you get a three-five- or six-inch package of pages, ask for that same thing on disk,” says Phillips.Get used to working on the screen. When asking for information in Canada, we
were reminded to be careful with the word ‘data.’ “The word ‘data’ is not even contemplated.Our legislation only contemplates paper,” Cribb tells a mixed group before lunch.Be covert.Use the word ‘record.’

On the data front overall, reporters seem to be bringing up the rear all day.

While news organizations are in the data and knowledge mêlée, more than a couple reporters feel training in the newsroom isn’t keeping up.
The students attending the weekend sessions feel a certain kinship,because hands-on training in information mining is having to grow with the industry.While some of our classes lean heavily on computer research, or graphic layout, initiatives are largely being taken by the students themselves, which is exactly what is happening in most newsrooms, except that it’s the reporters themselves
who take the initiative to bring more computer research into the newsroom.

Craig Welch of The Seattle Times says there are extensive databases on environmental impact, modern healthcare,NAFTA trade, lumber, fishing — the list goes on — with comparatively few stories coming out of them. How many reporters know how to access and compare massive databases? How many reporters are being paid to do so?

Way back in March, the Council of Presidents of National Journalism Organizations and the John S. and James L.Knight foundation released the results of their survey that included questions on newsroom training. The number one complaint from U.S. journalists, the survey concludes, is lack of training.

Now, I may be a student,but I figure if reporters in large urban areas in the States — where media resources are not typically in crisis — aren’t convinced they are getting enough training from their newspaper, then I doubt Canadian reporters,
where news budgets are constantly under threat, would respond much differently to a similar survey conducted here.

(Note to self: Lack of Newsroom Training — possible thesis # 9)

Those were just some of the complaints I overhear in the Banquet Foyer. (Which doubles as a hallway.)

The same problem is being discussed all across the continent. Bob Giles, author of the textbook Newsroom Management, says when money is tight there is a certain approach to promotion and computer instruction by owners, publishers and editors.

“Marketing and training are the first to go,” says Giles.

Well, after student intern programs, I might add.

As a beginner, it is bizarre to hear from veteran reporters that the news industry is lagging behind on information processing.

“I don’t think the problem will ever get resolved until corporate leaders and publishers make training a part of strengthening their franchise,” says Giles.

Computer-assisted reporting (CAR), in particular, deserves our extra attention.
In CAR, the idea is to find two or more databases and compare,or run queries on them.It’s a sure-fire way to get news stories, say Phillips and Vallance-Jones.Locate the list of school bus drivers, compare the list to drunk driving records, and Presto! You’ve nailed the enemy.

The workshop was jointly hosted by the CAJ and the IRE. The IRE runs The National Institute for Computer Reporting, a non-stop convoy of relevant databases. In the Washington, issues such as the recent sniper case, which hit pretty close to the 49th in Bellingham, the institute reminded people visiting its site that ‘now might be a good time to check out NICAR’s database of licensed
gun dealers.’

I began to follow CAR thinking.The possibilities momentarily blinded me.

CAR is helping newspapers and broadcast outlets break stories.But maybe more importantly, says Phillips, CAR can help me avoid someone else’s spin.

Many of the familiar faces at the conference were journalists who have served their respective news machine overseas,and surprisingly,almost all of them are used to work in the States.

The National’s correspondent in Vancouver, Terry Milewski,was posted in Washington for CBCTV News,where he reported on the U.S.,and Central and South America. Milewski told us that in some of the bigger stories developing, including NAFTA and softwood lumber,we should forget about taking sides. The battle cry “they’re the bad guys, we’re the good guys” is reserved for after heavy
investigation. Milewski believes these key areas are as yet underreported, and he sees very few stories on why the dispute is happening.

“Is anyone doing a story on what the Americans are doing (in softwood lumber)?”he asks the crowd of about 100.No one is.

While it’s more difficult to do a story about issues than about people, says Milewski, he feels reporters should be preparing to look at it less as a business story, or as a nationalist story.He wants to see the inside scoop on more serious issues at stake.

He makes a good commander for our small detachment in Room B. The day ends with a bit of something from the ‘sergeants,’ Milewski is one of the few at the workshop who drills the audience.Yet when he dismisses us, I still feel he’s ‘one of us.’ Maybe it’s because he’s from Vancouver,my favourite city, or maybe it’s because I’ve seen his face on the news so frequently over the past 10 years.

Whatever the messenger has going that day, the message is loud and clear.The buzzword of the day over and again is ‘reconnaissance’.

I learned a little about the enemies’ position. If I pursue a career in journalism, the answer to my demands for information from the government will be no,nine out of ten times.I hear some form of this message from Kim Bolan (The Vancouver Sun), Margo Harper (CTV),David Baines (The Vancouver Sun), Brant Houston (IRE and NICAR), Charlie Smith (Georgia Straight), Paula Lavigne Sullivan (The Tacoma News Tribune), Robert Cribb (The Toronto Star), Cheryl Phillips (The Seattle Times), Fred Vallance-Jones (The Hamilton Spectator) and Terry Milewski (CBC).

But these people are also confident and professional; a group of curious individuals ready to take service under any State that supports the defence of personal freedom. Reporters run into problems,many of them are discussed,but those at the workshop keep busy formulating and sharing strategies to get around them.

At one of the organizational meetings of the IRE in 1975, columnist Les Whitten says that it was a ‘sense of outrage’ that typified investigative reporters.When there’s a violation of others’ rights, there’s a story, no matter which side of the 49th you’re on.

Eventually, I have to leave the spiffy ‘war rooms’ of Crossing the 49th and head back to the Peace Arch and my border-hugging suburb, where dealings with Americans means gas, milk and cheese.

While the complimentary evening wine-hour reception being offered back at the hotel — ‘for guests to acquaint and refresh’ — is tempting, I’ve had enough for the day.

So I take off, eh