By Lynne Enders Glaser
Neiman Reports © 1993

A friend suggested the other day that I was "silly, at best," to speak before "conservative" groups like the Rotary and Farm Bureau on behalf of the "liberal" media and a "liberal" newspaper like The Fresno (Calif.) Bee.

I not only take exception to her choice of words, but I take exception to her thesis.

First, there's nothing "silly" at all about schmoozing with readers on the essence of the First Amendment -- discussing what an unfettered press means on a personal basis, particularly at a time when people have become polarized, vitriolic and vicious around issues like abortion rights, welfare money and whether homosexuals should be allowed in the armed forces.

Then, you've got those loaded words -- "conservative" and "liberal" -- which somehow have taken on lives of their own that, depending on your political placement, stand for things like good, evil, right, wrong, American, un-American, etc., etc.

Maybe it has something to do with the aging process, but I no longer buy into that word game. And I make that point clear -- should the need arise -- when speaking to groups as ombudsman for The Bee, which is a McClatchy Newspapers property with a Sunday circulation of about 186,000 and home-delivery service to six counties in central California.

But, in order for you to more fully appreciate why I avoid these two labels, let me share some details about this turf and its people.

The economy of the San Joaquin Valley, in which Fresno sits, and the adjacent foothills is heavily dependent on farming. Many of the early settlers came from the South and the Midwest. The region received a substantial wave of emigrants from Oklahoma, Arkansas and Texas during the Great Depression. The largest ethnic group is Hispanic, which accounts for 35 percent of Fresno County's population. The next largest contains people from all countries of Southeast Asia. The area is a stronghold for fundmental Christians and the Roman Catholic Church. There was measurable support for President Bush and the Gulf War.

I'm sure you get the flow by now: The area served by The Fresno Bee is conservative.

The Bee, by comparison, has taken liberal editorial positions on issues including abortion, farm-water costs, the unionization of fieldworkers and the right of acknowledged homosexuals to be in the armed forces. Generally, it endorses candidates who belong to the Democratic Party. It supported Bill Clinton for president in 1992.

Not all Bee readers are thrilled by its editorial pages, which is precisely why, when speaking to groups, I make a concerted effort to keep the focus on the paper as a news carrier.

"You should expect to see opinion on the editorial pages and among columnists," I tell groups or individuals who want to debate a particular position. "But you should not expect it in the news columns -- in news stories. And that's what we need to be talking about -- the news."

In two years, I've accepted about 60 speaking engagements from service, social, special-interest or high school and college groups. I also spend part of Wednesday mornings, from September through May, at an elementary school as part of The Bee's commitment to reading and literacy programs. I mention this because we save the last five minutes in each class -- I read to two classes a week -- to talk about newspapers and how students can use The Bee in their daily lives.

The numbers I've addressed ranged from about 250 (at one Rotary luncheon and an annual meeting of social-service professionals) to precisely three (at a Thursday-night forum in the oil and cattle town of Coalinga, in eastern Fresno County.)

The Coalinga Public Library is 92 miles from The Bee Building, and to contend the evening was worth the drive would be a bit Pollyanna. However, it wasn't all bad: I met three citizens who frequently square off against the town council and had never been utilized as dissident sources by Bee reporters. Indeed, their chief complaint was that the newspaper "only prints what the council and town bigwigs want you to know. You guys don't try hard enough to get the other side." Reporters now have their names and telephone numbers.

Generally, I talk for 20 to 30 minutes on why The Bee created the ombudsman's slot, ways for readers to access the ombudsman, and how and when reader reaction has caused change at the paper.

I've also spoken to college journalism classes about the First Amendment, ethics and writing, and to special-interest groups on how they can better utilize the press. But, for the most part, groups have asked me to speak because they want to hear about what an ombudsman does -- what the position really means.

And so I'll remind them, for instance, that The Bee scrapped a new format for its Sunday television magazine because readers said, loudly and en masse, that they preferred the previous version; that, because of readers' complaints, the paper resurrected a monthly compendium of club information; and that the "At your service" listing of elected officials was returned to print in response to letters and calls to the ombudsman.

I also will remind them that Sioux City, Iowa, was added to the national weather report at the suggestion of but one reader, and about corrections and stories that have appeared because of a single reader's concern. It's important readers realize that sometimes it only takes one person to cause change.

Normally, I reserve at least 10 minutes for questions from the audience. I think this is the most important part of our meeting, because it allows readers an opportunity to offer feedback they can be assured will reach the level of policy setters; to ask questions about The Bee's news content and conduct; and, sometimes, simply to vent. To this end, I explain, the ombudsman serves as their voice -- conduit, as it were -- transporting their expressions from the meeting place to the offices of the executive editor and publisher without interpretation or evaluation.

But, as often happens when I am speaking -- my "script" is more like a fistful of jottings -- I've jumped ahead of my outline. At this point, I was due to share how groups learn that The Bee's ombudsman is available to speak.

Actually, the newspaper promotes the position of ombudsman and my availability as a speaker in an aggressive manner that begins with a notice at the bottom of my Sunday column. The notice includes my direct telephone line, a toll-free number for callers outside of Fresno and a mailing address. The newspaper's marketing department puts me in touch with readers who call there.

A promotional brochure, titled "Meet the ombudsman," indicates that I welcome opportunities to speak and also provides the local and toll-free telephone numbers and mailing address. The brochure is available in the lobby of The Bee Building and is distributed at Bee-sponsored functions including "how to" sessions for publicity chairmen, Bee Day at the county fair and meetings with community leaders. I also hand out copies when I speak.

House ads frequently run that promote the ombudsman's column and the uniqueness of having a readers' representative. The ads often result in phone calls -- and whenever it seems appropriate, I tell callers I would be pleased to speak to their clubs, organizations, school groups, church units, whatever. I tell them I am available from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week. I don't want time, as such, to prevent an opportunity for me to share my enthusiasm about the position and what I think it that means to readers and the newspaper.

Because public speaking is physically and emotionally demanding, I try to limit talks to twice a month and do no more than one a week. Likewise, while I accept offers throughout Fresno County, and in parts of Madera County to the north and Tulare County to the south, I decline to travel more than 50 miles from home at night. I am unsettled by the thought of having a flat tire, after dark, on a lonely stretch of country road.

To this point, I have never declined an invitation to speak, although in March I put one organization on "indefinite hold." I did this based on the caller's pronouncement that everything that appears or does not appear in a newspaper is there or is not there by design -- actually, the words she used were "your covert liberal agenda." Nothing, she said, "absolutely nothing" results from human error, poor planning or bad work.

Well, I don't mind taking a little mud or a few rocks now and then. Sometimes, it is almost fun to see how well you keep cool under fire. But, overall, I expect the same courtesy to be extended to me that I extend to the audience, and I put a real premium on sharing.

It did not seem to me in March -- nor, really, does it now -- that the organization I put on hold could provide a forum in which ideas would be exchanged freely, and with respect, and that information would be assimilated and processed without preconception. I questioned the caller about my perception. Quite openly, she agreed. And, then, we agreed to talk again in fall.

Once I accept an invitation, I approach the engagement much in the same way I approached an interview as a reporter. That is to say, I do my homework. I gather as much information about the group from the person who made contact. I use The Bee's electronic library to evaluatate the coverage it received in the last two years and to help me figure out what issues or concerns members might want to address.

As I write this, I am two hours away from speaking to the Fresno County Democratic Women's Club. Last fall, the club expressed dissatisfaction with the publicity it received for a fund- raising luncheon and fashion show. (In my judgment, it got more ink than it should have, with a photo and post-event story in the local news section. I was suprised by the coverage, because there is nothing new about the idea of having local politicians serve as models and because it has been almost 20 years since the feature department has covered local, non-designer shows with more than a few lines.) During the 1992 presidential campaign, several members of the Democratic Women's Club, as individuals, also said things like "The Bee is bending over backward to be nice to President Bush, with stories and pictures that make him look wonderful, just because you endorsed Bill Clinton, and that's not fair." I expect both points to be raised today, along with coverage of the president's jobs bill and the way reports on Clinton's popularity, have been played.

(Neither of the four points was raised, in fact. The chief complaint was the number of stories -- most of them soft -- that The Bee has run on Rush Limbaugh. From the club's perspective, the newspaper is providing Limbaugh and his political allies with an "unfair advantage to preach the message of the radical religious right.. The Democrats have no voice or power that compares to that.")

Learning what I can about a group helps me to formulate my approach as a speaker -- whether, for instance, I want to sit on the edge of a table or stand behind a podium -- and to reflect on my physical presence. I tailor my appearance and manner to each group, and I neither view that as manipulative or toady. My intention is to remove unnecessary barriers so that we, as representatives of the press and public, can participate in a cooperative, unrestrained exchange.

I picked a pink silk shirtmaker for a meeting of a women's civic club in the small town of Reedley, a group whose members are almost all at least 60 years old and, for the most part, I suspect, have not worked outside the home. The dress blended nicely with what others were wearing. For a meeting with women political activists, I wore jeans, boots and a black silk shirt. The outfit matched several others. I wore a high-style, outrageously colorful getup to a what was billed as a "fun" luncheon and a practical skirt and blouse to a Grange meeting in Fowler, another small town south of Fresno. Since the Grange, as an organization, centers of the participation of husbands and wives, I asked my husband to accompany me.

Contrived? Admittedly so. But the point is, I do whatever I can to launch each session in an atmosphere of mutual comfort and cooperation. And, so far, the approach has worked.

I have two questions that I will pose to readers, if the readers seem hesitant to ask their own. The first is, "What can you tell me about your last contact with the press/the media/The Fresno Bee? Was it a positive or negative experience? How did you feel at the time, and how do you feel about the coverage, or lack of coverage, that followed?'' If that doesn't get things going, I ask, "What is the one thing about The Fresno Bee you would most like to change?" Seldom do I need the first question; almost never have I had to pose both. Audience members generally have more questions to ask than there is time to answer, which means that I frequently exit with a veral invitation to call or write me at the office.

Outside of Fresno, the most frequently aired comments and questions center on the amount of space that The Bee devotes -- or does not devote -- to the dozens and dozens of surrounding towns. In the city itself, there are more comments and questions about headlines, how The Bee covers Fresno State University athletics, local photographs that depict personal grief and words/phrases that may reflect a reporter's opinion. Since January, a lot of anger has been voiced about the newspaper's decision to shorten local obits by excluding names of survivors.

Rarely do audience members try to debate a political or social issue. When they do, the subjects they attack generally are abortion, gay rights, gun control and other things presumed "liberal." In two years, only twice did an audience member become truly obnoxious. One man at a service club meeting was bent on proving that The Bee is a "poor citizen" and "against our community" because it has reported the shouting and shoving matches of a Fresno State coach. There also was a woman member of a study club who loudly and repeatedly expressed her thoughts about the paper's "lousy liberal agenda" and "stinking bias." My answer was to offer the speakers five minutes of uninterrupted time to say whatever they wanted -- on the contingency that, when the period had elapsed, they would yield the floor. On both occasions, their remarks were cut short by other audience members.

These meetings would provide little benefit to The Bee if the questions raised there remained a secret between the readers and ombudsman. For that reason, I include them in a daily log distributed to editors at a late-afternoon huddle to hash over today's news and plan tomorrow's front page. Copies of logs are posted on the wall outside my office and bulletin boards in the newsroom so that staff members at all levels have opportunity to read them.

Here is an example of the entries from a January meeting of the Madera County Child Abuse Prevention Council:

1. April is Child Abuse Prevention Month. What can The Bee do to help us educate the public?
   
2. Stories generally talk about times when the social-services system has failed, and a child has been hurt or killed as a result. Why don't we ever see stories about times when family reunification has worked or stories about the trauma that children undergo when they are removed from their natural homes?
   
3. Suggest a story that would explain the laws that "restrict" social workers and the philosophy behind laws that suggest children are generally better off with their natural parents than in another setting.
   
4. Both the Bee reporter and the social workers who appeared on the "Valley Press" television show did a good job. Please let the reporter and his boss know.
   
5. Appreciate it when the newspaper carries the name, address and phone number of appropriate agencies in stories about child abuse or abuse prevention. A good public service.
   
6. Why does The Bee "wait so long" to include certain information in a story? "Move information about such things as legal restrictions higher up in your stories. It isn't fair to go all the way through a story that makes it sound like Child Protective Service workers have failed again, and then at the end find out their hands were legally tied."
   

One reason I selected this list is that it was limited to six entries. Most contain 10 to 15 items. I also chose it because special- interest groups tend to hone in on specifics and offer solutions to what they perceive as problems.

So, what is the net result of having an ombudsman who goes face to face with readers?

I believe that accepting this level of intimacy helped me to more fully and more quickly establish a voice -- and reputation -- as the readers' representative and, when appropriate, the readers' advocate. It has expanded the forum for discussion well beyond what the telephone and mail can provide. It has given new numbers of readers a chance to speak out on the editorial conduct and content of their Bee.

I don't contend that speaking to groups is everybody's idea of a good time. I am from a family that has a history of community service at leadership levels. I was schooled in public speaking long before I thought about newspaper work.

For years, as a reporter and editor, I repressed the ham in me.

But no longer.

Now, a couple of times a month, it's center stage for Lynne Enders Glaser, ombudsman for The Fresno Bee. And what an opportunity that is to schmooze on the importance of a free press and remind readers that the journalist's primary charge is to keep the public fully informed. This is a message I am pleased and proud to carry.

This article is reprinted from the Summer 1993 edition of Nieman Reports from the Nieman Foundation at Harvard University. Lynne Enders Glaser is ombudsman at The Fresno Bee in Fresno, California.