The word — if not on the street, at least at 425 Portland Avenue — is that the Star Tribune is getting ready to announce what I predict will be positioned as a conflict-of-interest policy. It will ostensibly bar ex-Strib reporters from writing for the paper's opinion pages until one year after their leave-taking.
Seen one way, this is textbook corporate ethics practice. It would appear to remove perception of a revolving door whereby former Strib employees parlay their presumed connections to benefit clients or causes. (Op/ed writers also receive what amounts to an honorarium for published pieces.) When I left corporate life, I was under a similar embargo that prevented me from consulting with the company for a year. (Unless I had approval from a vice president, which I had before I made it out the door.)
Goodness knows, in the wake of the Par Ridder injunction, it's understandable the paper might want to brush up its image by showing that its expectations for ex-reporters are higher than for their current publisher.
But that's not how reporters, those professional skeptics, may see it.
A less charitable person might think this forthcoming policy is a way for conservative-leaning management to diminish the impression that Strib reporters are disproportionately progressive. After all, look at some of those who would be barred:
- Eric Black, associated with Minnesota Monitor and Center for Independent Media
- Conrad deFiebre, Minnesota 2020
- Dane Smith, Growth & Justice
- Steve Berg, Linda Mack, Doug Grow, Jay Weiner, Sarah Schmickle, Delma Francis and a presumably ever-expanding group of writers and editors attached to MinnPost
- John Reinan, Fast Horse PR firm
- Jeremy Iggers, Twin Cities Media Alliance
Not exactly a full stable of flaming lefties, perhaps, but not a Kersten or Lileks among them, either.
Smith and deFiebre have had op/ed pieces run in the last month or two. Cutting them off at the byline does seem to impinge on their ability to perform their current jobs. For the others, putting the state's leading editorial page off limits at least restricts their freedom of expression. (Disclosure: As a communications fellow for Growth & Justice, I won't be sharing any bylines with Smith for awhile.)
No word on how the paper might further mute the political leanings and expressions of its actual staff.
*****
And though I've been caustic toward the paper over the last week, I want to say it is showing why good journalism matters with its reports on 3M's runaway chemicals, MnDOT and the bridge collapse aftermath and other recent stories on contaminated groundwater.
