TONY DODERO -- Second Thoughts

There’s a funny phenomenon in the news business.

Stories or photographs that we think will cause readers the least amount

of anxiety sometimes turn into a tempest that even the sturdiest of

teapots can’t contain.

Take for example our coverage of the fund-raising efforts of the Costa

Mesa Senior Center.

It seems a worthy cause -- a nonprofit group trying to raise money for

seniors and senior activities.

But unbeknownst to us, others were fuming over our news coverage, as well

as the actions of the senior center officials.

It turned out that the Costa Mesa Senior Center drive was coinciding with

that of the OASIS Senior Center, which has deep roots in Corona del Mar.

And what was worse is that the Costa Mesa fund-raising efforts were being

targeted to Corona del Mar and Newport Beach residents whose names had

been gathered from the tax rolls by County Treasurer John Moorlach, who

is spearheading this year’s Costa Mesa fund-raising campaign.

The dual fund-raising efforts caused some at OASIS to believe that

members of the public would become confused over which center to support.

Of course these behind the scenes snags went unnoticed by the newsroom,

and we continued to write several stories on the Costa Mesa center,

followed by a glowing editorial endorsing the whole thing.

We often debate controversial stories and editorials before they go to

print, but this wasn’t one of them.

*

In another bit of coverage this week that caused an uproar, we ran a

photograph of a young man skateboarding down the boardwalk as he toted

his dog along on a leash. Or maybe the dog was toting him, I’m not sure.

Regardless, the photo, which we thought was a nice illustration of the

burst of warm weather we were having, incensed a reader who called us to

say our publishing of the photo promoted the illegality of skateboarding

on the boardwalk.

While I understand the reader’s concern, and there has been much debate

about these matters within journalism circles, the media’s role is not

supposed to be that of the police officer or censor, merely as the eyes

and ears of the public.

There’s much precedence for this. If the media were to capture a young

man throwing a rock at a police officer, or a woman looting a store,

those images have news value and we would publish them for that reason.

I don’t think for a minute that someone would believe that we are

promoting the idea of throwing rocks at police officer or looting

businesses; we are simply portraying life as it is.

Likewise, if an outlaw skateboarder provides us with a perfect slice of

Newport Beach life, the debate over whether to publish it most likely

wouldn’t center on the legality of it all.

Besides, you could say this very same skateboarder promotes something

else that’s near and dear to Newport residents -- keeping dogs on a

leash.

* TONY DODERO is the editor of the Daily Pilot. Comments or

suggestions for Second Thoughts can be Mailed: 330 W. Bay St. Costa Mesa,

CA 92627. E-mailed: tdnews1@aol.com or dailypilot@latimes.com. Faxed:

949-646-4170. Phone: 949-574-4258.