Musings: On Media Relations

“Come on,” I said to the dogs, though they never need urging to go anywhere. “It's gonna be a beautiful sunrise.” And it was, with gauzy clouds turning the color of a blood orange and the ones covering the sun getting that red-gold gilt around the edges and still others forming towering cumulus columns that hovered on the horizon while a double rainbow arched mauka and iwa flew silently overhead.

So started a new day on Kauai, and at The Garden Island, too, where publisher Casey Quel Fitchett was fired yesterday — an event publicly celebrated under the “breaking news” headline: Ding dong, the witch is dead! (Click on image to enlarge.)

The article, which was quickly taken down from the paper's website, sarcastically ridicules the “positives” associated with Oahu Publishing Inc.'s (aka Star-Advertiser media monopoly) purchase of the paper:

“You may also have noted we've grown in the number of pages, increasing both outsourced editorial content and ads that help readers save precious dollars without requiring any local investment by the company. For the first time since their accounts were lost to OPI on Quel Fitchett's watch, Kmart and Longs advertising inserts are once again part of your Sunday TGI, because Quel Fitchett losing those contracts to OPI's Midweek is what strengthened OPI while weakening TGI enough to make the purchase possible.

Our foremost goal is to produce a newspaper that makes Kauai proud without actually investing in the product. How are we doing so far?”

I think we all know the answer to that one, sadly.... 

Oh, well, I'm sure OPI can round up somebody from South Dakota who has always wanted to live on Kauai to take Casey's place. Most likely a man, since OPI is such an old boy's club. Yup, owner David Black couldn't find even one wahine to round-out his all-male board of directors. What's up with that?

Meanwhile, OPI's MidWeek Kauai is going through a change as well, with writer Amanda Gregg and her hubby, deputy housing director and former deputy planning director Imai Aiu, headed for Boston. Guess now we'll never know why Imai approved all those vacation rentals even though the owners failed to prove they were eligible for a non-conforming use permit.

But OPI and Obama aren't the only ones worried about and clamping down on whistle-blowers and leaks. Kauai County has issued its own media relations policy that channels everything through the mayor's office. 

Under the First Amendment-stifling directive — approved by County Attorney Al Castillo — all county employees are forbidden to “proactively distribute information or initiate discussions with media representatives concerning County issues without first consulting with the County of Kaua`i Communications Team – and in particular, the Public Information Officer (PIO).” It goes on to state:

Spokespersons, staff, and members are not to give statements “off the record.” Any discussions, whether in an informal or formal setting with media representatives, will be considered on-the-record (even if the media representative says that the discussion is “off the record”).

It doesn't specify what punishment will befall those who deviate from “the process." Perhaps they'll be sentenced to sit through 10 County Council meetings without a smart phone for diversion.

I understand the role and value of a PIO, and in all fairness, the “communications team” — Beth Tokioka, Mary Daubert and Sarah Blane — is efficient and responsive. But surely managers making $100,000+ per year can be trusted to talk the party line to reporters. 

And what of those agencies — county council, auditor, KPD, prosecutor — whose staff are technically county workers, though they're not under the purview of the mayor's office? Does all the information from these departments have to be vetted by the mayor's office, too, even though he's their political enemy?

Whether it's Obama or Bernard, it seems we'd be better off if people focused more on doing the right thing, as opposed to tightly controlling the information that's released to the public. Because it is our government, after all.

While we're talking about doing the right thing,  the Department of Hawaiian Homelands yesterday nixed Eric Knutzen's plan to lease Anahola homelands to harvest and cultivate trees for his wood chip-burning plant. For years homesteaders have been protesting their lands being leased to non-Hawaiian grifters. 

Finally, DHHL listened. Or, rather, five of the eight commissioners did.