Press Releases: PPH almost sold. Now what?

Published in the Portland Phoenix

The long-floundering Portland Press Herald is about to have a new owner. At least, all signs suggest that the money necessary to seal the deal will come through by the end of the year. There are financial details to be finalized, and there's a slim chance the money won't materialize, but involved parties tell the Portland Phoenix that pens are very close to the financial paper, and that the financing may include an employee-ownership component.

As many had speculated, the likely new owner will be Maine Media Investments — owned by the governor's brother, Bob Baldacci; former US senator and defense secretary Bill Cohen; his son Kevin, a former Turner Broadcasting executive; housing and real-estate developer Mike Liberty; and Pennsylvania newspaper publisher Richard Connor (who was born in Bangor). Soon, this group will no doubt be making public what they plan to do to recover the paper's dying circulation, plummeting advertising revenue, and rock-bottom newsroom morale.

Connor himself was recently heard to say — while out and about in Portland — that he could see why the paper was struggling, since it was "so thin it blows off the front porch in the morning." That might signal an inclination to expand the news coverage, which has shrunk considerably in recent months, but it's unclear who would do that work: the employees union is "bracing" for significant layoffs after the deal is finalized, according to Portland Newspaper Guild acting administrative officer Kathy Munroe.

The new owners will have to navigate the complicated quagmire of determining what their readers actually want. The biggest dispute among the audience appears to be where a revamped Press Herald would strike a balance between local coverage and national and international news.

Some hints can be found in independent blogs. A poster named MediaDog at AsMaineGoes wants less wire-service copy, saying in an August post, "In this Internet era most wire news is stale by the time the papers reached readers' doorsteps."

At MediaMutt, Phoenix columnist Al Diamon's blog on the Down East magazine Web site, one commenter suggested last week that a more major overhaul is needed: "The newspaper has limited value in terms of keeping readers informed. I don't think I've ever seen a shallower newspaper than the version that is being published today."

Perhaps the best way to gauge the reaction from the Press Herald's audience, though, is to look at the comments on the paper's own Web site — specifically, those talking about the sale itself.

"I'm getting the Friday, Saturday, Sunday [subscription package] deal and the news is the same in all three papers," wrote one person, who said she is canceling her subscription.

Another commenter promised to "buy this rag IF it had some substantial US/world news," while simultaneously lamenting the lack of "real investigative journalism" and follow-up on "real issues." But that person did, apparently, agree with Connor's perception of the paper as too thin: "Once you dump the flyers and classifieds you don't have enough to line a bird cage!"

Other posters suggested: "Report from the middle of the road and tell me what is going on locally," and "focus in-depth on local news, and leave national and international news to the larger papers, television, and the Internet."

But one commenter just might have hit on a key element of any new owner's strategy: "I want to ask Maine Media Investments, if they can use a NO COST Reprter. I am much more then willing to volunteer my time and expertise. I can do indepth stories on Social needs, for free."

Of course, the citizen-journalism approach being experimented with by many struggling daily newspapers has several hazards, some of which are apparent in the posted offer just quoted — to cut down the costs of covering the news, grammar and spelling may no longer be worth paying for.

A few other races to note: Down the ballot

Published in the Portland Phoenix

You can get your fill of reading about the presidential, congressional, state-legislative, city-council, and school-committee races a few pages farther on, but there are a few other questions Portlanders will have to vote on this Tuesday.

First up is the question of whether the city should elect a charter commission to consider OVERHAULING THE CITY’S CHARTER. The major issue under discussion is whether the position of mayor should be elected directly by the people — rather than chosen by councilors from among themselves as it is now. But the charter commission could change other provisions of the city’s basic government structure as well, if the commission’s members decided to. Among the possible ideas is one floated by Tina Smith, who is running for the at-large city-council seat, that could allow legal immigrants and refugees who live in Portland but are not US citizens to vote or otherwise participate in local government. If the charter commission is approved, candidates for the commission would stand for election next year.

In the meantime, there are some CLERICAL CHANGES TO THE CITY CHARTER also up for approval. In sum, they bring the charter into compliance with state laws governing how election wardens and ward clerks should be selected, and also change deadlines for nominating petitions to give the city clerk’s office more time to certify that signatures on the petitions belong to registered voters.

In regional business, voters will choose one Portland representative on the PORTLAND WATER DISTRICT Board of Trustees between former trustee James Willey and former Portland school-committee member Ben Meiklejohn. It is a five-year term.

In the first of three county races, incumbent REGISTER OF PROBATE Republican Teri McRae is seeking re-election to a four-year term, and is being challenged by former county register of deeds Democrat John O’Brien. The job involves recording and preserving life records — such as wills, name changes, and adoption records.

In a race for a four-year seat on the CUMBERLAND COUNTY COMMISSION, the three-member board that oversees county government, attorney and former Portland city councilor James Cloutier, a Democrat, faces independent Jonathan Berry, a Falmouth resident who runs a solo law practice from an office in Portland.

And for a COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION, to study and recommend changes to the way county government is run, there are no declared candidates to represent Portland, so the election will be by write-in only.

The plebiscites: There are three referendum questions all Maine voters must consider on Election Day.

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Question 1: A people’s veto seeking to overturn a law imposing tax on beer, wine, and soft drinks to help pay for the Dirigo Health Insurance Plan.
A “yes” vote supports overturning the law; a “no” vote supports keeping it. The law, enacted this past spring but not yet in effect because of the petition to overturn it, is touted by proponents as preserving Dirigo Health — a state-created insurance program that offers a taxpayer-funded subsidy to help the uninsured get health coverage. The plan serves roughly 12,500 Mainers, but those numbers are dwindling. New enrollments have been barred for more than a year because the plan does not have enough money to cover more people. And the number of uninsured people in Maine has not changed substantially as a result of the program (see “Illusion of Progress,” by Al Diamon, October 10, and “Baldacci Raids the Cookie Jar,” by Lance Tapley, October 17).

Unless it is rejected on Tuesday’s ballot, the law would change how the plan is paid for, reducing the amount that health-insurance companies pay and filling the gap with a new tax that would cost consumers three cents per 12-ounce beer, one cent per glass of wine (five cents per bottle), and four cents per 12-ounce can of soda. If it is rejected, lawmakers will likely have to find another way to pay for state-subsidized health-insurance.

Question 2: A citizen initiative to allow a casino in Oxford County.
A “yes” vote allows establishing a casino; a “no” vote would block it. The law that’s being voted on would, among other provisions, give Olympia Gaming, a Las Vegas company, a 10-year monopoly on casino gambling in Maine; reduce the legal gambling age from 21 to 19; and absolve the casino from all criminal and civil liability.

Of the casino’s gross income (after paying out to winners), 39 percent would go to various state programs, some of which already exist (such as biofuel research at the University of Maine, the state university system, and gambling-addiction treatment programs), and some of which do not (such as a project to investigate an east-west highway in Maine). Under the bill, the casino’s president would hold a voting seat on the board of every state or local agency supervising the spending of that money, including the UMaine board of trustees, the Land for Maine’s Future board, and even the Oxford County Commission (see “Beatin’ the Odds,” by Al Diamon, October 17).

Olympia has promised to spend at least $112 million developing a large casino-resort-hotel, likely somewhere in the town of Oxford, roughly an hour’s drive north of Portland. They say they would employ roughly 900 people, with an average annual salary around $35,000, and would send $69 million to the state each year. State estimates suggest the state would get closer to $41 million, but there is no guarantee of any of those details contained in the law itself.

Question 3: A bond issue of $3.4 million for improvements to drinking-water and wastewater-treatment systems.
A “yes” vote authorizes the bonds; a “no” vote would prevent them from being issued. One of several such bonds floated in the past few years, this would add more money to existing state “revolving-loan” funds, from which municipalities and water districts can borrow to upgrade their facilities, including treatment plants and pipes, with the intent of providing both cleaner drinking water and discharging cleaner effluent from sewage plants. Authorizing these bonds would bring in $17 million in federal matching funds.

RickeyPAC on NPR's Talk of the Nation

Aired on National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation

Press Releases: Palin around

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Sarah Palin's trip to Bangor drew a lot of positive attention from Maine's TV stations, who mostly left the criticism to bloggers. Whether that was in deference to her telegenic presence or an attempt at objectivity, Maine's broadcasters treated a partisan political show as if it were a “feelgood” event — the protestors barely rated a mention — and missed a chance to bring truth and insight to viewers. Good thing the bloggers filled the void.

WGME-13 (Portland’s CBS affiliate) aired footage of a grinning Palin and a cheering crowd, with anchor Kiley Bennett delivering a credulous voice-over: “Palin came armed with her conversational style, but also came touting her ticket’s record of experience, promising a future of education reform, help for special-needs children, and the development of new energy sources.”

WABI-5 (the Bangor CBS affiliate) even went so far as to say Palin “resonated with Mainers,” though the station’s news crew talked only to people who attended her political rally. Nor did WABI examine what Palin said, airing a segment of her speech in which Palin said John McCain “knows how to win a war,” but then failing to ask for details in an exclusive post-rally one-on-one interview. (Instead, reporter Amy Erickson asked a softball question about LIHEAP, though she backed it up with a pointed observation that the program, which helps low-income and elderly residents pay their heating bills in winter, is “one form of government assistance [Palin] strongly supports.”)

WGME also noted that Palin was “welcomed by Maine Senator Olympia Snowe,” without observing — as did blogger Eric Olson at MaineOwl — the conspicuous absence of Maine’s other leading Republican, Susan Collins, who is in the midst of a re-election bid but is studiously avoiding almost every other GOPer, and even avoiding using the word “Republican” in her campaign ads.

Over at MainePolitics, blogger Mike Tipping took aim at Palin for repeating at the rally a line about America being a “shining city on a hill,” which she attributes to Ronald Reagan. Tipping notes, correctly, that it was uttered first by Massachusetts Bay Colony founder John Winthrop in 1630, and expresses doubt that “she knows the historical and philosophical background of that quote,” which was delivered in a sermon declaring the colony’s founders were chosen by God to create a holy community in the wilderness of North America.

And TurnMaineBlue blogger Gerald Weinand conducted a real-time fact-check, noting both the failure to properly attribute the John Winthrop quote, and Palin’s misleadingly incomplete statement about eliminating property taxes when she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska (she did, but with the help of federal funding earmarked for projects in town, and by creating a local sales tax). But while Weinand disputed Palin’s ability to say Bangor was “beautiful” because she’d only seen the inside of an airplane hangar, he failed to note that she had flown in on a plane with windows.

Another bright spot: WLBZ-2, the Bangor NBC station, stood up to Palin’s handlers demand that the candidate pick the reporter who would interview her, thereby turning down the chance for a face-to-face; no doubt the demand was blowback from anchor Rob Caldwell’s interview of McCain back in September, in which the first question was why Palin hadn’t taken any serious questions from reporters.

And a low spot: the pre-rally interview aired by Portland ABC station WMTW-8 was filmed in New Hampshire, with an unidentified reporter (from WMUR in Manchester), but voiced-over by local anchor Tory Ryden. Making matters worse, the two clips selected were among the least interesting of the full interview. WMTW allowed Palin to make accusations of political gamesmanship against unnamed Alaskan opponents, but did not air her allegation that her family persecuted an Alaska state trooper “at the behest of [other Alaska] state troopers,” a startling — and new — development in the case.