The Mighty Pen!

Artist, Stephen Hansen - zenithgallery.com

Almost two weeks ago, the Herald-Advocate published an editorial on the potential drawbacks of televising city council meetings; likening the endeavor to network reality television which, during the writer's strike, supplanted shows dependent upon professionally scripted plots.

'Reality' TV for public meetings?
February 28, 2008

Part of the editorial says, "So, given how quickly these staged "realities" paled in the public's patience, it is reasonable to ask, would local municipal meetings pull in any better ratings than, say, "Law and Order" or "Lost?"

The information we are about to reveal may come as a shock to the Herald-Advocate editor, but... "Law and Order" and "Lost" are fictional television dramas, not reality tv shows. And just so we're all clear, the "Flintstones" is not an historical documentary.

The PRU Crew now understands why so many of the stories that appear in the Herald-Advocate simply don't resemble the reality of what happened at municipal meetings -- the Herald-Advocate editor appears to confuse fiction with reality and must subsequently be encouraging the "professional writers" to "script" the stories they are telling! And that usually means providing a happy ending for local government.

The Herald-Advocate editorial goes on to say, "We certainly encourage residents to get interested and involved in knowing what their government is doing.

For Park Ridge, however, it means spending close to $130,000 to get the system up and running the first year -- except the city is facing an unexpectedly high budget deficit for 2008-09 and can't really afford it from a purely financial basis. To make it worth the effort, aldermen will have to convince themselves -- and their constituents -- that what happens in their meetings is worth the expense to transmit, and that the city's residents are significantly underserved without access to such coverage. We'd like to seem them consider a less ambitious, less expensive system, that might address the same needs."

Like.....maybe.....suggesting more constituents buy a subscription to the Herald-Advocate?

The PRU Crew does not recall this same level of concern for the fiscal well-being of Park Ridge when Mayor Howard and his goons were giving away $2.4 million dollars to Napleton Cadillac; $400,000 for environmental clean-up for their private property prior to a private sales transaction and $2,000,000 in sales tax benefits for their new location in town.

The fact that the Herald-Advocate takes a position that thinly veils its' own self-interest in being the preeminent source of reported information on city meetings tells us that the residents of Park Ridge are, and we quote, "significantly underserved."

Still we would even support the idea of the Herald-Advocate/Sun Times News Group charging municipal governments a flat yearly fee for taping and then hosting web-casts of municipal meetings, free to web viewers. But we are still ticked off about the archiving of print articles after only 30 days, so our "support" is rather unenthusiastic about any involvement of the Sun Times News Group.

The editorial also posed the question, "What happens when newer aldermen or board members ask, frequently, for explanations of issues which have been on the table for years -- which all the loyal listeners already may understand?"

Answer = "Loyal listeners" learn their new alderman or board member is a dumbass who hasn't been paying attention, or watching broadcasts of municipal meetings! That may be embarrassing for the new dumbass, but at least it will alert the "loyal listeners" to lower their expectations. After all, aldermen and board members are well-intended volunteers, and just because somebody promised to do a good job for you doesn't mean you should actually expect them to!

The Herald-Advocate editorial concludes with, "And those who have sat through many a City Council meeting also know that questions asked do not always have a tidy answer by the end of the program -- the "Law and Order" model, where everything is resolved -- nor is there any guarantee that there will be an answer given to the public, even if the aldermen are answered in private later -- the "Lost" model where every answer raises new questions."

And people having access to that reality would make it harder to write those happy endings, wouldn't it?