journalists

This column dovetails my last one concerning mental health care in Nevada.

The recent zeal to bring attention to Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) has rightfully brought the topic to the fore. But I feel that the media blitz has been at the expense of other equally severe mental disabilities, the awareness of which have waned and suffered. However good the intentions toward autism coverage may be, this attention has consequently overshadowed other developmental disabilities that are just as critical to treat, and equally heart-breaking.

In a piece that posted today, the respected Columbia Journalism Review argued, according to the headline: "Why political journalists shouldn’t report on internal polling."...

The story of one of the most rugged and resilient Nevada families, as told by one of the state’s most enduring journalists comes to the Nevada State Museum, Carson City Thursday, August 13 as photojournalist Jeff Scheid premieres a one-year exhibit, “Ranching in the High Desert: Five Generations, One Family.”

The exhibit text and labels that explain Scheid’s photos are written by Jennifer Robison. The exhibit debuts in the museum’s South Changing Gallery with a reception from 5 to 7 p.m. that is free and open to the public.

Last week, Assistant Controller Geoffrey Lawrence and I presented to the Legislature the state budget we developed with some Assembly members, professionals and business people as an alternative to the Governor’s proposal.

Las Vegas left-wing pundit Steve Sebelius trashed it and us. No surprise because he’s an aggressive tax-spend-regulate statist PC liberal, while our proposals are the antidote to such maladies. What was surprising is the ignorance, laziness, carelessness and possible malice and dishonesty in his attacks. They demonstrate the sorry state of much journalism today.

Wow, time sure flies when you are having fun.

So fast that I almost forgot about our birthday. I first turned the Carson Now website on back in November 2009, but our official public launch was in March 2010.

Political journalists often think they are smarter than politicians and could do a better job. But newsman Terry Care didn’t just bloviate. He put his smarts on the line, proving that he could do a better job than many lawmakers....

Bill O’Reilly’s account of a 1982 riot in Argentina is being sharply contradicted by seven other journalists who were his colleagues and were also there at the time....

Ed Vogel loved people.
That made him different from many journalists.
Ed Vogel loved human interest stories....

Next April, I will be traveling with the Carson City Chamber of Commerce Travel Club on a trade mission to China. This trip is open to anyone who wants to go, and is a great way to see this country for a really great price. Here are nine reasons why you should go:

Many celebrations are scheduled statewide in the month of August. These Nevada 150 events celebrate all things Nevada and bring awareness to the 150th Anniversary of Statehood. The following events are held Aug. 1 through Aug. 14.

The Rest of the Story

This in reply to Mr. James O. Hartman’s letter to the editor in the May 21st issue of the RC. Mr. Hartman, I will address you in the first person in this reply. Facts are stubborn things.

Let me be clear that I draw a parallel to your reporting in the RC opinion page with what in the 30’s was called yellow journalism. Use of the journalism in the same sentence with your name does a disservice to journalists everywhere even those in the mainstream.

In your article:

Usually in politics, endorsements don’t change the course of races; most are fodder for political journalists and insiders.

Local design professional and award-winning business owner Linda McCall was recently honored in New York City by Mario Buatta, one of the world’s best known interior designers. McCall owns the Decorating Den Interiors franchise in Lake Tahoe.

Buatta joined McCall at a dinner at the famous Four Seasons Restaurant to celebrate McCall completing her year as Decorator of the Year for Decorating Den Interiors. She was joined by company chairman James S. Bugg, Sr. and his wife Carol Donayre Bugg, vice president of design.

The call letters KUNR first broke through the FM radio airwaves on Oct. 7, 1963 with a short 15-minute broadcast that reached listeners in a 13-mile radius. Today, KUNR 88.7 is an affiliate of National Public Radio that serves 45,000 weekly listeners in 20 communities in Northern Nevada and Northeastern California.

This year marks KUNR’s 50th year of public broadcasting on the University of Nevada, Reno’s campus. The station has become a staple in the community and continues to be a growing source of local and regional news.

Between June 7 and August 4 the Carson City Library engaged a record breaking 2,750 youth, ages 6 – 17, in signups for the 2013 summer reading program and attendance in summer learning activities. In that time, more than 21,788 items circulated from the library’s youth collection, primarily traditional books but also e-readers like Kindles, iPads, PlayAways and PlayAway Views.

Carson City, NV – From the Carson Library and the Boys and Girls Clubs of Western Nevada, librarian-led summer programs and activities are over the halfway point and more than 1,500 community youth are participating. Summer reading pages for prizes, technology enrichments, video journalism and art clinics are among the most popular ways youth are spending time.

With political flame throwing at an all-time high, there has indeed been something missing from the Carson City air waves lately.

Sure, civility doesn't make the headlines these days, but what happens when two people can disagree, throw in some hilarious zingers at themselves and each other and still remain long-standing friends when the studio lights go dim? 

Welcome to Capital CrossFire 2.0., a program that will return to the Carson City airwaves after a 10-year hiatus.

The Nevada legislature's Assembly Committee on the Judiciary is set to meet tomorrow, Saturday June 1 at 8AM to discuss and possibly vote on Senate Bill 221. Please call and write to express your opposition to this bill.

The full text of the bill can be found on
https://nelis.leg.state.nv.us/77th2013/App#/77th2013/Bill/Overview/SB221

Assembly Judiciary Committee:
Jason.Frierson@asm.state.nv.us 775-684-8537
James.Ohrenschall@asm.state.nv.us
Richard.Carrillo@asm.state.nv.us
Lesley.Cohen@asm.state.nv.us
Olivia.Diaz@asm.state.nv.us
Marilyn.DonderoLoop@asm.state.nv.us

by MICHAEL M. MARCOTTE

Nevada Media Alliance Managing Editor Alex Pompliano in Carson City, NV

UPDATE: The Nevada Assembly voted along party lines Thursday to allow a public vote on a resolution that would repeal Nevada’s longstanding 5 percent tax cap on mining net proceeds.

Five Assembly members took the opportunity to speak prior to the vote on Senate Joint Resolution 15. Assemblywoman Irene Bustamante Adams and Assemblyman Skip Daly both spoke in favor of the resolution.

As the price of gold hit its lowest level in a month Thursday, the Assembly Committee on Taxation took a vote on a controversial resolution that would remove the state’s long-standing mining tax cap. Senate Joint Resolution 15 made its way through the Legislature during the 2011 session and needs only to pass in the Assembly before June 4 in order to go to a public vote next year.

I took some time over Spring Break to look back on what we’ve done so far. It makes me happy to see the breadth of issues that our reporters have covered — animal cruelty legislation, protests, measures to protect children from human trafficking, and so much more. Their work has been featured in the Reno Gazette-Journal and on our local NPR and PBS affiliate stations — and it’s no wonder why. It’s quality journalism.

by RILEY SNYDER

UPDATE 10AM: Today, the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, a national coalition, joined forces with a Nevada State Senator and local community leaders in and around Carson City to harshly criticize the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) for refusing to work with local residents to keep a small group of wild horses free. The mustang herd at issue travels between federal land in the Pine Nut Herd Management Area (HMA) and a rural area outside Carson City.

by ALEX POMPLIANO

It’s become somewhat of a cliché, saying in a retrospective astonishment that something began as an idea. In theory, everything begins as an idea. But I’ve never been a part of something from the very beginning that would eventually lead to a fully realized organization like the Nevada Media Alliance, so you’ll have to forgive the cliché.

by RILEY SNYDER

If there’s one thing that I’ve learned about myself during my very short career in journalism, it’s that I love to cover politics. Over last summer, I did everything from arguing with editors at my internship on the value of driving hundreds of miles to cover a candidate’s stump speech, to doing some of the area’s only coverage on school board elections, and live-tweeting City Council meetings for hours on end. I have an insatiable appetite for covering elections, governments, and everything in between.

Bill Felcyn's yarn about a practical joke among buddies on an Arizona golf course that involved a harmless snake, a six-foot rattler and a karmic turn of events won him entry to play in an epic Wild West golf tournament on Oct. 2 in Northern Nevada.

I want to take a break from the news to talk a little inside baseball about Carson Now and what's happening here.

On Monday I was notified that I had been selected for a John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University for the 2012-13 school year. It's an amazing opportunity to further the work I have done with Carson Now, at the top school in the world for Internet innovation. Situated in Silicon Valley, it's where Google, Yahoo! and more than 5,000 other companies were born.

Travel and ski journalists from national magazines, newspapers, websites, blogs and social media outlets will arrive at South Lake Tahoe next week and be greeted with several feet of fresh snow during the North American Snowsports Journalist Association National Conference.

For bad luck Friday the 13th news, let's start with the hundreds of down-on-their-luck kids who are enrolling in the Carson City School District's Students in Transition program for children without permanent homes. The director of the program, Peggy Sweetland, estimates there will be 650 kids who qualify this year. To quote the "newspaper": "That number is nearly triple the 333 students enrolled at the end of last year." (Don't be too hard on the reporter who wrote this. If journalists like us were any good at math, we would be working in jobs that paid a lot better than journalism.) The program runs on federal grants and donations. Those interested in contributing can call Sweetland at (775) 283-1537.

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The city's long-planned multi-use athletic center is scheduled to be completed by fall 2013, according to Parks and Rec Director Roger Moellendorf. The $5.8 million that will be used to build the 42,000 square foot facility behind the Western Nevada Boys and Girls Club on Russell Way comes from voter-approved Question 18 funds.

Have a fun Friday the 13th. Don't walk under any ladders.