Legislation that would give judges the authority to levy a civil fine against pub-lic officials or supervisory employees who deliberately violate the state’s public access laws has been filed in the Indiana Senate.

S.B. 70 was filed under the name of Sen. Sue Land-ske, R-Cedar Lake.

Landske has been a friend of public access, said Ste-phen Key, HSPA executive director and general counsel.

HSPA believes the fil-ing may have been done at the request of Sen. Beverly Gard, R-Greenfield, who has authored or co-authored this legislation for several years.

HSPA has been told that similar language has been filed in the House, but the author and bill number are not yet known.

Speaker of the House Brian Bosma has been a

co-author of this legisla-tion for the past couple of years, when it was carried by Rep. Russ Stilwell, D-Boonville.

Stilwell was defeated in the November election, and Bosma will not push indi-vidual bills since he was elected speaker. He is work-ing with HSPA to see that the bill does get filed in the House by another Republi-can.

The Senate and House

bills will mirror the bill that was passed by the House 98-0 during the 2010 session and is similar to the bill passed by the Senate 49-0 during the 2009 ses-sion.

The bill would allow a judge to levy a $100 fine for a first offense and $500 for subsequent deliberate violations of either the Open Door Law or Access to Pub-lic Records Act.

PublisherThe Indiana

Volume 76, Issue 1 • January 6, 2011 Published alternate Thursdays

State public access bill filed in Senate

Keeping its online newspaper direc-tory up-to-date is one of HSPA’s top New Year’s resolutions.

To ensure the information is current, we need your help now and whenever major contact changes occur at your newspaper.

Updating your information is quick and easy at hspa.com:

• Click “Indiana Newspaper Directory” in the horizontal menu.

• In the search box, enter your newspa-per name, city or county to bring up your listing. Review the information and note any changes needed.

• Go back to “Indiana Newspaper Direc-tory” and hover over it until “Directory Update” appears; click on it.

• Complete all of the required fields and any others that need a change.

• Click “Submit” at the bottom of the page.For this initial update, we ask all news-

papers to participate. You no longer have to complete a directory form every year. Staff will update the online directory any time you submit changes at hspa.com.

Star publisher has circulation background

HSPA wants papers’ updated information

By Ron Shawgo The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne)

It was a time of national tur-moil: Vietnam, college protests, women’s libera-tion. A president would resign in disgrace.

Sylvia Smith began working at The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne) in 1973, a native of Lancaster County, Pa., and a fresh graduate of Michigan State University.

It was a prime time for news-papers, as the Washington Post and other news agencies made “Watergate” a household word. Journalism had been her aim since high school. A continued backdrop of social upheaval solidified that goal in college. So after graduation and with some summer intern-ships under her belt, Smith shopped her skills around.

“I sent out résumés to lots of places, and the Journal was interested,” she said. “So, we got married.”

That marriage ended Dec. 31

when Smith left the newspa-per after 37 years, the past 21 years as The Journal Gazette’s Washington, D.C., editor.

With nearly four decades behind her, Smith, 59, was the most senior member of the Journal’s news staff.

Julie Inskeep, publisher of The Journal Gazette, said: “How fortunate The Journal Gazette has been to have Syl-via helping our readers make sense of what happens inside the Beltway – and, when it’s

REPORTER TURNS IN PRESS PASS AFTER 37 YEARS

Journal Gazette veteran retires

The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne)

Sylvia Smith, shown in 1979 at The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne), began her career with the newspaper in 1973. She

retired Dec. 31 after 37 years with the Gazette, the past 21 as the paper’s Washington, D.C., editor.

Start off the new year by register-ing for the HSPA & HSPA Founda-tion Annual Meetings & Government Conference – The State We’re In: Different Times. Same Mission.

After you register, we will mail you invitations to send to your legislators for the Legislative Luncheon.

Be sure to sign up early enough to get these in time for the final registra-

tion deadline, Wednesday, Jan. 26. Visit www.hspafoundation.org and

click on “Events” to see the program lineup, register online or download a registration form to fax in.

Register now for Annual Meetings

Sylvia Smith

See Veteran, Page 4

See Star, Page 2

Brian Bosma Sue LandskeTravis HoldmanBeverly Gard

See Bill, Page 2

Karen Crotchfelt has been named presi-dent and publisher of The Indianapolis Star.

Crotchfelt formerly was senior vice president/adver-tising and strategic plan-ning at The Arizona Repub-lic in Phoenix.

She succeeds Michael G. Kane, who is the new presi-dent and publisher of the Rochester (NY) Democrat and Chronicle.

“Karen has been an exceptionally strong leader in Phoenix and is an up-and-comer with Gannett and in the indus-try,” Robert Dickey, president of Gan-nett’s U.S. Community Publishing, said in a release. “Her combined business and strategic experience will enable her to provide outstanding service to consum-ers and advertisers in the Indianapolis area.”

Karen Crotchfelt

Page 2 January 6, 2011

2011 Calendar

HSPA Board of Directors

HSPA OfficersPresident: Don Hurd, Kankakee Valley Publishing

Vice President: Tim Timmons, The Paper of Montgomery County ( Crawfordsville), The Times (Noblesville)

Secretary: Greg Morris, IBJ CorporationTreasurer: Jim Kroemer, Goshen News

HSPA Board Members

Randy List, Rust CommunicationsJack D. Pate, Evansville Courier & Press

Robyn McCloskey, Pharos-Tribune (Logansport), Kokomo TribuneTina West, The Courier-Times (New Castle)

Dailies

NondailiesRobert Allman, All Printing & Publishing Inc.

John Haley, Pulaski County Journal (Winamac)Jon O’Bannon, The Corydon Democrat

Kathy Tretter, Dubois-Spencer Co. Publishing Co. Inc.

HSPA Foundation Board of Directors

HSPA Foundation OfficersPresident: Mayer Maloney, Hoosier Times Inc.

Vice President: Henry Bird, The Herald Bulletin (Anderson)Secretary: John Rumbach, The Herald (Jasper)Treasurer: Jeff Rogers, Home News Enterprises

HSPA Foundation Board of DirectorsLinda Chandler, Ripley PublishingCurt Jacobs, The Madison Courier

Barbara King, North Vernon Plain Dealer & SunPat Lanman, Vevay Newspapers Inc.

Kevin Lashbrook, Landmark Community Newspapers

HSPA staffStephen Key, executive director and general counsel

skey@hspa.com • (317) 624-4427

Karen T. Braeckel, HSPA Foundation directorkbraeckel@hspa.com • (317) 624-4426

Pamela Lego, MAP advertising directorplego@hspa.com • (812) 350-7711

Milissa Tuley, communications specialistmtuley@hspa.com • (317) 624-4430

Yvonne Yeadon, office manageryyeadon@hspa.com • (317) 624-4433

Shawn Goldsby, ICAN and ICAN Plus coordinatorsgoldsby@hspa.com • (317) 803-4772

The Indiana Publisher is published bi-weekly by Hoosier State Press Association,

41 E. Washington St., Suite 301, Indianapolis, IN, 46204, (317) 803-4772. ISSN 0019-6711 USPS 058-730.

Periodicals-class postage paid at Indianapolis, Ind., and at additional mailing office.

Postmaster: Send address changes to: 41 E. Washington St., Suite 301, Indianapolis, IN, 46204,

(317) 803-4772, Fax (317) 624-4428. Website: www.hspa.com

Subscriptions $25 per year. Ad rates furnished upon request.

Jan. 29 APME/HSPA Foundation Job Fair, IUPUI Campus Center, Indianapolis

Feb. 2-3 HSPA/HSPA Foundation annual meetings, Indianapolis Marriott Downtown

Employees sought

Member notices

Reporter — The Shelbyville News in Shelbyville, Ind., is seek-ing an enthusiastic, well-rounded general-assignment reporter. Passion for journalism and writ-ing a must. Primary coverage areas will include county govern-ment, education and breaking news. The top candidate will be looking to build or expand a solid portfolio and learn more about Indiana and rural life. We are, however, just 25 minutes from Indianapolis.Basic photography and computer skills are non-negotiable musts. Recent graduates are welcome, but internships and experience

with student publications are es-sential. Degree in journalism or related field is required. Benefits include 401(k), health, dental and paid vacation. The Shelbyville News is a six-day morning newspaper with a cir-culation of 7,000. E-mail résumé and writing samples to editor Andrea Smithson at asmithson@shelbynews.com. Deadline is Jan. 14. (2)

Journalist — We’re looking for a highly-motivated, community-minded, detail-oriented person to join the staff of our award-win-ning twice-weekly newspapers, The Salem Leader and The Sa-lem Democrat. Candidate must possess strong leadership and

teamwork skills and be commit-ted to ensuring our print product and website remain the trusted source for local news. You’ll work in a fun, fast-paced environment and produce hard news, features and opinion pieces; take photographs; and do layout and design. Minimum three years writing experience required. Flexible schedule, but nine-to-fivers need not apply. Looking for the ideal person to train as our assistant editor. Send résumé and references to stephanie@salemleader.com. (2)

Send member notices to mtuley@hspa.com. Postings will be listed as space permits in print and in full at hspa.com.

A “Sesame Street” guru and former TV Guide senior editor is the new execu-tive editor for the Journal & Courier Media Group.

Michael Davis, 58, started work in November.

He replaced Julie Doll, who left in July after six years in the executive editor’s position and eight years at the Jour-nal & Courier (Lafayette).

During his career Davis has worked at newspapers and magazines as an editor and writer.

“I think there will always

be a passion for local news, and we serve that,” Da-vis told Journal & Courier reporter Max Showalter for a Nov. 12 story. “The newspa-per has a connection to its audience that is palpable. You can only build on that going forward. I see a chal-lenge and opportunity. It’s a real good fit.”

From 2000 to 2007 Da-vis was a senior editor and Family Page columnist for TV Guide.

Later he was president of Applewood Books and wrote the New York Times best-seller “Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street.”

The Newport, Rhode Island, native has contrib-uted freelance writing and photography to regional and national publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post and O: The Oprah Winfrey Magazine.

Davis is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and earned a master’s degree from North-western University’s Medill School of Journalism, where he also was an adjunct profes-sor.

He and his wife, Debra, are the parents of two adult daughters, Meagan and Tyler.

Davis top editor at Lafayette paper

Michael Davis

In Arizona, Crotchfelt led The Republic’s unified strategic development of advertising, circulation, marketing and business development, and commu-nity newspa-pers.

She began her career at Gannett in 1995 as a cir-culation sales manager for The Tennessean/Nashville Banner.

From 1996 to 1998, Crotch felt served as circula-tion director for The Desert Sun in Palm Springs, Calif.,

and as advertising director for the Reno (Nev.) Gazette-Journal from 1998 to 2002.

In 2003, she became direc-tor of business development at The Arizona Republic and was named vice president of market and business devel-opment in 2005.

In 2008 she took on the added responsibility of overseeing circulation, and in 2009 she was promoted to senior vice president/advertising and strategic planning, while assuming leadership for print and digi-tal advertising sales.

Kane, previously president and publisher of The India-napolis Star and president of U.S. Community Publish-ing’s Interstate Group since

2008, was named president of U.S. Community Publish-ing’s newly configured East Group.

At that time, the Inter-state Group merged with the East Group, which now will be headquartered in Roch-ester.

Kane was president and publisher of the Roches-ter (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle and regional vice president for Gannett’s East Newspaper Group from 2005 to 2008.

Prior to Kane’s work in Indianapolis and Rochester, he was president and pub-lisher of the Lansing (Mich.) State Journal and regional vice president for Gan-nett’s Midwest Newspaper Group.

StarContinued from Page 1

BillContinued from Page 1

The bill also contains two other key provisions:

• Local government agen-cies with e-mail capabilities would be required to give electronic notice of meetings under the Open Door Law if requested to do so by a citizen.

• The Indiana Public Ac-cess Counselor or a judge would be required to exam-ine unredacted documents when the redaction is chal-lenged by a citizen.

Under current law, a citizen who successfully sues a public agency can get reasonable attorney fees and court costs covered by the public agency, but those costs are borne by the tax-payers since it comes from the agency’s budget.

A public official faces no financial consequence for intentional violations that would force a citizen to take legal action to obtain a record or halt a violation of the Open Door Law.

Sen. Travis Holdman, R-Markle, has filed a bill even stronger than Landske’s.

S.B. 125 would make it a criminal act to violate the Open Door Law or Access to Public Records Act.

His bill would set the punishment as a Class C infraction.

If an official is found guilty under the bill’s guidelines, he or she would be subject to a fine of up to $500.

More than 30 states have included in their public ac-cess laws civil fines, crimi-nal fines or removal from office as deterrents against deliberately ignoring the public’s right to information.

Michael Kane

January 6, 2011 Page 3

News in brief

Fund in memory of journalist

Online sports coverage honored

Editor a longtime sports fan

Please send promotions, announcements, staff changes and other corporate news to

mtuley@hspa.com.

Plain Dealer & Sun assistant editor Lilian Carmer, who died Dec. 20, 2009, has been honored with an endowment es-tablished in her memory through the Jennings County Community Foun-dation.

Josh Taylor, Carmer’s nephew who also works at the newspaper, estab-lished the fund on the year anniversary of his aunt’s death.

“Lilian absolutely loved Jennings County and the people here,” Taylor said. “She was a genuine role model not only to my fam-ily but to everyone that knew her.”

Carmer worked at the local papers for 52 years;

Taylor has been on the business side, selling advertising, for more than 15 years.

To kick off the fund, Taylor donated $1,000, 25 percent of which will be matched by the commu-nity foundation’s special challenge grant.

The fund will be known as the Lilian H. Carmer Community Endowment Fund. Once it reaches $2,500, it will award grants in four areas that interested Carmer: children, pets, nature and agriculture.

“Hopefully, this fund can help support these interests which were an integral part of her life,” Taylor said.

The U.S. Court of Ap-peals for the Seventh Circuit will hear oral arguments this month in a case that will decide whether a high school athletic association can require media organizations to buy licenses for Internet stream-ing of school sporting events.

The appellate court is reviewing a June lower court decision upholding the Wis-consin Interscholastic Ath-letic Association’s policies regulating Web streaming of high school tournaments.

Two Gannett newspapers in Wisconsin challenged the licensing policy on First Amendment grounds.

The Wisconsin licensing policy at issue requires any media organization to pay a fee ranging from $250 to $1,500 for the right to stream video of any tourna-ment event.

The Wisconsin association also reserves the right to grant streaming rights with-out specifying any standards for its rulings.

Under the policy, any media organization that pays the licensing fee and

receives Internet streaming rights must provide a master copy of its video to a private company holding exclusive broadcast rights.

That private company then may market the video, and the media organization that made the video is en-titled to a 20 percent share of the proceeds.

The lower court observed in its June ruling that “ul-timately, this case is about commerce, not the right to a free press.”

Gannett’s appeal, however, argues that the Wisconsin athletic association’s reve-nue-generating motive does not trump the media’s First Amendment rights.

Gannett also focuses its constitutional arguments on the unrestricted discre-tion the athletic association reserves for itself to grant licenses to media organiza-tions of its choosing.

Gannett contends that if the athletic association wishes to pick and choose which media organizations can stream video, the First Amendment requires it do so on an even-handed basis without a threat of exclusion based on viewpoint.

An array of national media associations and media companies has joined in

supporting Gannett’s ap-peal through the filing of an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief.

Those supporting organi-zations include the Newspa-per Association of America, the American Society of News Editors, the National Press Photographers Asso-ciation and The Online News Association. The supporting media companies include Sun Times Media and Lee Enterprises, among others.

The Wisconsin athletic association is supported by two amicus briefs, one by the National Federation of State High School Associations and the other by 10 state high school associations, including the Indiana High School Athletic Association.

A decision by the Seventh Circuit is expected this sum-mer or fall. Any of the parties could then seek review by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The decisions of the Sev-enth Circuit Court of Appeals are binding precedent for lower federal courts in Indi-ana, Illinois and Wisconsin.

Steven M. Badger is a part-ner at Bose McKinney & Ev-ans in Indianapolis and repre-sents media organizations and journalists in media law and First Amendment matters.

HeraldTimesOnline.com was named one of the top 10 sports websites by the Associated Press Sports Editors.

The Bloomington news-paper website, which includes the Hoosier Scoop and Quick Hits blogs, placed in Division C, which is for websites with fewer than 500,000 unique monthly visitors.

The website includes stories that also run in print, web-only stories, breaking-news updates,

weekly live question-and-answer chats with sports writers, live chats during games, photo galleries and video commentary from the Herald-Times sports staff of Dustin Dopirak, Jim Gordillo, Andy Gra-ham, John Harrell, Lynn Houser, Hugh Kellen-berger, Jeremy Price and Pat Beane.

The website is main-tained daily by Herald-Times sports and digital media staffs.

Candice Rohrman started as sports editor for The Paper of Montgom-ery County on Jan. 1.

She joins a small but elite group of female sports editors in Indiana.

“Since I was 10 years old, all I wanted to do was watch sports,” Rohrman said in a story published at www.thepaper24-7.com. “I watch ESPN a lot.”

Rohrman grew up in Fishers and graduated from Hamilton South-eastern High School.

In 2010 she earned a bachelor’s degree in jour-nalism with a minor in kinesiology (the science of human movement) from Indiana University.

During the summer of

2009, she began work-ing at the Indiana Daily Student and joined The Paper of Montgomery County in October as a reporter.

The Paper’s editor, Frank Phillips, said Rohrman made it clear in her interview that she was interested in cover-ing sports.

“It will be nice to get a bit of a different perspec-tive while we continue to cover the games, events and people that make up Montgomery County’s rich sports heritage,” he said in a story on the paper’s website.

Rohrman replaces John Groth, who came to The Paper from the Daily Journal (Franklin) more than four years ago.

Groth will join the sports department of the News Enterprise in Eliza-bethtown, Ky.

Court to rule on media policy

News racks OK on public sidewalks

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The National Newspaper Association has advice for newspapers who face re-quests by local postmasters to remove news racks from post offices.

While your postmaster may be correct that postal regulations prohibit vend-ing of products on postal grounds, that rule doesn’t apply to public sidewalks that may be on the postal property, according to the association’s Tonda Rush and Max Heath.

The news rack prohibition doesn’t cover “sidewalks along the street frontage of postal property falling with the property lines of the Postal Service that are not physically distinguishable

from adjacent municipal or other public sidewalks and any paved areas adjacent to such sidewalks that are not physically distinguishable from such sidewalks” – 39 C.F.R. 232.1(a)(ii).

“If a rack is on a sidewalk that the public may also use to access other retail or office buildings, or is clearly a city sidewalk, for example, it is likely to be news-rack eligible,” Rush said. “The stairs into a post office, on the other hand, probably are not eligible. If a side-walk’s only purpose is to bring people from a parking lot to the post office, it is less likely to be news-rack eligible.”

The rule doesn’t apply in

contract post offices, such as a country store with a post office inside. Heath said if the store is OK with the rack, then the Postal Ser-vice should have no beef.

Requests to remove a rack should be taken seriously. Rush said disobeying an or-der can lead to a fine of $50 or 30 days in jail or both.

Postmasters are being told to allow 30 days to remove a rack, which should allow time to resolve a dispute as to whether the rack location falls under the postal prohibition.

To report an enforce-ment action against a news rack, contact Rush at tonda@nna.org or Heath at maxheath@lcni.com.

Candice Rohrman

Hopefully the 2011 legisla-tive session will be the one that sees some teeth added to the state’s public access laws.

The legislation’s journey over the past two years il-lustrate how random events can derail a bill and leave one wondering whether it was bad luck or Machiavel-lian machinations.

Two years ago, Sen. Beverly Gard, R-Greenfield introduced S.B. 232. The main component of the bill was language giving a judge the ability to levy a civil fine against a public official found to have deliberately violated the Open Door Law or Access to Public Records Act.

That bill was passed 11-0 out of the Senate Local Gov-ernment Committee, chaired by Sen. Connie Lawson, R-

Danville. It then was passed by the Senate with a 49-0 vote.

Co-authors included Sens. Frank Mrvan, D-Hammond; Sue Landske, R-Cedar Lake; Patricia Miller, R-Indianapolis; and Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago.

Moving to the House, it was assigned to the House Government and Regulatory Reform Committee, which had a rookie chairman – Rep. John Bartlett, D-Indi-anapolis. Upset over how a debate unfolded on another bill, Rep. Bartlett cancelled any further committee hear-ings – dooming S.B. 232 which had been scheduled for the next committee hear-ing.

S.B. 232’s sponsor, Rep. Russ Stilwell, D-Boonville and the House Major-ity Leader, couldn’t sway

Bartlett from his decision.Stilwell’s co-sponsors were

House Minority Leader Bri-an Bosma, R-Indianapolis; Tim Neese, R-Elkhart; and Paul Robertson, D-Depauw.

Last year, Stilwell in-troduced H.B. 1075, which essentially mirrored Gard’s 2009 bill.

Making amends for the previous year, Bartlett be-came a co-author of the bill and gave H.B. 1075 a hear-ing in his committee, which passed the bill 7-0.

The House then passed it with a 98-0 vote. The other co-authors were Speaker

of the House Pat Bauer, D-South Bend; and Bosma.

The bill moved to the Sen-ate, shepherded by Gard and co-sponsors Miller, Mrvan and Bob Deig, D-Mount Vernon.

For some reason, the bill was assigned to the Senate Commerce, Public Policy and Interstate Cooperation Com-mittee, chaired by Sen. Ron Alting, R-Lafayette – not Lawson’s committee which heard the legislation the previous year.

Alting initially committed to giving H.B. 1075 a hear-ing but backed away, citing leadership’s decision to hear no bill with a negative fiscal impact.

HSPA worked with Stil-well and Gard (the bill’s sponsor) and agreed to remove a provision blamed for the $67,500 price tag on

the legislation. Despite that change, the State Budget Agency still said the bill would increase the Public Access Counselor’s office costs by $4,000 – enough to kill the bill according to Alting.

The State Budget Agency did not respond to HSPA’s request for an explanation on the fiscal impact found.

The experience leaves one wondering whether the bill inadvertently hit a mine or was torpedoed by an uniden-tified foe.

We will see what happens to legislation that has yet to receive a negative vote in the House or the Senate as the 2011 General Assembly unfolds.

Stephen Key is executive di-rector and general counsel of HSPA. Contact him at skey@hspa.com or (317) 624-4427.

Page 4 January 6, 2011

A

Q

Key Points

By Stephen Key

It’s Round 3 of access bill vs. political wranglers

HSPA HotlineThe following questions

came from The Times (Frank-fort), The Mail-Journal (Mil-ford) and The Press-Dispatch (Petersburg):

Members of the city board of works and representatives of a private ambulance service attended the

county commissioners meet-ing. When the commissioners refused to allow them time on the agenda, the board of works reportedly held a meeting with the ambulance service repre-sentatives at another location. There was no notice of this meeting. Does it violate the Open Door Law?

Yes. The board of works should have given 48 hours notice of the meeting with

the ambulance service repre-sentatives. The violation opens the door for someone to chal-lenge an action taken by the board that would be tied to this illegal meeting. That challenger could ask a judge to declare the action that was the fruit of the illegal meeting null and void.

A developer has served a retraction demand on the news-paper for its story pointing out his ties

to a naturist resort in another state. The demand insists that the newspaper print his response to the story in full (newspaper printed an edited version) and retract state-ments that created false in-nuendos in the public’s minds. Are we required to publish a retraction?

Indiana’s retrac-tion statute requires the aggrieved party to state the false

statements that need to be corrected. In this case, it doesn’t appear that the indi-vidual has identified any false statements, but believes the mention of his naturist beliefs will drive away potential local

investors from his develop-ment proposal.

The newspaper doesn’t have an obligation to retract a true statement that might put the developer in a less than favor-able position before investors.

I wouldn’t ignore the request but would respond by pointing out that the developer hasn’t identified false statements that should be retracted.

The Indiana State Police are investigat-ing an allegation that a county commission-er stole some items

from the side of the road that a homeowner had put out under a For Sale sign.

The sheriff’s department took the initial report and turned it over to the state police. In light of the libel verdict against the Terre Haute newspaper, what can the newspaper run on this story? The homeowner is willing to tell me his side of the story.

Despite the trial court verdict against the Tribune-Star, I believe that newspa-

per did no wrong in reporting on the complaint of alleged misconduct filed against a sheriff’s deputy. If a settle-ment hadn’t been reached, I’m confident the verdict would have been overturned at the appellate level.

The newspaper should feel comfortable in reporting the facts from the sheriff’s depart-ment daily log on the incident as well as quoting the hom-eowner and the county com-missioner as to their versions of what happened. The same goes for coverage of the Indi-ana State Police report when completed and the decision by the county prosecutor as to whether any charges should be filed in the case.

Have a media law question for Stephen Key, HSPA executive director and general counsel? Contact him at skey@hspa.com or (317) 624-4427.

This is the schedule for publication of local govern-ment units’ annual reports:County

Following the second regular meeting of the county commissioners, the report should be posted and published (IC 36-2-2-19). According to the state Board of Accounts, newspapers should expect those reports in February.

Last year, Tammy White of the Board of Accounts noted that the annual report for counties no longer contains a long-term debt schedule. The county, though, will still be advertising: The Certification Part I – Statement of Re-ceipts, Disbursements and Balances; and the statement

about detailed schedules being available in the county auditor’s office.Townships

Within four weeks after the third Tuesday following the first Monday in January (Monday, Feb. 14), the town-ship trustee is to publish an abstract of receipts and dis-bursements (IC 36-6-4-13).

To avoid squabbles over publication costs, township trustees and newspapers should note that budget lines with zero amounts do not have to be included in the published report. This will serve to condense the size of the publication.Cities and towns

Within 60 days after the end of the calendar year

(Monday, March 1), the fiscal officer is to publish an annual report of receipts and disbursements (IC 5-3-1-3).

Last year, Charlie Pride of the Board of Accounts reminded newspapers that there were several new entities required to publish annual financial reports.

“Many libraries and spe-cial districts with budgets of $300,000 or more have to now publish within 60 days after year end,” Pride said.

School corporationsNo earlier than Aug. 1

or later than Aug. 15, the secretary of each school corporation must publish an annual financial report (IC 5-3-1-3).

Annual reports schedule

Q

A

Q

AVeteranContinued from Page 1

appropriate, detail the nonsense.

“For her 21 years in Washington, she helped change The Journal Ga-zette” with her reporting of news of interest to north-east Indiana of Washington, said the newspaper’s editor, Craig Klugman. “She was rigorous in her news judg-ment, her ethics and her writing, and that showed.”

Smith will remain in Washington to edit the state section of the AARP Bulletin, a publication of the agency that advocates for retirees and seniors.

Like Smith, more and more of those seniors are baby boomers, who ush-ered in an era of unrest and increased government accountability.

“I was not a political ac-tivist in college, but it was the backdrop for every-thing, including journal-ism,” Smith said.

Until now, Smith’s sole career has been with the Journal, beginning as an education and social agen-cies reporter, moving to assistant city editor and eventually to assistant managing editor.

When a logical moment to work elsewhere arose, a new opportunity appeared at The Journal Gazette, she said.

One of those opportuni-ties came in 1989, when the newspaper opened its Washington bureau and chose Smith to fill it. She jumped at the opportunity.

“I’m quite sure I’m one of the very few people in Washington who did not

scheme to get here,” she said. “The job really just fell in my lap.”

Over the years, Smith has watched as the pool of Washington regional reporters has dwindled.

She once met regularly with about a dozen report-ers writing for Indiana publications. Today, with newspaper cutbacks, there is only one other person, she said.

Journalism’s watchdog role is diminished without a Washington presence, even with information overload in the Internet age, she said.

“I don’t think a democ-racy can function without information about its gov-ernment, but it’s unreal-istic to think that citizens have enough time to adequately educate them-selves to everything that’s going on,” Smith said.

So, why stop now?“I think people should

change every 38 years or so,” she said. “Nobody ever said that I was too hasty.”

“I think people should change every 38

years or so. Nobody ever said that

I was too hasty.”Sylvia Smith,On retiring from

The Journal Gazette after nearly four decades