A press conference regarding the Chief’s program to put police officers back on the street was held September 1, 2011 at Jack Evans Headquarters in the Media Auditorium.

It was a press conference attended by many media personalities along with Chief Brown’s command staff. The Chief was not yet in attendance. Tonya and Scott arrived late as well. They thought this was to be an exclusive interview with the Chief. Tonya became enraged after seeing the entire press group in attendance.

At that time, in the presence of at least 2 to 3 people, she remarked, “The cock sucking asshole.” Members of the police department’s public affairs office also heard the derogatory remark. Tonya admits to having made the remarks and later sent an apology to Chief Brown.

Longstanding and Institutional Concerns

• Continued attack on the dignity and authority and person of strong African American leaders exist in your media outlets and others for example, a Congressman who called the president a “Liar” in the halls of congress DURING the State of the Union Address before a Worldwide audience.DMN wrote 30 articles about Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson from June 18, 2010 through October 1, 2010.  DMN made an attempt to correct the reporting of the rally for Commissioner John Wiley Price after we brought it to their attention.

• There is a negative portrayal of black leadership and the black community by media, specifically as it relates to the issue of crime and criminal offenses.

• There is a lack of adequate representation of persons of color in the reporting, managerial and executive ranks of media entities.

• There is an insensitivity of media with regard to cultural and racial issues; need for comprehensive and on-going intensive training in issues of diversity and cultural understanding.

• Creation of a community based apparatus that includes civil rights organizations and media high-level representatives for ongoing and constructive dialogue and evaluation.

• Appropriate consequences and public discipline for offensive violations of a cultural or racial nature by a media person; i.e. in cases such as this termination should be the result.

• Let’s not revisit the idea of Taney after the filing Dred Scott v. Sanford!

The NAACP feels that this was a TOTAL violation and repudiation of journalistic ethics and core values well accepted by your industry. This kind of language has not place in the community and it does not help race relations; does not sustain the environment of trust and confidence necessary for good police/community relations, creates an atmosphere of suspicion and deceit on behalf of the Chief and the community; creates further division among the various communities and cultures in the city. This type of behavior is destructive.

Our demands to redress the immediate issue

• Tonya must be terminated immediately. She no longer represents her company, the DMN, or her community, the City of Dallas. Unless her sentiment is the sentiments of the DMN, she must go!

• Public apology by the DMN to the Chief and the entire City of Dallas.

To redress the longstanding institutional issues

• Hiring and retention of AA in positions of editorial authority and supervision at the DMN; with representation that at a minimum reflects the AA population of the Dallas metropolitan area.

• Immediate hiring of a nationally recognized consulting firm to conduct on-going and comprehensive training for all reporting and editorial staff; the development of cultural sensitivity standards, benchmarks and objectives to be implemented company-wide with measurable mastery of the standards that would be correlated to performance; the development of a cultural sensitivity curriculum for internal personnel development within the company.

• The creation of quarterly meetings for dialogue between the NAACP and it’s invited participants and the senior executive management of the DMN to promote and foster greater understanding, communication and cooperation; there would be special meetings convened in the event of an unexpected occurrence that affect the AA community; such meetings should include a review of monitored coverage from the newspaper’s daily content.

• Creation of a special mentoring/internship program that engages potential journalism students in the development of a global standard of cultural/racial sensitivity and inclusiveness; creation, funding and sponsorship of a substantial development and recruitment program for persons of color (specifically AA) to the profession of journalism and employment by the Belo Corporation.

• As the president of the Dallas Branch NAACP, I look forward to a response, but more importantly working with you to create a master plan for execution in my area of expertise.

Next Sunday, DSN reporters will introduce shoppers to our organization and products, get story ideas from the retail and non-profit outlets, give away the November issue of our @dallassouthnews newspapers.  We’ll keep our Twitter and Facebook managers busy.

We will also present our “Citizen Soldier” photo exhibit by photographer Grant Meeks which features North Texans who served in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. Join us at the community room near the stage next Sunday from 3-5 p.m.

Editors Note:  I’m so excited for Benét Wilson who I have worked with on the Digital Task Force. I know she will build upon the excellent work of Dr. Syb.

Rod Hicks

NABJ President Gregory Lee announced today that he has selected Rod Hicks as Convention Chair and Benét Wilson as Program Chair for the 2012 NABJ Convention to be held in New Orleans, June 20-24, 2012.

Hicks will serve as Convention Chair for a second year, after a successful 2011 Philadelphia Convention & Career Fair. Hicks is a veteran journalist currently working as an editor for The Associated Press on its Philadelphia-based East Regional Desk, which covers 10 states. He also held editing positions at newspapers in New Jersey, Michigan, Missouri and Alabama. He earned a master’s degree in newspaper management from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree in mass communication from the University of Alabama.

Hicks has a long history with NABJ, having served on the national board in the early 1990s as a regional director representing members in six Southern states. He was co-chair of NABJ’s Election Committee in 1999 and served as a committee member for the two subsequent elections. He attended his first NABJ convention in 1989 in New York, and has attended every convention since. His wife, Velvet S. McNeil, is chair of NABJ’s annual photo auction.

Benét Wilson

Wilson has been a trade journalist for 20 years, covering issues as diverse as aviation, employment and training, welfare reform, economic development and agriculture/agribusiness.  She spent five years in senior corporate communications positions at Delta Air Lines, Rolls-Royce North America and Mesa Air Group.   She has also spoken at conferences and seminars, consulted with aviation and aerospace companies and written extensively on social media trends.

Wilson is on the board of directors for Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s Aviation Communication program, is chairman of NABJ’s Digital Journalism Task Force, a member of the Online News Association and of its Diversity Committee and a member of Black Social Media Professionals.  She was one of the founders of McGraw-Hill’s Social Media Council, created to help create a company-wide social media policy and help business units navigate the latest tools and technology.

“New Orleans 2012 is gearing up to be one of the best Conventions NABJ has ever had. I am pleased that Rod is continuing as our chair and that we now have Benét on board,” said President Lee. “This is a fantastic duo, and New Orleans promises to have great training, programming, and workshops to meet the needs of our attendees.”

Convention programming will focus on innovation, education and entrepreneurship in the dissemination of news. NABJ members will walk away with skills that will increase their relevance in the newsroom. There will be a continued emphasis on digital skills, along with courses that focus on journalism basics. While sharp reporting, writing and editing remain the cornerstones of good journalism, the tools and technology to execute them have changed, and NABJ members need to adapt to the changing industry.

Six weeks after Radio One changed formats to Old School 94.5 (KSOC-FM), they have announced the first Old School 94.5 On-air Personality “Janet G.”

According to the Old School 94.5 website, Janet G. will be on the air from 9 AM to 2 PM.  AllAccess.com says KSOC has “tapped veteran air personality Janet G for middays.”  Urbaninsite.com list some of her previous stops as WVMV, WMXD and WJLB in Detroit, WQUE in New Orleans and KRBE in Houston.

So where does Skip Murphy and Company fit into all this?  Apparently negotiations continue.

The American media scene is in utter chaos.  There’s no way to quantify the uncertainty that is taking place in newsrooms across the country.  People are scared and that includes folks right here in our own back yard.

This week, the Dallas Morning News implemented more layoffs.  The DMNcuts blog posts positions and of individuals that were terminated, though they don’t go so far as to name names.  They also link to a Scibd document that lists the ages of those let go.

In 2009 I had the opportunity to attend the Sensemaking Program at the Poynter Institute of Media studies.  There were about 30 folks who gathered from traditional media, online media and no media to discuss the future of journalism.

Before then I’d never give much thought to the profession of journalism or the values of the profession.   Back then I still read the newspaper everyday and was a subscriber. But I was ready for the old media walls to come tumbling down and welcome the new era of citizen journalists and new media.

While I’m still and advocate for the open web and all the wonderful things that have resulted from the internet’s contribution to media, none of that dismisses the fact that the role played by working journalists is vitally important.  It’s important to a healthy democracy and important to healthy communities.  Newspaper reporters still provide the bulk of the content that radio folks comment on throughout the day.

I understand those who find delight in the pain of our local daily though I disagree with their sentiment. And honestly, I’ve run across my fair share of journos who needed to be taken down a few pegs.  But the work that goes on at places like the Dallas Observer, the Dallas Weekly, D Magazine and the like make our city better. Too often we mix up personalities with the mission.

By no means am I discounting the contributions of organizations like ours.  Whether it’s West Seattle Blog, Voice of San Diego or Q City Metro; hyperlocal sites, blogs,  aggregators and content curators have exponentially increased the information options for citizens.  The appetite for news has never been stronger and it’s almost insatiable.  It the physical piece of paper that has lost it’s place in American society, not the content itself.

However the business model on which most newspapers are built is broken.  It’s a model that is similar to most American business which are all top heavy.  What makes it more difficult is the role newspapers play (or should play) in local communities is in the interest of the public, just like water works, the police department or the sanitation department.

Those businesses would have a tough time making a return to investors too.  Something will eventually have to give on the top end, that’s just a fact.

I think the DMN deserves credit for efforts to reinvent their organization.  The business/news integration strategy implemented a couple of years ago make some folks uncomfortable, but it’s a reality.  I know because I live it everyday.

Their focus on investigations is logical, though I don’t always agree with their execution.  Local politicians have been turned off by local coverage and rightly so. And I still don’t get the whole Parkland thing.

By and large DMN gets it right on the news side more than they get it wrong because of writers like Gromer Jeffers, Scott Goldstein and Tawnell Hobbs as well as editors like Sharon Grigsby.  I hope The News can tinker with their model until they reach something sustainable for the long term, but we’re not there yet.

As the industry works towards a solution it will be important that diversity is valued and the interests of underserved populations are fairly represented.  It will continue to be painful for all of us, but our communities are better for the effort.

By Shawn Williams

When I helped organize and launch Dallas South News two years ago, creating a print edition was always part of the plan.  As much as we value the open web, we know there are those who still love to wake up and sit down at the breakfast table with their cup of coffee and morning newspaper.

We feel that our print edition will allow us to reach out to individuals who we have not effectively captured through our online presence.  It also gives us another tool to help realize our vision: to tell the real story of every Southern Dallas community.

Words cannot express how excited I am about our foray into print.  But let me be clear: we continue to be a web based organization.  Unlike our friends in the traditional media who write for print and adapt to the web, our stories are produced from a web first mindset. From there we will work to make the content fit our print aspirations.

Still, I didn’t want to print a newspaper just for the sake of saying that we did.  I wanted us to design a product that embodied the spirit of innovation that is prevalent throughout DSN, from our board of directors to the members of the crew.

Fortunately, board member Neil Foote introduced me to Rhashad Hicks the creator of this phenomenal design.  It is the perfect mix of contemporary and traditional and captures the essence of dallassouthnews.org.  When I saw the template, I knew we were headed in the right direction.

This would not be possible were it not for our sponsors, the University of North Texas at Dallas and Texas A&M Commerce.  Our inaugural issue has an emphasis on education since school is now back in session.

The feature article highlights DISD’s new Barack Obama Male Leadership Academy which opens with high expectations.  We also have contributions from State Representative Barbara Mallory Caraway and Dallas County Republican Party chair Wade Emmert. This is just the beginning.

We plan to continue to push the envelope and bring more new ideas to the print arena.  But in order to be effective we will need to get feedback from you.  Please follow us on Twitter @dallassouthnews, like us on Facebook and sign up for our newsletter.  This is a team effort and we’re glad to have you on board.

@shawnpwilliams
shawn@dallassouthnews.org

We’d like to invite you to the Third Annual Dallas South News Open House on Friday August 26th.  This year the festivities will be held in the Janette Kennedy Gallery at Southside on Lamar (1409 S. Lamar in Dallas) and kick off at 6:30 p.m.

FULL DETAILS IN FLYER BELOW

We’ll have the opportunity to share some of the great things we’ve done over the last year as well as share some of our plans heading into 2012.

For the first time, we will also have a silent auction.  We’ll have a final list of auction items to share early next week.  In addition, a line dance seminar taught by Ms. Barbara where she will teach the Can’t Wang, The Wobble, the New Wobble, the James Brown, she knows them all.

The DSN Open House has become a big event for us and a great opportunity for us to show our appreciation for our readers, friends, followers, commenters et. al.  If you plan on making it out please send an email to linda@dallassouthnews.org or call us at our new number, 214-434-1401.  See you and look for more details next week.

As I continue to speak with folks who were in Philadelphia for the NABJ Convention a couple of weeks ago, the positive energy has yet to subside.

I’ve heard many people say it was the best NABJ convention they’ve attended. I didn’t see the final numbers, but I know NABJ was expecting up to 1,000 more conventioneers than last year in San Diego.

Having only been to the last three conventions, I don’t have a lot to compare to this year’s superior production. But I do want to offer my personal take on why there’s still so much chatter about what went down in the City of Brotherly Love.

1. The Executive Suite

I’m a little biased because a Dallas South News board member Neil Foote helped put together the Executive Suite along with Duchesne Drew. They partnered with the Executive Leadership Council to host a two-day program designed to provide professional development for managers in the print, broadcast and digital spaces.

Many of the attendees were one of the few (or only) African-American’s in their newsroom. They had the chance to ask questions, voice concerns and in the case of three individuals from one organization, meet each other for the first time.  The intimate setting at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts provided seminar participants with up close and personal access to some of the industry’s most significant players.

Speakers at The Executive Suite included Maria Arias, Executive Director of Diversity & Inclusion, Comcast Corporation; Greg Osberg, CEO for the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News; and David Rhodes, President of CBS News. Next year the series will continue so NABJ members in management roles should stay tuned (pun intended).

2. Reality has set in

I attended my first NABJ convention in Tampa two years ago. A tweet I saw on the #nabj11 thread yesterday conveyed my experience back in ’09:

On an unrelated note…the sheer amount of bourgeois posing at #NABJ11 must have been astronomical. @DannyOzark

While “bourgeois posing” is still in effect, I’d have to say it wasn’t as much this time around. Media in general has kept it’s distance from the masses they report on, but I think the shrinking job market has humbled NABJ.

Coming from the digital world without a background in journalism, I was on the outside of every meeting, panel and reception that I attended at my first convention. My goal was to introduce entrepreneurial journalism as a possible way to continue the practice despite layoffs. I wasn’t laughed out of the convention but I wasn’t take very seriously either. I saw more folks like me at NABJ than my two previous trips.

NABJ is still a lot about where you work, but it’s much more about just having a place to work now. And if that place is a .com and it pays, then all the better. There were multiple panel session on entrepreneurism, startup capital and hyperlocal news sites. I think NABJ has turned the corner on embracing innovation.

3. Philly

Philadelphia was an outstanding host city and the fact that it is one of America’s greatest cities helps a lot. It’s always a bonus when the convention hotels are in close proximity to the convention hall itself.

But more than logistics, the host chapter was able to weave in the city’s history and legacy throughout the program without beating us down with how wonderful they are. Everytime I felt like I was in the middle of a Philly commercial it abruptly ended. Kudos for that.

There really was an unmistakable vibe that connected every session. The credit goes to the city as a whole and the host chapter in particular. I was so impressed by their effort that I’ll give them a pass for Friday night’s party. Speaking of party….

4. Sports Task Force Party

I attended the NABJ Sports Task Force Annual Scholarship Jam on Thursday night at Whisper Club for research purposes of course. In Tampa and San Diego last year, I was told that the STF party was a must attend event but didn’t make an effort to get out to see.

Well this year I did and it was as good as or better than advertised. I’m not often compelled to dap up the DJ while he’s in the mix, but I couldn’t leave without giving the brother his props on Thursday night…er….Friday morning. I’ll need another excuse besides research to join the men and women of sports next year in New Orleans.

5. Al Sharpton

As journalists prepared to converge on Philly for the convention, news began to break that Al Sharpton was in line to pick up a show on MSNBC. Some black journalists questioned the move, as they continue to implore all news organizations to consider experienced journalists to fill any open time slots.

Sharpton was scheduled to appear during the Thursday session convention, but decided not skip the event. In an interview with TheLoop21.com, Sharpton said the MSNBC situation “…would have been a distraction for what I was invited to come speak about.”

In the end, it was a worthy conversation to have and I think most NABJers are cool with what Rev. Al is trying to do. NABJ’s new president Gregory Lee said, “We are happy to see Al Sharpton get the opportunity to have a prime-time show on MSNBC.” The publicity created by the dust up was good for NABJ and helped shine a light on all the other positive programs and speakers who were there. Hopefully Sharpton can make it to New Orleans next year and talk about how successful his turn on MSNBC has been.

6. Digital Focus

It hasn’t been easy, but NABJ has embraced the media revolution on the web. In one of the first sessions I attended back in ’09, I remember how outraged traditional journalists were that TMZ had broken the news of Michael Jackson’s death. Fast forward to this year when I saw a number of my blogging counterparts like Baratunde Thurston and Latoya Peterson at NABJ, as the lines between new and old are blurred.

On Wednesday the convention kicked off with a Multimedia Learning Lab in a joint venture between the Visual Task Force and the Digital Journalism Task Force. Other digital sessions included Google for Journalists, Creating Multi-Platform Stories and Amy Webb’s Top Tech Trends for Journalists.

Kudos to the NABJ Digital Journalism Task Force co-chairs Benet J. Wilson and Andrew Humphrey who have remained ahead of the curve. I heard the phrase “back on offense” at the Digital Task Force reception Thursday night. I think a continued focus on the digital space help the organization keep pace in a rapidly changing media landscape

7. Rod Hicks and Dr. Sybril Bennet

In the end, the success of the NABJ Conference comes down to leadership. Past President Kathy Times’ selection of Rod Hicks as Convention Chair and Dr. Sybril Bennett as Programming Chair made all the difference.

Hicks and Dr. Syb provided the forward thinking that is necessary for NABJ to remain at the forefront. I knew they were serious when I first met Dr. Syb in person at this year’s Blogging While Brown Conference in Los Angeles.

Because of the work of Rod Hicks and Dr. Bennet, the good vibes from Philly continue and are sure to lead to more production and innovation from NABJ and its members. Count me in for more of the same in New Orleans June 20-24, 2012.

It keeps getting better for Brett Shipp as the days go on.  Today WFAA’s Shipp reports that he was shoved by Commissioner John Wiley Price in an attempt to get the umpteenth interview regarding Commissioner Price, Wai-Wize, and Willis Johnson. Shipp’s tweets:

@brett_shipp: I was just assaulted by John Wiley Price. Details to follow.

@brett_shipp: Jwp goes on to threaten to “split my throat”.

Shipp has hit the jackpot with this one as the Channel 8 website report there will be “video of the altercation” on the 5, 6 and 10 PM newscasts.  Cue the scary Black man music and get your popcorn ready.