October 15, 2002
Editorial moonlight at One News Plaza
by Bruce Jackson
Spreading sugar
Why is the managing editor of Erie County's only daily newspaper—Stephen W. Bell of the Buffalo News—spreading sugar for New York's chamber of commerce? Why, a few weeks before a critical state election, is he putting his name (hence his newspaper's weight and authority) on a publication that can only help George Pataki in his reelection campaign?
Bell is the author of Upstate New York: Corridor to Progress, just published by the Business Council of New York State. The Council is the product of the 1980 marriage of New York's two largest business lobbying organizations, the Empire State Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of New York State, Inc.
Many of the state's most important public and private corporations and organizations belong to the Council, among them IBM, Merrill-Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Chautauqua Institution, CUNY, Hospice, University at Buffalo, the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Adelphia Communications Corporation is also a member, as are the Buffalo News, Buffalo Niagara Partnership, Buffalo Place Inc, National Fuel Gas Company and Verizon.
The Council's president, Daniel B. Walsh, is a former New York State Assembly majority leader. It is governed by a board, some of whose members work not far from Stephen Bell's office: Buffalo News publisher Stanford Lipsey, M&T Bank president and CEO Robert Wilmers, HSBC president and CEO Youssef Nasr, and National Fuel Gas CEO Philip C. Ackerman.
The Business Council of New York has the same function on a statewide level as the Buffalo Niagara Partnership has on a local level: when businesses want to influence Mayor Anthony Masiello or County Executive Joel Giambra or Assemblyman Sam Hoyt or Senator Byron Brown, they do it through the Partnership; when they want to reach a broader or more powerful audience, they do it through the Business Council. The job of both organizations is to promote business, advocate legislation that will be good for business, oppose legislation that will not be good for business. Neither is a civic organization; their interest is money, not quality of life.
The Business Council had the book put together by an Encino, California, company that does books with such titles as America and the Spirit of Enterprise; South Dakota: The Face of the Future; Bakersfield, A Centennial Portrait; and Maryland: Anthem to Innovation. Amazon.com lists it at $49.95 with no discount and a two-week delivery time, which means each copy has to be specially ordered from the distributor and they don't expect to sell very many of them. I doubt that the Business Council ever intended to sell many copies either. It's the kind of book an organization has printed, then gives away by the thousands.Council president Walsh says the book is a "love letter" to upstate New York and that it was produced "to spread the good news about upstate and all it has to offer to individuals, businesses, and institutions.... Many Americans, and even some upstate residents, may not fully appreciate upstate's virtues — its great quality of life, its natural assets, its rich traditions and culture, and its dynamic business community....By telling this great story to the world, we hope this book can spread the word about the beauty and economic vibrancy of upstate."
"A friggin' puff-piece"
One long-time observer of and participant in upstate politics called to offer a very different view:
Bell writes a vanity book for the Business Council of New York State on how great upstate New York is, obviously getting paid for it by the Business Council, and he's the managing editor of the newspaper!
There are two things that are really bad. One is, the managing editor of the Buffalo News shouldn't be freelancing for the Business Council of New York State. That's a conflict of interest. How is this different from him doing PR for Jim Pitts?
The second thing that's incredibly injurious is, Buffalo News reporters have done two really well-regarded series of articles in the Buffalo News on the economic problems of upstate New York. They got awards. But here Bell is writing this book that basically says, "There are no problems. Everything's hunky-dory."
It's a friggin' puff-piece. It's a vanity book for the Business Council. I hear that reporters at the News are just puking their guts out over this. Managing editors don't write vanity books for the state chamber of commerce.
The bad taste
Upstate New York remains the most economically depressed of the rustbelt areas. It has suffered a huge exodus of young professionals and skilled laborers. Many of its cities, especially Buffalo, have seen such a great decline in tax base their mayors are constantly begging for survival dollars from Albany and Washington. Public services are reduced and infrastructure is poorly maintained. In Buffalo, hardly any downtown development occurs without huge tax concessions, further eroding the real tax base. These are issues that Buffalo News reporters have covered extensively and well.
These are also issues that the campaigning governor wants very much to avoid or at least mute. George Pataki's political campaign in this area is almost single-issue: he is the governor who does good things for this region. No parcel of state money comes to this region without Pataki appearing two, three or four times in press conference and photo-op dog-and-pony shows announcing it. Whenever he has been able to get to the tv cameras first, he has even claimed credit for federal dollars obtained for the region by federal officials. His television ads pound home the message that he is making upper New York nice. And now, just before the election, one of the chief editors of the area's only daily newspaper publishes a book saying that things are really nice up here, folks, really nice.
The Business Council's press release for the book prominently mentions Stephen Bell's position as managing editor of the Buffalo News. When his bosses at the News okayed this extra-curricular employment, did they consider whether or how his book would undermine the work of his own reporters? Did they ask how he could make nice for the big business lobbying organization and at the same time objectively oversee reporters who are examining the region's most recalcitrant economic, political and ecological problems? Did they ask what he would do when the reporters' work and the sugar-coating work contradicted one another?
Would the Buffalo News permit one of its top editors do writing-for-hire that advanced the interests of the gambling casino industry? Would it let him be a hired hand for the Republicans or Democrats? Would it let him be on the paid staff of a politician running for office? In this election year, how does this book for the Business Council differ?
It's perfectly appropriate for the Business Council to hire someone to write a very slick public relations document. That, and arm-twisting politicians, is what organizations like the Business Council are supposed to do. But it's not what editors of major newspapers are supposed to do.
No good to say, "It was done on off-duty time." At least no more than it would be for a priest to run a lapdance club in his off duty hours or an off-duty cop to idly watch a mugging or a vacationing physician to do commercials for a cigarette manufacturer. Some aspects of some jobs go with you wherever you go and whatever time it is. Or should.