The latest installment of media notes as compiled by Gateway Journalism Review contributor Benjamin Israel leads off with the news that the St. Louis Media History Foundation has inducted 21 new honorees.
BY TRIPP FROHLICHSTEIN / Many people now rely on the Web to get results on election nights. Such Web-savvy folks likely were frustrated with St. Louis’ local TV election-night website coverage.
The St. Louis Police Department has instituted a new mobile fingerprint identification system in its North, South and Central Area Stations, as well as at the St. Louis City Justice Center, to help avoid wrongful arrests, according to Chief Sam Dotson. The new fingerprint technology was put into the stations after a series in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch last year maintaining that about 100 people had been arrested mistakenly over a seven-year period, serving a total of 2,000 days in jail.
The head of the union that represents reporters and other workers at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says employees of Lee Enterprises – rather than its chief executives – deserved bonuses. In March, Lee Enterprises refinanced $800 million of its debt relating to its 2005 purchase of Pulitzer Inc., owner of the Post-Dispatch, extending the time in which its loans must be repaid. Employees at Lee’s 46 newspapers shouldered a major share of that loan repayment through layoffs, furloughs and buyouts, frozen wages, elimination of some benefits and higher costs for others.
“Media can be the greatest force for peace on Earth.” That is what Amy Goodman, host of the award-winning program “Democracy Now!” told a group of more than 150 people at special Gateway Journalism Review event March 29.