APSE Winter Conference: Closing minutes April 18, 2012
KISSIMMEE, Fla. — Closing minutes from the 2012 APSE Winter Conference held at the World Gate Resort Orlando Hotel:
1. Call to order
APSE President Michael Anastasi calls meeting to order.
2. Roll call
Officers present: 1st vice president Gerry Ahern, USA Today. 2nd vice president Tim Stephens, Orlando Sentinel. Third vice president Ben Brigandi, Williamsport (Pa.) Sun-Gazette. Past presidents: Jerry Micco, Phil Kaplan. Regions: West: Mark Faller. Atlantic Coast: Northeast: Joe Sullivan. Mid-Atlantic: Josh Barnett. Atlantic Coast: Steve Trotsky. Great Plains: Reid Laymance.
3. Old Business
A. Roy Hewitt. Michael Anastasi presents Roy Hewitt with a gift from Colorado House of Beef for his years of service to the organization. Hewitt is retiring and this was his last judging.
B. Executive Director’s Report: Nothing new to report on budget. The Worldgate has offered rate of $110 per night for 2014. Disney is interested and eager to have us onsite. We will look at other places such as Reno and Los Angeles as well.
C. Committee Reports
1. Commissioners (Jeff Rosen/Kansas City Star): Greg Aillo’s request to take all or part, our preference is not to do that. We do not want it to be press conference but do want it open. AP asked to shoot video during sessions, probably would not be in favor of that. Great lineup now includes NCAA’s Mark Emmert and NASCAR’s Brian France.
2. Conference (Michael Anastasi): Update: the 40th anniversary of Title IX falls during the conference and we need to have that reflected in our program.
3. Diversity (Jorge Rojas/Miami Herald): Nothing new. Anastasi notes that informally discussed funding for the Diversity Fellowship Program these past few days. Few, if any, sports editors today can make large financial commitments. Many, however, can make smaller contributions. We ask members who can to seek to make commitments from their organizations of $100 or $250 apiece. This can create many more stakeholders in the program and as few as 20 commitments can easily raise $2,000. Jack Berninger will invoice those who ask to make a commitment.
4. Futures (Joe Sullivan/Boston Globe): Feedback on TV membership was not positive and will not pursue. Seek out and recruit websites that meet our criteria.
5. Legal affairs/ethics (John Cherwa/LA Times): Nothing new.
6. Olympics (Jerry Micco/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette): Nothing new.
7. Outreach (Phil Kaplan/Knoxville News Sentinel): We are pleased to announce that we are launching the University Outreach Initiative, Ron Fritz’s excellent idea. We are asking each APSE member to reach out to what they consider “their university” and establish a personal mentoring connection with one student. We ask that the member sponsor the student’s APSE membership of $25. The student members receive a resume check from their mentor, know that they have a mentor, and we ask that they write one sports journalism-themed story for the APSE website. We’re asking every member present to commit to participate in the program to give it momentum for launch.
8. Professional Development: Chair Toby Carrig is absent. Anastasi reads his written report:
The APSE Sports Management Program is a worthy project that the organization should continue as a way to help members develop management and organizational skills.
The trial program attracted eight participating sports editors who were paired with mentoring sports editors from larger newspapers in their geographic areas. Six APSE regions were represented. Some of the pairings worked out better in forming bonds that achieved successful results. A few others were affected by time factors that prevented successful results: One participant was unable to make time to participate; Two others resulted in small amounts of contact, but in one of those cases a resume review helped the participating sports editor obtain a new job. The program was planned to run from April into the fall. The time frame works well in allowing participating sports editors to cover a variety of items—coverage of spring championship events, handling the summer schedule and producing enterprise, and preparing for the fall and football previews.
A critique to begin the program also proved to be a valuable function.
Due to circumstances of scheduling and working on other APSE-related items, oversight waned in the summer, so the program ran incomplete in concluding with a closing exercise, but some benefit was gained by editors who participated.
A closing exercise could be beneficial in making the program an accomplishment among participants.
9. Red Smith (Bob Yates/Dallas Morning News): Nothing new.
10. Regions (Josh Barnett/Philadelphia Daily News): Region meeting days are set for the following: Mid-Atlantic on April 9 at State College, Pa; Southeast on April 16 in Birmingham, Ala.; Great Lakes on April 22-23 in Detroit.
11. Scholarships (Joe Sullivan): Nothing new.
12. Website (Tim Stephens/Orlando Sentinel): Opportunities for website content and mentoring through our University Outreach Initiative. Students could write stories for the website that would provide them feedback from their sponsoring editor as well as networking opportunities with other sports editors and reporters.
4. New Business
A. Third Vice President. The Third Vice President’s committee nominated Tommy Deas of Tuscaloosa (Ala.) News, Robert Gagliardi of Wyoming Tribune Eagle, and John Bednarowski of Marietta (Ga.) Daily News. An additional three nominations may be accepted from the floor at this time from members of the Executive Committee. No additional nominees are submitted.
B. Second Vice President. Nominations for the office of 2nd Vice President are Mike James of the Los Angeles Times, Mike Sherman of The Oklahoman, Josh Barnett of the Philadelphia Daily News and Ron Fritz of the Baltimore Sun. We’ve reached our allotment of four from the floor. Ben Brigandi, as outgoing 3rd Vice President, is nominated automatically. Matt Pepin of Boston.com, as outgoing region chair, is nominated automatically.
Additional nominations made by membership, according to bylaws, by this process: “Any APSE member may nominate a candidate for second vice president by composing a petition and obtaining the signatures of representatives of 15 member newspapers who acquiesce in the nomination of said candidate. The petition must be presented to the president by March 15.”
C. Writers’ liasion committee. Anastasi introduced suggestion to restart the writers’ committee. BBWAA and the NBA writers both have engaged in negotiations with their respective sports without our knowledge. It will begin at the summer conference and Gerry Ahern will appoint the chair.
D. Women & comments policy. After consultation with a number of journalists, Anastasi is recommending that APSE adopt a statement of belief that calls on news organization to aggressively police and ban reader comments that are sexist against female sportswriters (or other staff members). We will post paragraph on our website stating this belief.
E. Contest. Ahern reports 94 judges participated in winter conference. There were four grand slam winners and 14 Triple Crown winners. Issues that arose include: Library printouts, most if not all agree time to modernize by allowing library printouts and all members are expected to abide by an honor code. Ahern’s recommendation is that we go ahead and allow them. Jerry Micco suggests posted corrections should be included on printouts. Ron Fritz suggests we look at uploading PDFs. Futures Committee unanimously recommends that entries be copy/pasted into word documents so they all look the same. Penalty for an organization caught cheating is that the entire organization’s entries are disqualified. Ahern reports that the new beat writing category seemed successful. Some members suggested that we allow stories to be entered in more than one category. Ahern believes that would be a mistake. Some of the smaller papers questioned the definition of what a beat would mean to them in the contest. There was also debate over the game story requirement, with some support that the game story be reinstated as its own contest category. Other issues raised: moving from 4-person to 3-person judging committees, improving category groupings for better time management among judges, recreating the contest committee and issuing a clarification about the explanatory category (specifically, must entry be limited to a single day as currently specified in rules).
5. Any other Business? No other business.
6. Call for adjournment. Motion to adjourn by Drew Van Esselstyn. Seconded. Meeting adjourned.
Attendance
Jack Berninger, APSE Executive Director
Joe Sullivan, Boston Globe
Jim Luttrell, New York Times
Josh Barnett, Philadelphia Daily News
Reid Laymance, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Drew Van Esselstyn, Newark Star-Ledger
Scott Thurston, Boston Globe
Jeff Maillet, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Ruben Luna, Detroit News
Courtney Linehan, Times of Northwest Indiana
Carrie Cousins, The Roanoke Times
Andy Kuppers, The Ledger (Lakeland, Fla.)
Dan Spears, Star News (Wilmington, N.C.)
Tom Quinlan, Daily Herald (Arlington Heights, Ill.)
Karen Wald Bush, AWSM
Ed Guzman, The Washington Post
Mary Byrne, The Associated Press
Paul Skrbina, Chicago Tribune
Jorge Rojas, Miami Herald
John Sahly, Daily Chronicle
Jon Styf, Beaumont Enterprise
Jeff Rosen, Kansas City Star
Keith Campbell, Dallas Morning News
Todd M. Adams, Orlando Sentinel/South Florida Sun Sentinel
Phil Kaplan, Knoxville News Sentinel
Melissa Geisler, Yahoo! Sports
Patrick Obley, Charlotte Sun
Paul Kasko, Sporting News
Mark Faller, Arizona Republic
Ron Fritz, Baltimore Sun
Brian Hofmann, Columbus Dispatch
Steve Mohlman, Salt Lake Tribune
John Bednarowski, Marietta Daily Journal
Jeff Kuehn, Oakland Press
Roy Hewitt, Cleveland Plain Dealer
Marc Lancaster, Washington Times
