Television news reporter Jeff Crilley stands at the front of a small room in Waxahachie, having just passed out tiny bottles of bubble-making liquid to his audience as part of a demonstration. Make bubbles, he instructs, as the room gets to its collective feet and begins to blow. Bubbles fill the air, floating around slowly, and Crilley looks pleased.
The audience members think they get it: The bubbles are symbolic of all the press releases sent to television news programs, and Crilley’s point is that its hard for a press release to capture anyone’s attention because there are just so many of them out there and they all just disappear too quickly. There are hundreds of bubbles filling the room, and the audience keeps blowing.
But then Crilley walks to the front of the room and grabs a bubble- blowing machine, which spews forth bubbles faster than a group of 5-year-olds on a sugar high, and soon the hard work of the audience has drowned among a sea of manufactured bubbles. The room gives up, having been beaten by the great metaphorical Public Relations Machine.
“Press releases really don’t work anymore,” Crilley tells his audience, a small group of public officials and county information officers attending a National Association of County Information Officers workshop.
There are just too many press releases for the news media to read, adds Crilley, who wrote a book titled Free Publicity in order to help connect stories with journalists. His own newsroom, Fox 4 in Dallas, now gets 2,000 press releases a day, mostly via e-mail or fax. They almost all go through the news station’s “gatekeeper,” an assignment editor who Crilley said spends his day sitting in the middle of 13 different police scanners, two computers, two phones, two CB radios and two fax machines.
The assignment editor lives in fear that the station will miss some important or breaking news story, so his main concern and attention has to focus on those police scanners and the telephones, which are more likely to have news that could get him canned, should he miss it. For county officials who wonder exactly how a news station operates and where their unanswered press releases go, Crilley recalled the first time he asked his assignment editor about how quickly he decides whether something is a story.
The assignment editor grabbed 20 press releases off the nearby fax machine and flipped through them within minutes, reading only the headline and the first sentence, if that: “No, no, no, maybe, no, no.” He threw the stack into the wastebasket, telling Crilley that anyone not smart enough to write a gripping headline wasn’t deserving of news coverage, anyway.
“I felt sad for anyone who has ever written a press release,” Crilley said, adding that there were good stories in that wastebasket that the station’s reporters would like to have covered — but that’s the impact the public-relations machine and e-mails have had on the news business. Reading 2,000 pages a day just isn’t feasible, and nobody has time to spend looking for needles in haystacks.
So if not press releases, what can county officials do to capture the media’s attention, to promote county programs and services, to let the public know about events and jobs well done, or to respond to controversies that may rise from different policies?
The Benefits of Having a PIO
Perhaps the most efficient choice a county can make to ensure its messages are carried out to the public is to hire a public information officer — someone who has either been a member of the media or who has been otherwise trained on the lives and needs of reporters, and someone who can devote time entirely to the goal of informing the public.
Hidalgo County hired Cari Lambrecht, a former reporter for The Monitor, as its public information officer in April. She had been a journalist for about seven years at various newspapers before deciding it was time for a career change.
“It was time to leave because I thought I could be more proactive, instead of reactive, on this side,” Lambrecht said. “I liked the new leadership that had come in. I liked the judge’s ideas, and his spunk and personality, and the same with the court and department heads.”
Most commissioners courts do not have access to a public information officer, since it may be difficult to justify the cost-effectiveness of the position. But a public information officer can make it possible for officials and other employees to spend more time on county business, help promote county services, be trained for disaster- situation and emergency communication and help manage the amount of negative press coverage a story generates. Counties that receive calls from journalists from several different markets, receive a significant number of open records and public information requests or have numerous community programs they want to promote are perhaps best suited to hire a public information officer.
“I think a lot of budget-stressed counties would think that a position like the public information officer is a luxury,” Lambrecht said. “But if residents don’t know about the county’s programs, then what good are you doing? A public information officer provides a direct link from the county to the public. It’s not just about dealing with the media. It’s so much more than that. ... You can try to do what you can for the people, but if the people don’t know what you are doing for them, then it’s difficult to make a difference.”
Her own position includes four main components. Lambrecht serves as the county’s media liaison and open records specialist. She also develops public outreach programs and events, such as community service announcements and speeches to be given to different community groups for different occasions, and serves on the county’s emergency management team.
When Hurricane Dean threatened the area in August, Lambrecht worked almost around the clock for five days, holding press conferences and coordinating information between the region’s different agencies.
“There was a category five hurricane coming toward us, it was really sink or swim time,” she said. “We got everyone involved and set up a joint information center. I kept a database of what everybody was saying. It was important to give the same message and make sure everyone was on the same page. You have to prepare the public for their safety and not alarm them.” Besides emergency communication, media relations, open records and public outreach, public information officers are often responsible for writing the employee or citizens newsletters, generating Web site content, preparing presentations to citizens’ groups, general event planning and marketing, branding the county so residents are more aware of its mission and actions, researching information for brochures and reports, and working with citizen volunteers for fund-raisers or other events, according to Jane LeMaster, president of the National Association of County Information Officers.
A county should look at the number of reporter inquiries, open records and information requests it is receiving in order to justify the hiring of a public information officer. Often, counties in more saturated media markets will have more reporters calling for interviews, though counties in less saturated media markets could also have a number of services they want to promote and may have to spend more time being more creative in how to market those services.
“Sometimes, I think people think the media seeks out information,” Lambrecht said. “They don’t always. Sometimes you have to throw it out in front of their face.”
Tarrant County Public Information Officer Marc Flake has had his job for the last 10 years. He was one of the first public information officers hired by a commissioners court in the state. At the time, the Tarrant commissioners court was involved in a dispute with the county sheriff, who had been spending part of his budget on obtaining military surplus equipment to operate a helicopter surveillance program. The commissioners court had not approved of such a program, and a lieutenant and a sheriff’s investigator died in a helicopter crash.
“The commissioners didn’t approve of the program and didn’t include it in the budget, and it looked like an out-of-control situation to the public,” Flake said. “They wanted to make sure the public knew that the commissioners court was doing everything it could do (to not spend taxpayer money on the program) and ultimately it was up to the voters to resolve the situation. It was good to have to come in on that kind of situation because it allowed me to establish some credentials with the media.” It was also probably helpful for the county to have Flake as a spokesman. Having come directly from the City of Dallas, where he had worked in public information for 13 years, he was already familiar with many of the journalists and major news outlets in the region.
“The people in this market knew me and they knew my reputation for being an honest person and someone who got information to them quickly and was frank with the information that I had,” Flake said. “It wasn’t like I just came in cold and had to convince people about the people that I was representing. I had full confidence in the people I was working for.”
Though Flake technically works for the commissioners court, his services are available to all the county’s officials to help promote any county program, as long as it’s approved by the commissioners court.
“If the district clerk wants to get out some information about his passport program, I will help him get that information placed as best as I can, as long as the commissioners court has approved of the official’s activities,” he said.
There are a lot of good reasons to have a public information officer, Flake said, the least of which is that someone trained in journalism or information sharing understands the nature of the beast better than someone who has never studied journalism. Flake himself was a reporter for five years at the Palestine Herald Press and the Lubbock-Avalanche Journal before going into media relations.
“There is a greater variety of work and more interesting work assignments in public information,” he said. “As a reporter, I was covering meetings, and interviewing people at newspapers and that was about it. When I got into the public information career track, I was putting together grand openings and parades. I was doing writing, too, and interviewing for the internal newsletter and the citizens newsletter that went out.”
Flake added that often, over time, reporters become disenfranchised with the job, for one reason or another. Many reporters are passionate about making a difference and about the ethics of their field. Some feel that business and advertising needs trump their vision of what quality news is.
“I came to the realization that I had gotten into the newspaper business in order to serve the public, but the people who worked in government were the actual people serving the public,” he said.
While Tarrant County has a saturated media market, the center of the media’s attention is usually on Dallas. Many of the stations and newspapers have bureaus assigned to cover the more outlying areas, and Flake works with those bureau chiefs to make sure Tarrant County news is being covered. Networking is a win-win in that case, since the bureau chiefs can get substantial stories that compete with stories being generated in Dallas and the other counties, and Tarrant County gets recognition for its programs and services.
“Anything that happens in that area is going to get more attention in their newscasts than anything outside, and that is a good 30-to-40 miles from the Tarrant County courthouse,” Flake said. “It takes the skills that I have to draw some of that attention away and to develop story ideas and to develop media events that can compete with what they are doing over there, so that the people here in Tarrant County can see on the TV that our government is doing positive things here as well.”
While most public officials certainly have networking skills and communications skills, many lack one significant thing: enough time to follow up with the media and give reporters the amount of information they need, when they need it.
“I follow up on articles like someone who is paid to do the job every day during the week,” Flake said, adding that on that particular day, the Tarrant County story he was promoting was about the county’s Auto Theft Task Force.
The Task Force was going out to parking lots in the area and checking cars for unlocked doors or visible items that would make the car an easy target for theft, then placing report cards on the vehicles to let their owners know what they were doing right or wrong. It was the first time the county had ever tried such a program. “I don’t just send out a news release,” Flake said. “Once it goes out, I call up and say, ‘Want to make sure you got it, do you have any questions? I think there is a really good picture or video opportunity.’”
For the auto theft story, Flake called up all the area news outlets, telling them when and where the task force members would be out placing the report cards, promising visuals and readily available interviews.
Public officials may also lack two other traits found in most public information officers: a reporter’s perspective and an inside view of the industry. “We all understand that when media comes in to a story, they are human beings, they have a perception of the people that they are covering,” Flake said. “A public information officer can help with the perception that a reporter has by building relationships in the media community. I understand the news business and I understand reporters, where they come from and their motivations.”
While managing a negative news story is unpleasant, it’s also straightforward: Tell the truth, tell it right away, and most stories will dissolve within a day or two.
“The worst thing you can say is no comment,” Flake said. “A public information officer can help you say, ‘Here is the issue, here is what the media is going to want from you, and here is how we can get our message… at least have the reporter in on a positive note, here is what we are doing about it.’ The media wants to know what happened, when did it happen, whose fault it was, and what are you doing to keep it from happening again, and sometimes there is how much did it cost. Until you have answered all of those questions, you are going to keep that story in the media. If you can answer those questions, the media closes the book on that story.”
One negative story that did arise in Tarrant County was during the 2002 elections. A programming glitch caused the ballot-counting machines to discount straight party ticket votes.
“The elections office found out about it at about mid-morning and they came in and told the commissioners court about it right after that commissioners court meeting,” Flake said, adding that he immediately started preparing for a press conference to alert the public and give reassurances that the votes would be counted.
“One of the things that I advised was that we needed to have the chairs of both political parties at the conference,” he said. “We needed to brief those parties about what happened so that they were comfortable.”
The press conference was set for 4 p.m., so that news of what had happened and what was being done to correct it would be on the air for the 5 p.m. news and radio shows, as well as for the 5 p.m. rush hour to the polling places.
“It was a negative story, it was difficult to do, but we showed we were doing something positive to correct the negative,” Flake said. “They had the encouragement of the local officials to keep voting. We guaranteed that every vote would be counted. The two party supervisors would be there to supervise how that was going to be done.”
For the 10 p.m. news shows, Flake took a slightly different approach.
“We fed the beast with different visuals.
... We opened up the garage doors (to where the votes would be counted) and showed the cars going in, the workers getting the boxes unloaded,” he said. “It showed we were doing something positive, working our butts off to fix this situation.”
At 4 a.m., Flake went to the elections office to speak with workers about doing an update for the 5 o’clock morning news in order to show the public that the office had been working all night.
“By noon, the reporters were looking for different things” Flake said. “They wanted a poll worker who was tired from working all night.” Flake found an 80-year-old grandmother type, enthusiastic about the voting process, excited about having a hand in fixing the problem. She had been up for 36 hours, but was still going strong. The media loved her, Flake said.
“The next Tuesday, elections officials came to the court and explained what they were going to do to make sure it wouldn’t happen again, and that was the end of the story,” he added.
In general, promoting a county event, service or program is more difficult than managing a negative news story, public information officers said. The public is generally forgiving when people make mistakes, and their attention spans easily wander.
The best thing a county official can do when it comes to promoting county services is make sure that all the reporters in the region know about it, and not assume that something is not a story, Flake said. “A lot of times people will develop relationships with media they trust. They just tell the local newspaper about it when TV would be interested as well,” Flake said. “At least give them the opportunity to cover the event.”
That’s where a lot of the networking comes in — if reporters are familiar with officials and with the county, they are more likely to promote its events and talk about the county’s needs, such as why it needs the tax base it has or why a particular program may be strapped for cash without a tax increase or voter-approved bond.
Hidalgo County has begun inviting the area’s reporters over for a monthly informal breakfast. Everything is on the record, but there’s no real agenda for the meeting. Reporters still have easy access to the officials when deadline time comes around and for their stories, but the breakfasts can be used to mention services and programs and develop article ideas for the future.
Lambrecht said she believes the additional time the county devotes to the media has helped the county’s image.
“We’re just more out there, more visible,” Lambrecht said. “I’ve only heard good things about my bosses from reporters, and I take the media to be a barometer of the community. The reporters have told me that they are very happy that they have access to the officials and information.”
Understanding Reporters Tips for Working With and Responding to the Media
Working as a reporter is a stressful job, no matter the media market. With the exception of big-time national anchors, journalism is not an industry known for its lucrative pay, benefits or understanding of human needs. Nobody becomes a reporter for the money or vacation time, or because they lack the skills necessary to do anything else.
Stereotypically, journalism is an overtly competitive industry filled with once rosy-eyed idealistic writers who believed in the ethics they were taught in school. Many journalists have become jaded as the market becomes increasingly profit-focused, and jobs and entire bureaus are cut.
Many journalists don’t stay reporters for long; turnover rates at entry-level papers are generally incredibly high. In 2003, small-town newspapers across the United States employed 21,114 journalists, according to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, and about half of those employees stay at their papers for less than a year. They either burn out and change careers entirely or move on to a bigger market.
The life of a reporter isn’t all that glamorous, either. At small-town papers, reporters are often one-man bands. They write; they edit; they take photographs. They cover the city council, the commissioners court and the school board meetings. They went to school to study Watergate and now spend their time writing articles about the local dog-show winner. At larger city papers, reporters have daily deadlines, beats that they must somehow generate new information on every day, and weekly night shifts as stand-by reporters that can last till 2 or 3 a.m.
So those who stick with it do so with purpose: They want to seek the truth, be the voice of the people, share information for the public good and ensure that the government is serving the people to the best of its ability. Journalists are taught to be fair, honest and unbiased. “Public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist to is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues,” according to the Society of Professional Journalists’ code of ethics.
“Reporters are the watchdogs. When I was a reporter, that was my mentality,” said Hidalgo County Public Information Officer Cari Lambrecht, a former newspaper reporter.
There is an obvious line between members of the media and public officials, but it’s a line that both sides must routinely cross in order to be successful. Public officials are as important to journalists as journalists are to public officials, she added.
“When you’re a reporter, you think the government is big and bad and wrong, and you come over here and you find out they are nice people doing good things,” Lambrecht said. “I try to work with the media as much as I can because I know what it’s like to be hit with a brick wall… sometimes the government doesn’t trust the media either.”
Mistrust sometimes stems from mistakes or misrepresentations that may have been made in a report, which often reporters are not aware of. It can also stem from differences in outlooks or personal beliefs that were apparent in a report. “I’ve done it too,” Lambrecht said. “You take a lot of things personally.
You read it and don’t like it. It didn’t come out the way you want it to. I don’t think it’s on purpose. We’re all just people trying to do what is best. The media can be your ally if you let them. They can definitely help you get messages out to the public, and it is imperative to develop good relationships with reporters.”
But most counties do not have public information officers who are trained to respond to the media. And even in counties that do have public information officers, officials or department heads will often still be the ones talking directly to the media. While public information officers are good liaisons for the county, it’s difficult to create a position that can entail all the county’s programs, services and interests across departments.
“There isn’t any way that you can find one person that you are going to be able to hire to speak for 47 different county officials, and county officials feel like that is their job,” said Shawn Malone, speaking at a National Association of County Information Officers workshop in December. Malone is a research analyst for Travis County who fills much of the county’s public information officer needs.
“If you’re not going to have a PIO, what we should do instead is have a training program,” he added, so that all department heads and officials can promote a county event or respond to a controversy.
Travis County had such a controversy last year, when the commissioners court agreed to offer bariatric surgeries as a benefit to severely overweight employees. The media reported on the action taken, but buried the integral part of the story that said eligible employees needed to have a complicating health factor or risk (such as high blood pressure, diabetes or heart problems), and to qualify for the benefit, employees would also have to work with doctors for one year on a weight-loss program.
The procedure was recommended as a benefit by a county committee because it had the potential of saving the county money in the long-term, since so many costly long-term health issues and complications stem from obesity.
The surgeries’ approval was reported in such a way that the public became convinced commissioners were trying to give employees a cosmetic benefit to pay for poor dieting behaviors. “I do not feel I should have to pay for someone’s bad lifestyle habits,” wrote one citizen on a blog about the controversy. “We need to be responsible for ourselves and not depend on someone else doing it for us,” wrote another. No one seemed to understand the procedure would have saved taxpayer money until after the commissioners court canceled the benefit.
“Reporters don’t always have the time to study things that are complicated,” Malone said. “Successful media management could have avoided that controversy.”
Here are some tips on how to work with the media, manage a negative news story and promote county events from professional county information officers around the state:
1. Do not lie. Self-explanatory.
2. Avoid giving “no comment.” A story will be a story, whether or not the county’s viewpoint is present. Not commenting on a negative news story will only mean that the other side is overrepresented in a report or article, and that the public won’t have access to any positive information. Citizens may think something is being hidden.
“You’re definitely a lot better off saying something than just ‘No comment,’” Malone said, adding that commenting keeps reporters from being able to frame the county’s message themselves and builds trust between the county, reporters and the public.
Eventually, not commenting on a negative story or refusing to comment in general will hurt the county’s brand — how the public sees the county and what they think about when they think about the county, or whether they think about it at all — more so than one or two negative stories, especially if those stories dissolve quickly. “People mess up. We live in a very forgiving society, we do. The only thing we don’t forgive is a cover-up,” said Jeff Crilley, author of the book Free Publicity.
There may be times, however, when there is no other reasonable option than to delay giving a straightforward answer. Consider, for example, when the facts known about a situation are incomplete or unclear — an early comment to the press may be something an official needs to “take back,” which later comes out sounding like an alibi or lame excuse. It’s still better media relations not to clam up with “no comment.”
Instead, respond with “I don’t know” or “I’ll get back to you when I have that information,” then prepare responses to the questions that are arising. “I’ll get back to you” means just that. Even if the responses are still along the lines of “We don’t have that information at this time,” it will sound better and make constituents and reporters less suspicious than an outright refusal.
Of course, if there is potential legal action to follow, an attorney may have good reasons to recommend against saying anything substantive about the circumstances. There may not be a point in preserving one’s public image if it means a legal liability, or worse, a conviction.
3. Find a way to turn a negative into a positive. Karin Newell, a marketing and sales expert who is now president of a growing organization that facilitates artistic and cultural opportunities in the Tarrant County area, said it’s important not to let negative branding remain unchecked. That can be something as simple as responding to a negative news story about something that went wrong during the county’s election process with a positive point on how the county is fixing the problem, or something as creative as coming up with a positive correlation residents can make when thinking about the county.
She pointed out the steps residents in Euless, Texas, took when some people from neighboring towns began calling the town “Useless, Texas”: They made their own play on words, coming up with a slogan and graphic for the town, now promoted by its residents as “Simply Fab-Euless.”
4. Work with the news of the day. There are two types of days in which reporters are actively looking for news, explains Crilley: When there is a major breaking national news story that must be covered locally from different angles, and when it appears that there are no news stories to cover. These are the days journalists are most likely to take the bait on a local news item.
In the first case, someone trying to get an article written or a news item broadcast must pitch their stories to fit into the event of the day. If, for instance, there’s an announcement from White House officials about children’s health-care funding, local governments can use the opportunity to talk about their own children’s health-care spending and programs. On the other hand, if Britney Spears has just gotten another DWI, maybe it’s time to promote the county’s work with the drug court, or improved effort to catch drunken drivers before they hurt someone.
In the second case, someone trying to get media coverage doesn’t have to do much of anything, other than offer something interesting and make themselves and other sources available. The best times to do that are near government holidays, though, so it may involve working on a day off.
“Keep a story handy,” advised Tina Morton, the spokeswoman for the Travis County Tax Office.
5. Do your research before pitching. Don’t rely on a press release to sell a county event or service for the county. Instead, pick up the phone and sell it, person to person. Although having a press release is still important, the advantages to selling a story over the telephone are numerous.
“News got to the newsroom before the Internet,” Crilley said, adding that over the phone, a person selling a story can tell exactly how interested a reporter is in covering the story and decide whether to move on to the next reporter or to change the angle of a story.
“There’s not that much miscommunication on the phone. You can always retreat or change tactics,” he said.
Knowing which reporter to pitch a story idea to is just as important as the story itself. Blindly sending out press releases and e-mails, or making random calls into newsrooms is likely to get something thrown into the trash can or brushed aside. Instead, do an Internet search and find out which reporters would be the most likely to cover a certain event: It could be the county beat reporter, but if there is no county beat reporter or the story has something to do with raising awareness for breast cancer, children’s health-care services, or protecting cars from auto theft, the story can be pitched toward features or cops reporters.
Another tip? When pitching, Crilley said to remember that everyone likes to be told they are doing their job well. Look up the last article the reporter wrote and mention it at the beginning of the sales pitch.
“Stroke their ego. Recognize what they do,” Crilley said.
If the reporter doesn’t answer their phone, leave a shorter voicemail rather than a longer one. “I’ve got a story for you,” is an intriguing message.
6. Think visually. Reporters, whether working for newspapers or television, rely just as much on visuals as they do words when telling a story. A compelling photograph can be the difference between a bold page-one article or something that gets hidden on the inside. In broadcast journalism, compelling visuals make everything easier. If a story idea has a visual element, advertise it.
7. Focus on the human or cost element of a story. There’s news in almost everything, but the news that generates the most interest generally has to do with two things: people and money.
If a county is holding a holiday fund-raising event that it wants to generate publicity for, say a 5K run, sending out a press release about the annual 5K run isn’t going to do the trick. That story is done every year and written every year — it’s just as easy to change the date on the news article as it is to change the date on the press release. Instead, look for the most compelling human element of the story — in other words, not how much money the county is hoping to raise and how, but who the money is going to and how it will help.
If the county incorporated new technology into a service or program, the press release shouldn’t start with the technology, but how much taxpayer money is expected to be saved. Don’t talk about the program, but about the value of the program.
8. Be a reliable, model source. Gaining reliable sources is essential for any reporter, and a source’s perceived reliability will play a major role in how that source is covered, and how his or her “side” is covered.
Reliability, for reporters, is determined by three characteristics:
how quickly a source calls the reporter back, how straight talking the source is or seems to be and how accurate and complete his or her information is. Not returning a reporter’s phone calls can ruin a relationship with a reporter.
“Reporters do carry an attitude into their coverage of a lot of topics, especially when covering governments,” said Marc Flake, a former reporter who is now the public information officer in Tarrant County. “If they don’t like you, that’s going to affect their coverage. You can cuss them out, you can call and complain about what you think is an inaccuracy, and they will forgive you for it, but you have to return their phone calls as quickly as you can.”
On the other hand, scheduling regular informal times to meet with reporters can make a source seem more reliable and easily accessible during more significant times. If a reporter is new to the area or to covering county government, offering to meet prior to the commissioners court meeting in order to discuss the agenda and any other county business going on may give the reporter a preview of an issue, and give him or her time to prepare a more in-depth or interesting report.
9. Take time to think. If a reporter calls an official or department head for an interview, the best thing to do right off the bat is ask what the article will be about, what the conversation itself will be about, and whether the reporter will be available to talk in 15 minutes. Hang up the phone and think about the things the county or department needs to say.
“You have to make sure the county commissioners will be at ease with whatever you communicate to the public,” said Jane LeMaster, president of the National Association of Counties and the public information officer in Gwinnet County, Georgia.
Also think about the information the reporter will be interested in: the who, what, when, where, why and how. Pull up any statistics available on the topic. Write down a list of necessary points to make during the conversation, Malone said. If another person would know more about the topic, ask that person to respond instead, and let the reporter know who that person is and how to contact him or her.
When talking to a reporter, don’t tell jokes or use sarcasm, Malone said. Don’t be afraid to pause, and don’t allow yourself to be provoked. If on camera, don’t fidget or allow your eyes to wander around the room. Other “don’ts” include rushing, interrupting, and using jargon, legalese or acronyms.
“Don’t be afraid to say, ‘I don’t know,’” he added. “Don’t assume reporters know everything that county government does.”
10. Do not go off the record. While it’s true that sometimes officials will have information they cannot release or do not want tied to them, going off the record is usually frustrating, unnecessary and confusing. It can mean different things to different people. “Off the record” actually means that the conversation cannot be reported on at all, something that reporters must agree with and will usually not see the benefits to doing. Many sources use “off the record” as a way of saying they do not want to be quoted as having said something, such as bad-mouthing a fellow official. But as a rule of thumb, “off the record” is only good when it’s said before something, not after something. Some sources use “off the record” as a way of going “on background,” meaning that the information can be reported but not attributed, which is again something a reporter must agree to do.
“Your knowledge is divided into two different things: things you can say and things you cannot say,” said Newell. If something cannot be said lawfully, don’t say it.
Rather than going “off the record” during conversations, a better practice is to always speak professionally and accurately. If a reporter wants a sound bite with personality, it should be positive. A source can always ask a reporter to repeat back any direct quotations for clarification’s sake, but should never ask to review a reporter’s notes or to see an article or report before it is published.