(00:00:00) Deborah Howell is with us in this hour of the program. She is executive editor of the st. Paul Pioneer Press and dispatch opposed. She's held now for a little over three years. I guess it is, uh to two years. Yeah and prior to that you were managing editor of the Pioneer Press. For about two years, right? How did you get into the newspapering business Deborah? Well, it was natural. My father was a newspaperman and he met my mother who was a high school newspaper editor and at a newspaper in San Marcos, Texas and I was the result thereof. So I probably never had a chance. Uh-huh. Just sort of ran in the Family Blood right after he was newspaperman. He went into radio and TV news. Now you also have worked as a reporter in the field. Have you not. Oh yes. I started out as a police reporter in Corpus Christi, Texas and you worked your way all the way up from there. Right? How did you do that? How did you get in from into management from reporting? That's a fairly difficult jump. Is it not someone especially when you you are supervising the people who you were on the same level with the day before I did not particularly aspire to management, but it just Called called as it were my first supervisory job was actually supervising something called column one on the old Minneapolis Star which was a consumer Action Line column and I went from there to being a city editor of the star now as executive editor. How much say do you have on what we read day-to-day in the st. Paul Pioneer Press dispatch. Well, my main say probably comes through the people who report to me whore who are in the jobs who make the absolutely down in the trenches decision. What are we covering today? What are we covering today? The managing editor makes the decisions on what goes on the front page everyday, but I look over his shoulder and get a report before I I leave and I know what's going to be on the major front Sports features page one business Metro before I leave for the day. Now, do you have set out in your mind as a policy that you will devote x amount of space to international news domestic news State political news and so on or does do these vary dramatically from day to day depending on what the news is they can very very dramatically depends upon what's happening. Sunday is a much more planned paper. But daily well for instance the shuttle something like the shuttle explosion simply wipes out the newspaper for the I mean, that's the main story and we're going to put all of our resources into covering the biggest story. That doesn't mean we're going to ignore other things, but that's what our readers are going to want to know about the next day or that afternoon as it were now that of course is a national story is there much that the local paper can do about that to further enhance people's understanding of it or do you rely primarily upon your National wire services and your other syndicated sources of information. Well, it depends upon the story there. There were things that we could do locally and I think that there are lots of national and international stories that you can bring home and that you need to do that that day. We talked to teachers about Christa McAuliffe. We had a story about the teacher who had wanted to be on the space shuttle. From Minnesota. We talked to the journalist the journalists who wanted to go on the space shuttle things like that stories that that you could say. Yes. They do have a they do have a guy in local original angle to the right Deborah. How old is with us? And if you have a question for her, you're certainly welcome to call us and ask her to to 76 thousand is the number in the Twin Cities area 2276 thousand if you're a listener outside the Minneapolis st. Paul area call us toll-free on our number one 865 to 9700 and if you are a listener in Wisconsin or one of the other surrounding states, you can call us directly at area code 612 2276 thousand. We have some people already on the line Debra. Let's get to our first caller now. Hello, you're on (00:04:34) good afternoon, Miss Howe. I must simple resident and a subscriber to the newspaper and my concern is with the editorial page. It appears as though you are running at. Orioles especially a neighborhood activities and neighborhood problems and the unit editorialize without having in the past had any significant articles at all on the subject are editorializing on and I'm speaking of William Mitchell College parking lot versus the neighborhood and lately the College St. Thomas growth versus the neighborhood with no articles previously in the paper with the (00:05:08) details. I'm not in charge of the editorial page to begin with but certainly we have written on the news pages about those to contract. They were Hood controversies several times, but I guess it could have been that we had an editorial on one day and hadn't written about him for a few days beforehand, but we try to cover every major Community story that would be likely to result in an editorial to tell me about the structural situation of the paper where you don't have anything to do with the editorial page who runs that or what Donna Clark is the editor of the editorial page and he reports directly to John Finnegan. Who is the senior vice president and editor. I'm in charge of the news and features operation Graphics. So the editorial department is kept separate from yes, then that's quite common on American newspapers and okay. Let's move on to our next listener here. Rubber hose listening. (00:06:11) Hello. I'm calling from st. Paul. I have a question or a comment about the features from syndicated columnists that are carried on the editorial page. Now. I note that there are usually features from columnists and commentators who are well known for being conservative, and these men's views are aren't really balanced by any views from the left. Any balancing seems to be done with editorials from columnists who are somewhat slightly liberal or middle of the road. We don't see anything from columnists as far left to the far left as the right one columnist such as Jean Kirkpatrick urquelle Thomas why not publish some editorials from socialist commentators such as Michael Harrington, I'll hang up now. Thank you. (00:06:59) well again, I'm not in charge of the editorial page, but I will be happy to pass that along to run Clark who is let's move on to another listener who has a question for Deborah Hall executive editor st. Paul Pioneer Press dispatch. Hi. (00:07:12) Hi. Is there any truth that the editorial page has a higher reading level than other sections and therefore some people are locked out of reading the editorial page. (00:07:25) I don't believe that that is true. When we do readership surveys at the paper. That's not something that we come and count with what education level do you aim for in writing the paper? We do not aim for a particular educational level. We try not to either right over our above our readers heads and I think that we're that we write for people who are Certainly, probably high school educated or above. What is the most popular part of the paper? What do you get the most response to what Lee what do your surveys tell you is the most read the most valued among the readership? Well, certainly. TV listings Comics things of that sort have enormously High readership the most high reader. The highest readership is page one. Is that right? Everybody looks at page one. Yeah, they look at it. But do they read it and do they read if the goes beyond page one to page eight or there are four National studies show that readership falls off dramatically when you jump a story. All right. So more folks with questions for Deborah how high you're on with her now? (00:08:50) Well, that's all I guess. My question is as far as competition goes on the newspaper. Do you feel you compete with Minneapolis Tribune or are you competing with the electronic media for news (00:09:06) we compete with we compete with a lot of things including people who just don't have time to read probably are that's probably our biggest problem. Certainly we compete with Stern Tribune. We would not try to cover every single single thing in Minneapolis city hall or in there historically their part of the market but on breaking stories and Of interest to the entire Twin City certainly we are highly competitive. We also consider ourselves highly competitive with television has there been some tendency on the part of both papers to rate each other's staffs or the past few years. You've seen definitely some transition. Some people have gone from the Minneapolis paper to St. Paul some have gone from st. Paul and Minneapolis. We've hired several people from Minneapolis over the last several years probably about a dozen they've hired a couple from us. Yeah. So what do you identify people you want and then Court these people or do they come looking for work in st. Paul or how does that work? It's worked both ways. Let's work both ways. Sometimes that sort of competition could be used not just because you want that person. But because you see that individual as one of the more popular people there in a way of weakening your competition, is that part of what's going on here. Mostly I think it has to do with saying a person saying that person will Drink than our staff it's more that than than trying intentionally to weaken the other newspaper. I believe the other thing that has been alleged over the years is that the two papers have an under-the-table agreement not to compete in some areas. That is the sale of newspaper is primarily within each other cities. How about that? I can say categorically that is not true. Was it ever true at one time? I've been working and the Twin Cities for 20 years on one side the river another and I've not known it to be true. It may have been true in many many many years ago, but I certainly not recently. I wonder where that story originates in why it seems to persist because we sell newspapers. They sell newspapers in many places most places in our markets and we sell at least Street sales newspapers throughout Minneapolis and their territory. Deborah Hall is with us today. We have some folks on the line also a couple of lines available again in the Twin Cities 2276 thousand if you have a question about modern-day newspapering and in other parts of Minnesota, our toll-free number is 1-800-695-1418 Hall next go ahead. Please (00:11:52) good afternoon. One of the things that concerned about is the extent to which the news comes in clusters. Now you've referred to the shuttle and I can think of another set of clusters stop Africa the cluster the Iran-Contra scandal to Cluster and I'm wondering do do printed printed media Outlets like yourself you latch onto these clusters because you see them as selling selling papers and catch people's eyes or are you part of a larger conspiracy to control the minds of men and perhaps influence legislation and state local and federal government? (00:12:25) That's pretty Cosmic. We are in the we are in the business to sell newspapers certainly, but we also look upon the newspaper is a public institution of public trust if you will and we neither ignore stories Gnar cover stories that we don't think are important to our readers to our readership. When a story that's local endotronix would be a good example. It was a story that lots of news media we got on top of and we're very competitive on I don't look upon it as a conspiracy. I look upon it as here. Something has happened. That's a very big deal to the state and that we need to find out what's going on. And so reporters are all over the story and it comes out bit by bit. I think that's quite true Iran-Contra the same thing. What occasionally you see a story that will that will be broken by one paper or the other end? It will be copyrighted by that paper. What determines when you will seek a copyright and what restrictions does that impose we seek a copyright when we know we have a story or we're fairly certain. We have a story exclusively. That's a big story and that we want credit for when it's broadcast on the air or if it's going to be picked up by another newspaper. So that's where that phrase in a copyrighted story today. The such-and-such newspaper reported that right? Okay. We want people to know we had it first and another listener with the question higher on whatever (00:14:04) Hall yeah. I'd like to ask a question make a couple of comments maybe sort of critical. I'm sorry to have to but I heard miss how I just got in the end of that part that I think you did you say you went to the University of Texas or (00:14:17) Yes (00:14:18) Were You There When Karen Elliott was there? (00:14:22) No, I wasn't but I know who she is. (00:14:23) Yeah. Well, I'm from down around there and I used to read the daily Texan a lot. So I used to work for it admiration. Will you the editor or assistant editor something like what years were you there? (00:14:34) I graduated in (00:14:34) 62. Well, let me say this about your paper and many apps paper. I a lot of stuff good in there and my main criticism sort of is in the in the business section of both papers. I'm investor are very nice in the stock market. I know not everybody is but friends in your paper, you've had a running mistake now for years on your big stock market tables says sales and instead of saying in hundreds like in the Minneapolis paper and a thousand other papers, it just says sales and you have to multiply that by a thousand and if somebody error Yeah by founding if somebody took it literally they'd be off by a thousand to one. I don't know if you know that and I've never called on there and told anybody but it's true. I also In your Sunday paper for instance of course of your dailies, but even in the Sunday, you don't even have the high and low for the year on even the New York Stock Exchange, which is all the Minneapolis paper as they don't even deign to give us the high and low for a year and The American or any of the over counter stock and to me that's just Busch League 4 City's biggest st. Paul and an area of this boot. Also. I know the Minneapolis haven't noticed him St. Paul Riesling. They dont give friends even the livestock could changes for the week in the Sunday paper on the Commodities markets. It just seems to me your statistical data is very poor. I do appreciate your money featuring the Minneapolis has a similar thing where you give the eighty or a hundred local stocks and what their high and low has been for five years and what the change for the week. That's very valuable and it's very good thing to do. Of course, you don't have to carry the market for that day because there's no Market on Saturday and Sunday, but I do think your statistics in the I like Linda McDonald and that fell a bill. I think they're top-notch reporters are Either stuff. They're very good. But I do think your statistical stuff is so lacking for a big metropolitan area. I believe they used to be at least some areas of the country with towns of 50 or 75 thousand people that at least in the Sunday paper had the high and low for a year on the American and the New York. Stock Exchange is (00:16:34) poor kid never. What do you think about that? I've been sitting here taking notes and I'll go back and talk to the managing editor and the business editor this afternoon about that and you have expanded the the business section and you have this yes section every every Monday as the Minneapolis paper does you've added some things we've expanded our statistics a lot over the last several years and and continue to try to package them in a way that's attractive to readers and can get as much information in our news whole limits as we can what other kinds of things have you added over the years to try to appeal to people. Well right now we're adding a new feature section. That I think are going to be very popular. We've added to health and fitness and money and this Thursday. We're adding entertainment Twin Cities, which is a new tabloid entertainment guide that we think it will be the most comprehensive liveliest and generally most thoroughly wonderful entertainment guide in the Twin Cities. And so we've been doing a lot of work there and we have not finished with with are improving our features coverage a certainly business Twin Cities was an important addition to the paper. What about knowing all these these things you've talked about have all been sort of in the features area. The lifestyle things that information that people can use is consumed as consumers and so on does this come at the expense of further development of the news area the hard news area that you know, the nuts and bolts of what goes into the paper. Well I come from the hard news area and that's my If I have a excuse me strong biases it's in the hard news area and to some degree. It does come at the expense of that. But you also have to serve a total readership and most of our readers don't want to read just hard news. They want information. They can use in their daily lives. They want the comics. They want the sports. I defined Sports has hard-nosed but a lot of people think that's more on the feature side. So, I mean it's a balance and you got to have that balance every day are you'll lose part of your readership. Everybody pays the quarter for something different. Have you added anything to the so-called hard news segments over the years? Yes. We've added a great deal of new space in the last three years in particular the we haven't added any feature space. Matt all to speak of but we have pumped a lot of space and to the daily paper. You mentioned that terminal into main news Metro and sports news Okay business, you mentioned that term news hole, which is I should explain that. That's the person that's the part of the newspaper that is not ads. That's the part that is news and features and typically what percent is that? It varies day-to-day it can be as high as 60 40. It can be as low as 70 30 that's news to ads. Mmm-hmm. Okay moving on to some more folks with question. It can be as high as 50 50 on occasion to okay Deborah Hall executive editor st. Paul De Spiner, press dispatch is with us in your on with her now. Go ahead, please (00:19:59) yes master. Would you send the material to I'm located up here in northern Minnesota and I do a little bit of freelance writing. I'll hang up now. Listen here, I (00:20:22) think. We have temporary part-time people who do work for the newspaper who are actually am temporarily employees of the staff. We don't we do not do a great deal of what would be called print a great deal of of what we would call freelance. We have people who cover concerts for us and who do some work for us in sports in our neighborhood sections who are part-time employees. However, so you're wouldn't hold on a whole lot of Hope for our friend up in Minnesota. All right, so don't send anything to the st. Paul police. Well, no he can send he just shouldn't have a whole lot of Hope but you you never know when there's a major Talent out there in northern, Minnesota. All right. You're on with Deborah. He'll know. What's your question today. (00:21:16) I'm calling from Minneapolis and I'm afraid that reading the Star Tribune takes the place of reading your paper. But I have a question for you this dealing with the newspaper both as a public institution and as a historical document Minnesota Public Radio was asked if they would take note of the seventh anniversary of an influential Minnesota Coalition Coalition, which deals with women's equality and Women's and Children's issue and it declined saying that there were people that oppose the views of this women's Coalition and what I want to ask you is I know that 200 years ago, there were a lot of revolutionists the revolutionaries around how do you see your role with respect to reporting on movements that R4 change, especially if it's if they're very rationally oriented. (00:22:21) Well, we do reporting all the time on groups and movements trying to bring about change in the society. I mean, there's hardly a day. I can't imagine a day that would go by when we wouldn't have some story in the newspaper someplace about some group that's trying to bring about some kind of change in some in some area of the newspaper and that may be the same exact sort of thing that brings complaints from folks who say the paper generally newspapers, not your paper, but generally newspapers in the media tend to be too liberal. They tend to show a liberal bias and liberal slant. What do you respond? When you hear that complaint? We have people who say we're to traditional people who say were too liberal some statistics. I just saw about how people view our newspaper they seem to view as is Pretty middle of the road. We on our editorial page. That's the one place in the paper where where we have strong political opinions. I would say that We're pretty Centrist. Is that what you want to be? I think that's I think that's fair. I think that's what we want to be, but we are not on the news Pages Although our columnist certainly have strong opinions about things. We certainly do not try to have it either a liberal or conservative bias, and I would I'm very I'm very opposed to that. I think you have to appear fair to your readers and you appear unfair if there is a bias to your reporting or folks with questions for Deborah whole today. Hi you're on with her (00:23:56) now, it's good afternoon. I have a quick question. Have you folks conducted any surveys as to the effect of the Tribune increasing your price to 35 cents versus years at 25, and you see any price increase in your paper in the near future. Thank you. (00:24:12) I like our newspaper being in a quarter and I hope we don't change it and there are no plans to right now, sir. Kill our circulation department may have done some research that I'm not aware of. I do know that we have picked up circulation on Street sales because we're a quarter and I think that's appropriate. You have a question for Deborah Hall today. Go ahead, (00:24:34) please. Yes. I've been reading the same Paul paper for approximately four years now and I haven't noticed that it's gotten much better. But I would like Miss Hall to comment on this morning's front page where they had a little colored picture of a four-year-old girl in Florida whose father was a arrested and all this custody given to her stepmother because the child was tried to was going to be sold for $100,000. This strikes me as somewhat tabloid type journalism, and this has occasionally happened on the st. Paul paper. I'd like to her Make a comment on this and also to tell her how much I do. Enjoy Jo Soo charades column. Thank you. (00:25:18) Thank you very much. When I looked at that picture, I had my heart went out to that little girl sitting in that car with all those TV and newspaper cameras pointed at her and I can see why you might think that that is a bit Sensational. I don't I thought there was a particular feeling about that picture that made you feel empathetic toward the position that little girl was in and I don't think that the story and our newspaper at least has been covered to the point where we violated that little girls privacy. I think that's a one-time picture. But but it gives a powerful one time message about exploited children occasion, you know, the front page of the paper is generally what you think of as where the most important stuff goes the Port News appears on the front page and yet there will be pictures like that. There will be pictures of animals. He'll be pictures of you know, human interest kinds of things. Let's put it that way sometimes on the front page. What are they doing there? Why aren't there on page 84 or something? Oh because you know, the reason those pictures that go on page one or chosen every day. I mean it's according to what has happened that day what events that often shape what the picture is going to be though. Sometimes the picture certainly will be with a story and sometimes it's just news a crane falls down at a shopping center. That's a great picture a hotel. They're doing one of the exploding Hotel pictures which are very popular the beluga whales big mouth is being shipped off to San Diego that's news and a picture is dramatic and that's what you want on page one some days. There are no dramatic news pictures not only here but anywhere else in the world that Really want to put on your page once so you choose a softer shot of something feature e something that will make you smile and I don't think there's anything wrong in this world with picking up a front page and seeing a picture that make somebody smile. How much of how much of that is determined by your desire to get somebody to punk out there quarter in that in that vending machine. We talk every day about what's going above the fold in other words that portion seen through the news rack and certainly we want to put the most in important stories up there and we put the little promos at the top of page one to tell you what's inside to let you know what you might want to buy that newspaper for but the most important thing about what goes above the fold is the most important news of the day and that most important news might not necessarily be the kind of news that would traditionally sell newspapers, but that's still what we put above the fold. Okay pictures certainly, but we don't pick the pictures on what's going to sell a particular newspaper that day. Hmm. Let's move on to some more folks with questions for Deborah Hall. Hi, what's your question today (00:28:28) series of UPI articles Associated Press article from another centralized agency the you as an editor. Feel obligated to comment on a slant or an angle or use of use of words you feel is incorrect in the story or do you feel that your paper is a kind of a neutral retailing outlet for these centralized agencies. (00:28:52) We added all the wire and syndicated copy that appears in our newspaper and we would never let anything go in newspaper from any new service that we knew to be wrong incorrect biased ungrammatical. We pay Coastal close attention. That's that copy does not go in the paper unread and unedited. What's the biggest single source of your of your news is it's tough that your own people right or is it some of the syndicated services? frankly, I've never gone through the newspaper and done a survey depends day-to-day most she's you know, that's a really good question and I can't answer that as well as I'd like to be able to because it depends upon whether there's lots happening out there in the world. It's that we're getting in on the wires or whether we're having a very heavy local run a news some days. We will have six stories on page one that will all be local and only one wire story on occasion though not very often. It might be exactly the opposite Deborah Hall is with us. You have a question for her today. Go ahead. Now you're on with (00:30:02) her. Yes. Hello. Don Roberts going from Minneapolis. One thing that bothers me about all the news including mpr's is the redundancy destructive redundancy of issues and how certain other issues that seem important to pushed way back in the back and what I bring to - hinckley's Easter vacation, it didn't happen and all the Marine Embassy. Snooze versus for example a peace conference that was held in Libya certain third world information piece news, and I'd like your comment on this redundancy Factor at the cost of other news. Thank you. (00:30:44) Well, there are a number of people at the newspaper who whose opinions go into what we put in the newspaper every day. We have people who are in charge a local news people who are in charge of wire news people are in charge of business news, and it's their best judgment every day on what the most important news is and when they come into the news meeting every afternoon, they're pushing for what they think the most important news is now there are always stories that get left out of the paper and there are always stories that we cover and I think the the certainly the Moscow and be Embassy story is a very important International story. And so we will pay more attention to that then we may have pay attention to some other things. It's all a matter of human judgment. You have a question for Deborah Hall. You're on next go ahead, please. (00:31:46) Yes. I have two questions when you buy color photos from freelance photographers. Do you prefer flies or Prince? And the other question is roughly how much less you pay for a reprint of an article compared to buying first right from for that same (00:32:02) article? On I would want you to talk to my picture editors my picture desk about the picture. We have we've gone both ways on that on reprint rights. We sell them are buying first rights to do any published material. I mean, that's where if we're buying a something that's nationally syndicated or are we're serializing a book which we do periodically, we are among many newspapers doing so the material we published its first rights is basically the material from own employees or listeners with questions for Deborah Hall today and you're on with her now. Go (00:32:53) ahead. Thank you. I had a couple of short questions and also a comment I along with a couple other colors would like to congratulate you on what at least I perceived to be a very much improved. But I only intermittently read the same Paul paper, but it seems to me that over the last couple of years. It has very much improved secondly unlike more offering home delivery Minneapolis. Just within the past couple weeks someone stopped by and said you were going to start home delivery Minneapolis. And so I'm going to have to consider that my first question is a very short one and that is a periodically here newspaper people refer to something called a graph that just newspaper shorthand for paragraph. (00:33:34) You could be two things. It's probably newspaper shorthand for paragraph. Although we certainly do we run charts and graphs with stories (00:33:44) and then the second question which is maybe a little more more important. One of the things that a lot of kind of non media people feel about media is that there's a certain kind of self-righteousness that newspaper people and perhaps more more visibly anyway, Television people lend to their to their work they seem to frequently say that they in some way have a public charge to bring information to the public Etc on the other hand you and the Minneapolis paper and probably most papers do a lot of kind of commercial killing that I find objectionable in which doesn't seem to fit in with that non example that I would give is for example, the little advertising agency puff pieces that you and certainly the Minneapolis paper run in your Monday business sections seems to me that is just clearly the type of situation where your padding on the back the people who are filling your your adds a second somewhat related issue. I would perceive is you're having a policy which allows your columnists or reporters for example to Joe Sutra and See to work for competitors. It seems to me that that in some sense diminishes the freedom that they would have to comment on on whatever a competitor is doing. Alright, whatever you want to come in on these (00:35:20) items first people who advertise in our paper do not get special breaks in the news pages that is a matter of integrity and we do not print puff pieces from advertising agencies to I think that there is some self-righteousness from time to time on the part of journalists and we try to come to combat that I think that that's been something that's talked about in newsrooms for the past several years in particular that we have to remember that. We don't have all the corners on the truth on Sutra and ricey. I think them having a radio show is fine it Increases their their visibility and makes people more likely to pick them up and pick up our newspaper and read them. So that doesn't bother me at all. I bother me if the competing media was the Star Tribune and that obviously wouldn't happen but it doesn't bother me for them to have radio shows. Okay, we'll move on to some more people who have questions or concerns for Deborah how she's executive editor of the st. Paul Pioneer Press dispatch and our conversation obviously not limited to just what goes on at that paper but to newspapering nowadays in general. Go ahead. You're (00:36:35) next good afternoon somewhat related to the last callers problem. I will find sections in the newspaper for government legislative news fairly regularly almost on a daily basis. You always can count of particular portion of the paper will have that there is a place for business news with a banner there is a place for the television and so on and incidentally the Cable listings only offer from 6 to 12 o'clock. The side issue. Why is that? Why don't you put in the full day's schedule, but where is the equivalent section on a daily basis in which you allow advertising agencies and PR people who are releasing things from corporations to always have a spot in the business page where that goes. Where is the equivalent for workers and the labor page? There are sections for the consumer on food issues shopping house remodeling Etc. But the newspaper doesn't dedicate a portion everyday for labor. Are you between the lines are we to interpret them that you are only pro-business and that you're not interested in the interests of of the working people because there are PR people from those areas who would have material for you to include that. You also can have your writers look at issues of inflation implications of The implications of government policy on embargoes trade embargoes on okay. Thanks section guaranteed every day for the workers. Okay. What about that (00:38:09) Deborah? We have a reporter who spends full time covering labor and Union and workplace issues. And most of that news runs in our business section, but some of it runs in Maine and metro news too and that's just locally and we do follow nationally important Trends in news with labor unions. This is a heavily Union area and would be foolish not to do that. And as far as putting the full day's cable TV schedule, we are thinking about doing that in a redesign of our TV book and so Come along to fall we're looking to do some things in that area to improve our coverage. When you do that. When you add these extra sections that you talked about earlier in the broadcast on health and fitness and money and entertainment coming up is there less space for something else or do you just expand the amount of pages that go into the paper with health and fitness and money. We had kind of like a generic feature section on Monday and Tuesday and we focused it. We didn't put any more or less space in the paper. We just took away from a general kind of feature treatment of some topic the saying we're going to focus on Mondays on health and fitness and on Tuesdays and money. Hmm does the amount of Wednesday's on food? Yeah. Now do the number of pages vary quite a bit from day to day based on the amount of news that's available or is it more or less a fixed thing there? There are several things that go into making up the paper. How many ads we have what the Press configuration has to be we run four sections most days and they have to technically they have to balance on the Press. There's there's always two sections that are the same size. So to say there may be two sections of 12 pages into sections of 14 pages and that all gets fairly complicated and you have to break up and give a Metro front and a features front and a sports front although some days. We don't always get the friends. We would like for mechanical reasons. I see and some days we have more ads than others. Some days we have those inserted adds to and we have a space we have something called we call a space bank so that we have when we have a heavy run them to say the ending days of the legislature something like happens like the space shuttle. We will put more new space in the paper the handle major news and then some days when things are fairly slow. There will be less new space. All right, Deborah Hall is with us. We've got more folks with questions and we'll put you on with her now. Hello. (00:40:59) Yes. Good afternoon. I'm a Saint Paul resident freak regular reader of your newspaper. I have a question about part of your classified section. That is Section. I believe it's 27 that began. I believe not too long ago a sort of a personal section for individuals to meet other people your we're familiar with that. I (00:41:19) assume yes, I am though. I don't have anything to do with classified (00:41:22) advertising. Okay. Well anyway, my question is that the section refuses to print personals for gays and And either mentions mentioning of people being gay or man looking for another man. For example, I'd like to know why that is on the assumption that that is the policy. I don't know if you're aware of that and more importantly isn't that discriminatory? (00:41:49) I I really can't reply to that. I am not in charge of the advertising policies of the paper at all and have nothing to do with it and it would be foolish of me to comment on somebody else's Department policy. So I'm not going to do that. We will then move on to you who been waiting for a little while. What's your question (00:42:08) today Eddie? I got a question for you. I have an idea for a column. Who do I talk to? (00:42:14) Well, you can always write me a letter at the paper. (00:42:17) All right, I'll send you some sample columns in. (00:42:20) All right, I assume that you get a lot of people who would like to be newspaper writers of some sort or another from time to time and we have a very very good set of columnists. So it'd be real hard to break into our newspaper right now with the new cow. All right, let's move on to your question. Hello, you're on with Deborah whole (00:42:38) no, I'm calling regarding the future of your circulation policy New Brighton area and have my paper delivered by auto route and just received a letter from the carrier indicating that you are effectively putting him out of business by reducing his receipts by 20% of what they had done and I want to observe that dealing with an adult is just infinitely more satisfactory than hassling with kid carrier in this is a major reason why I don't take the money at this paper. I suggest you better consider the convenience and satisfaction of your subscribers before going ahead with this chain. (00:43:15) I'll certainly take that message to our circulation department. Thank you that like advertising and editorials beyond your purview, right? Okay, we have about 15 minutes left with Deborah Hall and lots of people with questions. Go ahead please you're (00:43:28) next. Yeah, I want to ask if mrs. Hall is a familiar with the works of Noam Chomsky or project (00:43:36) censored. No, I'm (00:43:37) not you're not well in spite of that. Do you see your role as a government Watchdog at all? (00:43:45) Oh yes very much. (00:43:46) So and who do you think is the Watchdog for the Press then who watches the Watchdog? (00:43:51) I readers. (00:43:52) Yeah. Okay. Thanks. (00:43:55) All right, and you hear from readers a lot right all the time moving on to some more questions from folks who may or may not be readers of the st. Paul paper, but they are probably newspaper readers of some sort or another. Hi you're on with Deborah (00:44:07) Hall listen to an early caller who questioned why there were no Roll columns on the editorial page and was Hall said that wasn't really her irresponsibility but later she stated that the papers policy on politics was satirist and yet I noticed that in the news Pages, they're almost never as any regular coverage of the political opinions of either the Socialist or communist parties. I'm curious what the papers policy is with regard to machine left-wing political (00:44:39) opinion. Well again on left-wing political opinion. I'm not the editorial page editor and I don't choose what goes in the on the editorial page though. They try to have many different kinds of opinions over a broad spectrum and I know right that's important to run Clark who is the editor. We do not print opinion material and the regular news Pages as such we cover socialist and Communist Party events, when we think they will be a broad interest. You talked a little bit earlier about competition with primarily with the Minneapolis paper, but you also mentioned competition with television. What how do you how do you see yourselves as competing with television which after all can go on the air with a news broadcast either live or three times a day within a few minutes after something has happened. All right, well It's just a fact of life. And anybody who is covering the news is competition to us. I think that there are in many ways complementary aspects of TV news and newspaper news. You can get it quickly on TV. You can get it in a visual manner but I think for many people the newspaper gives them the details the analysis the time to reflect over what the event has been they have seen on TV. What do you think of USA Today? Well, I think that it's sometimes a very quick and entertaining read it's it's certainly taught a lot of us a lot about newspaper Graphics, but it is not my kind of newspaper. I like more thoughtful longer articles to balance the chartres clip your stories. If you found that it is of they do a beautiful job of something. So no doubt about it. Did you find that it is a significant competitive force in this market that really it is I do not think that people by USA today instead of us. They may buy it as a second by they do a terrific job and sports information. And I think that is one of his primary primary things primary reasons people buy it in a local market. It's a course. It's great to buy at airports when you're And replace it, you know if you're in the Atlanta airport you don't care about what's happening in Atlanta that day USA Today is an easy read. Hmm. Of course thanks to satellite technology. You can also get the New York Times Midwest addition. You can get the Wall Street Journal every day on the streets in st. Paul and Minneapolis and other major areas. You can get the Chicago Tribune and all kinds of other papers. Do they have much of an impact on on your sales. Do you think I think that they don't have as much impact as a first by but that they have a significant impact on as a second by mean I subscribe to the New York Times every day and I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal in USA Today and I look at all three of those newspapers every day as well as the Star Tribune. You still have time to go to work. I didn't say a riddle of my said I looked at him and I take note of what they're doing every day. And so they have an impact certainly on the way. We look at news because very often Will read a story first. Are you will see an analysis of some Topic in a way. You hadn't read about it any place else in the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times and it gives you an idea about what's going on out there that you don't always get from our newspaper and I think that's okay. I mean we are the st. Paul newspaper. Yeah. This is our area and Western, Wisconsin and That has an impact on how we added our newspaper but not on what we're covering in st. Paul and Wisconsin Deborah Hall is with a she is the executive editor of the st. Paul Pioneer Press dispatch those of you in the Minneapolis st. Paul area might want to stay tuned on ksjn 1330 AM at one o'clock on two-way radio. We're going to continue this conversation about the newspaper business a couple of different guests coming in with Allen Cyril. Tom will Kowski enter the Minnesota daily and David she and her of the surveyor boy. I don't know if I've got any of those names pronounced right? I should have checked before I said anything shouldn't I? Well that's what poor preparation will do for you moving onto another listener with a question for Deborah. Hello Hi, how are you (00:49:16) today? Fine? Thank you. I have a couple comments and a question the picture of the little girl this morning immediately hit me as exploitation, but then it was quickly followed with a very by striking very empathetic court and and I could see what why it was there and I think it was an excellent an excellent run that concerning redundancy. I noticed MPR is redundant in his newscast to end. It's only redundant if I happened to catch the first one and listen to the second time. It's presented sometimes I miss that first one. I certainly appreciate it being run again so that I don't miss it. So redundancy I guess is is redundant only if it if a listener has Listen to it two or three times, but I like to have it run more than once so that I can so that I in case I miss it the first time I can pick it up the second time. Also what we bought leaving certain result. What do you choose Arthur Ruben Arthur Rubinstein once said that he left out enough notes in one concert to fill an entire another concert. And so I guess some of the best people have to leave something out and and hit the high spots. (00:50:35) So what gets left out of the st. Paul paper sometimes Deborah Hull we couldn't possibly begin to print all the news we get over our wires and many days. We do not have the space to print all the news that our own reporters have gathered. So you have to make judicious choices about what is the most important thing to the most to the broadest segment of our readers. So what gets left out any Monday is lots of things but that's what editors are paid to do make decisions about what needs to go in the newspaper and what we can pass on we're going to move on to another listener with the question. Hi, you're on with Deborah Holt (00:51:13) Noel. Yes. I have both a comment in a question. I get both Twin Cities newspapers and I must say I'm impressed with how much quicker the st. Paul papers come up with news more thoroughly than the ones in Minneapolis do but my question has to do with whether or not the Saint Paul papers ever considered publishing a disclaimer on their astrology column. Some scientific groups are concerned about the growth of the following the young people are having for astrology as a somewhat Direction in their lives and they started a campaign to get newspapers to print a simple disclaimer saying that this forecast is just for entertainment and has no basis in scientific fact, I think about twelve hundred papers published astrology columns and about 16 major ones have now begun adding this as a disclaimer in amateur be nice if the st. Paul papers would be the First in Minnesota to do that (00:52:04) well off the top of my head. I don't think it's necessary because I think people who do believe in astrology believe in astrology and people who don't may still glance at what the column says but aren't going to take it as gospel truth. And I have a great deal of faith in the intelligence of our readers in that regard you have any idea what percentage of your readership counts on that astrology column. I would never want to leave it out of the newspaper. I'll tell you yeah same with the comics. I'm sure oh right and any specific kind. Is there any specific one specific comic that is overwhelmingly more popular than others. We haven't done a comic survey in about three years, so I can't tell you right now. I know that peanuts, excuse me not peanuts, which I wish that bloom County and Doonesbury are very very Popular but then I've dropped a couple of comics that I did not think we're very popular and had the roof fall in on me as an editor. So all of all the ones we presently print we know have a wide readership. Hmm. Okay, we've got about five minutes left. Let's get some more of you on the air with Deborah whole how you're next. (00:53:27) Thank you. I'm a Twin Cities resident and I consider the Twin Cities to be my whole of the Twin Cities To Be My Playground wondering why on the edit on the advertising pages that I understand you don't have much to do with why they don't carry ads for the same for the Minneapolis theaters and such like that if I subscribe to the st. Paul paper I have to on the days. I want to go see a movie in Minneapolis. I have to buy their paper to and wondering if anybody has ever considered. Just a Twin Cities paper as opposed to a Minneapolis Star Tribune or a pine St. Paul Pioneer Press. (00:54:05) Well, the Minneapolis theaters do not advertise in our newspaper well to the st. Paul newspapers do not ever, excuse me. St. Paul theaters do not advertise in the Star Tribune and our new entertainment Twin Cities. We will be telling you what movies list of movies and where they're playing in the cities. So I would invite you to look at our new entertainment guide because I think it will solve the problem for you what you're saying is that you don't refuse to sell ad space to Minneapolis. That's that's correct. They want to advertise in our paper would be happy to have them. Let's put you on with Deborah. No, go ahead, please. What's your question? (00:54:40) Good afternoon. I've worked on and off as a freelance writer and also on the editorial staff of a college newspaper and was a little bit disturbed to hear that Deborah was not familiar with Noam Chomsky or the project censored (00:54:54) as I thought about it. I am to I have read about it and Just flip my mind. I don't know. I'm not going to claim to know a lot about it, but I have read some things about. All right. I don't know if that's the extent of his concern or not. But let's move on here because we're nearly Running Out of Time. Hello, you're on with Deborah hall (00:55:12) now. I'll try to make this quick. I write a column for the paper and the cities and I get to go around every once in a while with my copy editors on certain words that I want to use this to be very very precise honest. I used the word decaling the word decal as a verb. They said no, it's not a verb. You can't use it. What would you how would you react to something like that? (00:55:38) I wouldn't let a guy wouldn't let you have used it either. It's not a verb. Sorry never before before we move on to a couple more questions, which we might have time for. I'm really curious to hear what you think your paper will look like in the year 2000 it is gone. You have had a lot of changes the format of it has changed quite a bit you've added new sections and so on and so forth. What do you think that your newspaper will be like turn of the century. Who I think will be running more color. I think the technology we will have picked up and be able to run more and better. I am hoping that we'll be able to package what we get more efficiently. I'm hoping that we'll be able to that our technology will improve so that our reproduction will improve the ink won't rub off on your hands. Here here what I'm there's some things I'm hoping that don't change. However, I'm hoping that we never stop chasing the news and I'm hoping that we never I'm hoping that we always value good writing and there were always putting the freshest information we can and the paper for our readers. Let's take one maybe two more questions if they're short higher on with Deborah Hall briefly. (00:57:08) Yes, two quick comments a gentleman called concerning the Cable listings beginning only in the evening how that isn't completely true because in the Sunday TV tab, they begin at 5:00 a.m. And go until 1 a.m. So that is covered. If you buy the Sunday paper secondly a suggestion on the entertainment section, it may be going to be in there. But I feel that one of the very best entertainment prize. And the Twin City area high school musicals and other plays and I would hope that a column could be in the paper on a regular basis particularly in the spring that included the listings of the upcoming high school productions. Thank (00:57:46) you. That's a good idea. Thanks. I just took a note on that. There were houses been taking more than one note throughout this broadcast. And I think maybe it's interesting to hear what folks like and don't like about the newspaper. I love it. It's clear that people feel very passionately about it. Probably is passionately as those of you who write for it. I put that wonderful. Thank you very much for coming in and visiting with us today.