Three Things I Have Learned from Reporter/Editor of The Corvallis Gazette Times

Who: Editor and Reporter for Corvallis Gazette Times, Bennett Hall
What: Speaks to a Journalism class
Where: Linn-Benton Community College
When: May 24, 2010
Why: To give insight and teach a few things about investigative reporting

Bennett Hall is an investigative reporter and editor for the Corvallis Gazette Times newspaper. Through his many years of experience, Hall was generous to be a guest and share some insight from his career to some college students at Linn-Benton Community College. (link to Rob Priewe who teaches Journalism at LBCC)

Three important things that have stood out for me from Hall's visit is that, one, the power of the press has the ability to speak for the "unheard voices" of the community and perhaps change the law. The second thing I learned is that a "paper trail" is a very useful source for a reporter. And the third is simply this; do not use anonymous sources and do not allow "off the record" conversations to be acceptable.

From the investigative work and news stories of Hall, and other reporters, renters of the communities are finally getting their voices heard. A newspaper in Salem had a headline that read "Lawmakers Hear Proposal to Change Landlord-tenant Laws." This is due to renters who feel as though landlords are charging fees that should be illegal and are not. Fees, for example, like charging $200 for changing locks that never get changed, yet the landlord still keeps the money.

I think investigative reporting is great for the community. Like I said before, reporters are the voices of those who don't get heard. There are a lot of people who take advantage of others and sometimes we all need someone who can see the bigger picture of what is happening. How else do we know that these crimes are repeating if no one is keeping track?

Paper trails are very common for any reporter and become a very useful source for cross-checking a news story to make sure all the facts are, well, facts. Cross-checking paper-trails is also useful for when a reporter has a person who won't talk about a certain subject. A reporter may always find a hundred more stories that come out of one story that has many paper-trails.

A person can ask a question and get a straight answer for the question asked, however, do you notice that a lot of the time, even with the one question being answered, that a couple more questions spring up out of the answer? That is kind of what paper trails, or interviews, will do for reporters.

The third, and probably most important, is do not use anonymous sources or allow anything to be spoken "off the record". The most common reason not to use an anonymous source is because there is no credibility for the reader as to what is being read can be determined as true. For all the reader knows, the sentence in the news story was the writers opinion and not a fact.

As far as "off the record" commentary goes, throw it away before the speaker speaks. Let the person know who is being interviewed that what he or she is about to say and wants off the record is trash to you and you would rather not hear it. It sounds like a shocker, or a rude gesture, but it makes you more proffessional about your work and most of the time something at the tip of someone's tongue will need to come out and they will say, "Ok then you can write it then" and spill their guts out from anticipation.

So what can we learn from Bennett Hall? We learn that the press has the power to change laws based on the voice of citizens, paper trails are great for covering facts and digging up extra news stories, and, most importantly, to discard anonymous sources and "off the record" information.