I really like KBJR’s weather people. We attend the same church and they are swell folks. I write this as a disclaimer for what follows. I’ve had some challenges dealing with KBJR reporters this last year. They are back with a vengeance but this time they are going after my only ally on the school board.
Last fall when I was running for the School Board and just a few weeks before the election KBJR set two reporters on me like Mr. Burns releasing his hounds of hell. The reporters were about to report that I lied about being a teacher and had a child molester for a campaign manager. They were wrong but this led me to pay about $500 bucks to discuss these allegations in an ad in the Duluth Reader: You can read the ad in full in this post from Oct. 27, 2013. My ad begins:
A TV reporter just called to tell me that an “anonymous source†had told her that I had falsely claimed to be a “retired teacher.†I told her she was in error but she insisted twice that there was no record of me teaching in Proctor or the Duluth Schools. Then she insisted I had obviously violated my quaint campaign slogan, “Honesty is the best policy.â€
It would be nice to think that before they attempted another character assassination; this time on board member, Art Johnston, they would stop to consider that the primary eye witness of Art’s “assault” (tapping the Superintendent on the shoulder) is dating one of KBJR’s newscasters.
I just called KJBR’s news department and had a pointed discussion with the reporter of this hideously unnuanced story which declares that investigator Mary Rice had found that Art had committed all six of the offenses leveled at him. Here’s the link to the story on their webpage.
I urged the reporter to talk to her News Director and either pull the story or follow it up with something a little more journalistic-ally sound.
I then told her I hoped they would send a camera to the December 2nd meeting in which Mary Rice will explain her report to the School Board.
