Newspaper giant Gannett Co. on Tuesday (Feb. 13, 2007) purchased Central Florida Future, the University of Central Florida's independent student newspaper.

The company's Central Florida unit, FLORIDA TODAY/Cape Publishing, paid an undisclosed amount for the Future, a free paper published three times a week during the academic year. It also bought the Seminole Chronicle, a weekly circulated in Oviedo and Winter Springs, and Sales, a coupon book distributed at UCF.

"It is a good fit for them," said Heissam Jebailey, who was co-owner of the three publications. "It has become a great publication."

The Future, with a circulation of 15,000, was once the university's official newspaper. Jebailey said it moved off campus in 1992 and eventually became a for-profit business. Jebailey and a partner, Brian Linden, bought the Future in 2001.

Jebailey will work for Gannett, serving as liaison to the university, which advertises in the paper. About 30 students work in the paper's editorial operation, Jebailey said.

FLORIDAY TODAY Publisher Mark Mikolajczyk said Gannett has no plans to change the publications' operations.

"The Future will be a student newspaper," Mikolajczyk said. "The papers will report to me, but they will be run locally."

Last year, Gannett entered the student newspaper market with the purchase of Florida State University's independent student newspaper, a free semiweekly called FSView & Florida Flambeau.

John Morton, a newspaper analyst in Silver Spring, Md., said he doubts Gannett's foray into the world of university journalism will grow significantly.

"Most university dailies are products of their schools' journalism departments," Morton said. "I don't see a groundswell of interest developing."

But Morton said corporate ownership could bring unforeseen change to student newspapers, which are often freewheeling operations.

"They will be answering to a different master," Morton said. "And it will be a more strenuous master."

Landmark Community Newspapers Inc. has purchased the Gadsden County Times in Quincy. The 107-year-old newspaper was purchased from Gemini Newspapers Inc., owned by Ron Isbell and Dwight Connelly.

Eddie Ledbetter will continue as general manager of the 5,200-circulation weekly newspaper, which now is published on Thursday, Landmark announced on Tuesday. He has been with the Times since Dec. 1, after nearly 10 years on the editorial staff of the Statesboro Herald, a daily newspaper in Georgia. He served in several editorial positions in Statesboro, including managing editor for six years. Previously, he was a reporter, photojournalist, columnist and correspondent for the Herald, The Post-Searchlight in Bainbridge and the Claxton Enterprise.

No personnel changes at the Times are expected, Ledbetter said. "It will be the same people here in the building."

Otherwise, transition to the new ownership is still ongoing.

Gerry Mulligan, general manager and publisher of the Citrus County Chronicle, will oversee the transition, Ledbetter said. Mulligan was traveling to Quincy on Tuesday and was unavailable for comment.

"I'm really excited that Landmark has acquired the Times," Ledbetter said. "I'm looking forward to the challenge of making a great small-town weekly even better with the resources that Landmark has to offer. This is a great situation for us, our readers and customers, and we're fortunate to have the opportunity to join such an organization as LCNI."

LCNI owns several Florida papers, including The Wakulla News in Crawfordville, The Chiefland Citizen, Williston Pioneer Sun-News, the Cedar Key Beacon, and Riverland News in Dunnellon, which are all paid weeklies, and the Citrus County Chronicle.

"We are happy to add this paper serving the full-time and part-year residents of Gadsden County to our Florida properties. It's a lovely place in a growing county," Mulligan said in a statement released Tuesday to the Democrat.

Landmark Community Newspapers Inc., a division of privately held, Norfolk, Va.-based Landmark Communications Inc., publishes 57 newspapers in 13 states. LCNI also publishes 41 free newspapers and shoppers, along with 30 special-interest publications. It also operates 17 web offset commercial printing plants. Landmark Sports Group operates seven nationally circulated collegiate sports publications, including Osceola, which covers Florida State University.

Florida Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink today (Feb. 13, 2007) honored members of the Florida Association of Black-Owned Media, Inc. for their contributions to Floridians and promoted February as Black History Month. At a meeting of the Florida Cabinet this morning, CFO Sink presented a resolution honoring the association and its members.

“They provide a strong, consistent voice and a viable presence in the media that greatly influence all of our lives while addressing specific concerns facing African-Americans and their communities,” said CFO Sink. “And in my opinion, there is no issue that touches one life that does not touch all lives.”

The Florida Association of Black-Owned Media, Inc. is a consortium of 13 Black-owned newspapers, radio and cable television stations reporting in all of Florida’s 10 media markets. Combined, these media outlets reach 3 million readers, listeners and viewers each week.

On hand to accept the resolution that CFO Sink presented were: Bobby Henry, Publisher and President, Westside Gazette; Sylvia Perry, Publisher, Jacksonville Free Press; Johnny Hunter, Sr., Vice President, Tempo News; Dr. Calvin Collins, Orlando Times; Kay Andrews, Publisher, Florida Sentinel Bulletin; Candice Lewis-Khufa, The Mahogany Review; Peter Webley, Caribbean Today; Vernon Watson, WBPQ-TV; Robert Hill, WRNE Radio; and Gayle Andrews, Andrews Plus.

“As we celebrate Black History Month,” CFO Sink said, “I would like to thank the Florida Association of Black-Owned Media for their support and promotion of this annual celebration of a rich heritage.”

The News-Journal Corporation's board of directors met Thursday and elected successors to the late Herbert M. "Tippen" Davidson Jr.

• Marc L. Davidson becomes chairman of the board and co-editor while retaining the titles of treasurer and assistant secretary.

• Publisher Georgia M. Kaney assumes the additional titles of chief executive officer and president.

• Chief Financial Officer David R. Kendall gains the additional titles of executive vice president and associate publisher.

• Robert Truilo steps into the position of general manager and assistant treasurer.

• Jonathan D. Kaney Jr. retains the titles of secretary and general counsel.

• Julia D. Truilo remains assistant secretary.

In addition, the board announced that Executive Editor Don Lindley will assume the title of editor. He will carry forward The News-Journal's long-standing news and editorial policies in which he has taken an active role since beginning his career under the late Herbert M. Davidson Sr.

Orange Magazine, a free weekly publication that tracked Tampa's alternative arts and nightclub scene, has ceased publication.

Orange's last issue was published Wednesday (Jan. 24, 2007). The magazine was distributed at bars, restaurants and shops in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.

The publication was part of a chain of newspapers owned by Media General, a Richmond, Va.-based media company that also owns The Tampa Tribune, TBO.com and WFLA, Channel 8.

Orange was launched in September but did not gain a strong foothold in the competitive market for alternative arts-themed publications, said Rusty Coats, vice president and general manager for TBO.com, who oversaw Orange.

"We determined it was not going to be a long-term investment for us," he said. Orange never turned a profit, he said.

If you are one of the increasing number of people who regularly visit The Ledger's Web site for the latest news updates and other information, there are some new features you need to see.

Three Ledger editors have begun blogs aimed at providing context, insight and tidbits of information that complement The Ledger's daily print publication.

Managing Editor Lenore Devore is writing Inside Scoop, which will give readers a behind-the-scenes look at The Ledger and the news business in general.

Religion Editor Cary McMullen, whose weekly Beliefs column in The Ledger offers insight into issues facing the religious community today, is offering more of the same with Scriptorium.

Rounding out the group will be veteran Political Editor Bill Rufty, who will let readers know what's happening in the political world, from the local level to the national level, with Politics.

Each blog will be updated on a regular basis, so check them out at blogs.theledger.com.

The boards of directors of FPS (Florida Press Service), the for-profit subsidiary of FPA (Florida Press Association), and FNAN (Florida Newspaper Advertising Network) voted at their January board meetings to combine the FPS and FNAN.

FPS, which operates under the brand N2PS (National Newspaper Placement Services) to its advertisers and agencies, represents advertisers including Sprint, SunTrust, Wachovia and others. FPS had revenue of $54 million in 2006. FNAN, representing advertisers including Publix, the Florida Lottery and more, had revenue of almost $28 million in 2006. The new company plans to continue to market to advertisers and agencies using both the N2PS and FNAN brands.

Foy Maloy, the chair of FPA, said “I am very excited about the potential and opportunity of the merger as it relates to the future of Florida’s newspapers and to our advertisers. The strengths and success of both organizations combined will give our industry an edge in our rapid and ever changing industry. I am extremely proud of all individuals that were involved in the process and thank them for the countless number of hours they invested.”

The FPS and FPA boards met January 18 in Ponte Vedra and approved the concepts that were proposed at a committee of representatives from all three organizations. FPA members include 45 daily newspapers and 161 weekly newspapers in Florida.

The FNAN board met January 24 in Tampa and approved the same concepts approved by the committee. FNAN is owned by 44 daily newspapers in Florida and Southern Georgia.

Robb Olson, FNAN Chair, said that "The combination of FNAN’s exceptional sales resources and FPS’s industry leading ad operations system will greatly enhance our service and advertising solutions portfolio and better position Florida’s newspapers to compete in today’s increasingly competitive media marketplace."

"The merger represents a critical evolution in the strategy of Florida’s newspapers to address the dynamic changes in today’s marketplace including the continued growth of web-based advertising and the emerging mobile advertising platform.”

"A more comprehensive information, service and solutions portfolio, embodying print and web, will enable us to bring our customers more timely and relevant market and audience data, greater depth and effectiveness in advertising solutions, improved convenience and ease in making advertising buys and an even greater reach of Florida’s population."

Dean Ridings serves as President and CEO of FPS, and Bob Berry serves as President of FNAN. Berry said that "The Florida Newspaper Advertising Network Board of Directors voted in concept to move forward with the merger with Florida Press. This is the result of many discussion meetings between committees from both organizations. Dean and I have developed a good working relationship, and the ad processing Florida Press started in January for FNAN is going well. The FNAN Executive Committee and I will be meeting with the Florida Press Service committee to work on merger details. We expect the synergy between the two companies will result in a more effective newspaper advertising sales and service organization. We expect our clients, newspapers and employees to benefit from the merger.”

The new organization will continue to provide the services provided to FPA’s members for many years. There are no plans to discontinue any of the programs of either organization, including the Advertising Networks of Florida, which includes the statewide 2 x 2 network, the classified line network and the Metro Daily network.

When it comes to competing with arch foe Craigslist, newspapers and other local publishers should stop charging for merchandise ads and develop an online classifieds brand separate from their traditional Web site. That's the advice offered by market research firm Classified Intelligence, based on an 18-month study of Craigslist in a dozen markets including Baton Rouge, La., Knoxville, Tenn., Mobile, Ala., and Ithaca, N.Y.

Surprisingly, the firm's new report concluded there is no evidence that Craigslist takes significant dollars from local newspapers' real estate and job listings in small- to mid-sized markets. "Large metropolitan markets, where ad volumes are considerably higher, are likely a different story," noted the study. A previous report on Craigslist by Classified Intelligence, for instance, found that the free listings powerhouse pulled at least $50 million to $65 million from Bay Area newspapers annually in help wanted ads alone.

And in the communities it studied for the report, the firm found that the younger and better-educated their populations, the more likely that Craigslist is to be the volume leader in the marketplace. In middle markets, Craigslist mostly ends up filling an unmet need for free, low-hassle merchandise ads. "It is in this category that Craigslist grows the quickest--almost invariably beating the local newspaper within just a few months," stated the report.

The Naples Daily News took home four "Edgies" on Sunday (Jan. 28, 2007) at the 11th annual Newspaper Association of America Digital Edge awards.

Naplesnews.com, the Web site of the Naples Daily News, grabbed the ultimate honor, being named as the “Best Overall News Site” in the under-75,000 circulation division.

Andrea Lynn, the Daily News’ multimedia director, accepted the award at a ceremony held at the Mandalay Bay Resort in Las Vegas.

"This is a tribute to our entire multimedia content organization," Lynn said. "We work with an amazing group of individuals with tremendous creativity that get to showcase it every day."

Naplesnews.com beat out Bakersfield.com, the Web site of The Bakersfield Californian and LJWorld.com, the Web site of the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World, for the top prize.

The Daily News also won “Most Innovative Multimedia Storytelling,” for its "Studio 55 Vodcast," a daily news show that can be viewed on the Web sites, downloaded to iPods or viewed on cable television.

Other awards won by the Daily News include: “Best Local Shopping & Directory Strategy,” the restaurant guide on naplesnews.com and “Best Advertising Program,” an expandable multimedia advertisement for Prime Home Builders featured on naplesnews.com.

The Associated Press held the Annual Legislative Planning Session at the 22nd floor of the Capitol today. Speakers for the event included Gov. Charlie Crist, Attorney General Bill McCollum, CFO Alex Sink, Chief Justice R. Fred Lewis and others.

The Associated Press has held the annual planning session for many years, and this year the Florida Press Association and the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors hosted a reception following the planning session. The planning session and reception were open to all members of the association without charge.

The Herald-Tribune will lay off fewer than a dozen employees during the next few months as it outsources the group that takes classified advertisements over the phone and makes other less visible operational changes.

The move, which will allow customers to phone in classified advertisements 24 hours a day, will likely be completed by the end of April.

Faced with a growing migration of ad dollars to the Internet, the Herald-Tribune and other newspapers in the 15-paper New York Times Regional Media Group will be engaged all year in finding ways to cut costs and increase efficiencies, Herald-Tribune publisher Diane McFarlin told staff members on Monday.

The goal is to keep profits on target as print advertising revenues subside from their real-estate-induced peaks during 2006, and also to spend more going after multimedia markets.

Other papers in the chain are making cost-saving moves that are appropriate for them. Some are being announced at the same time that the Herald-Tribune moves toward the new classified system.

For example, the Hendersonville Times-News in North Carolina will close its printing plant and instead print at the Spartanburg (S.C.) Herald-Journal, another New York Times Co.-owned paper. Hendersonville will lay off 35 people, including both full- and part-time workers.

More changes are ahead, McFarlin said.

"Our industry is in the throes of change," she said. "At the same time we are dealing with local economic conditions that have affected sales locally. I think the key to success is to deal with this in a way that will maintain our print strength while building our capability in new media."

Circulation-related marketing for the regional group will soon be centralized at the chain's headquarters in Tampa.

That may result in some job losses at some of the chain's papers. It is less clear whether that will result in any job losses in Sarasota.

The Herald-Tribune is a 116,000-circulation daily newspaper with its own television station, SNN News 6.

The newsroom publishes six editions daily, an online edition and several weeklies and magazines. Its prime readership area is Sarasota, Manatee and Charlotte counties.

The Daytona Beach News-Journal will ask a court today (Jan. 19, 2007) to make public a grand jury report examining State Attorney John Tanner's investigation of the Flagler County jail.

Tanner has asked a circuit judge to delete at least portions of the report, saying it's "unlawful" and shouldn't be made public. State Attorney Harry Shorstein, who convened the Duval County grand jury, says the report is of "great public importance."

But attorney David Evans, as part of a motion to intervene on behalf of The News-Journal, argues that the public should be allowed to read the report, called a presentment. Evans points out that neither he nor The News-Journal has any knowledge of what the still secret report says but Tanner's opposition to unveiling it leads him to an assumption.

"Here," Evans writes," the only logical assumption is that the Presentment contains statements regarding the Flagler Jail Controversy that are critical of Mr. Tanner . . . Without question, the work of the grand jury and the Presentment that it issued relates to alleged misconduct and errors by public officials in the way that public business was conducted . . ."

"From time to time, rightly or wrongly, public officials are subject to scrutiny and criticism that may not be justified and may not be fair. A thick skin is required," Evans' filing states.

Evans plans to file the motion today in Flagler County circuit court.

Tanner and Shorstein have been in a legal fight since Shorstein began investigating Tanner's probe of the Flagler County jail. That probe traces its roots to the arrest of Tanner's daughter, Lisa, 26, who was strapped into a restraint chair at the Flagler jail in March 2005.

Tanner began investigating the jail after Flagler Sheriff Don Fleming requested it, a request Fleming later said he regretted.

Jon Kaney, an assistant state attorney for Tanner, argues it would be unjust to make what he said was a flawed grand jury report public.

"The reason that we who are advocates of open government and open court say they should be open is because we believe that sunshine purifies and sanitizes," said Kaney, one of the state's leading advocates for open records laws.

(Kaney is also general counsel to the News-Journal Corp. and senior partner with Cobb & Cole, a Daytona Beach law firm.)

"By the logic of a sunshine lawyer, which I am, this presentment is neither sanitary nor pure," Kaney said Thursday. "It has not been conceived in sunshine. It was concocted by a biased prosecutor behind closed doors more than 100 miles away from the community that it affects with 20 people that were selected at random from Duval County."

Kaney said the motion didn't sound like legal work.

"That sounds like an editorial to me, not a legal brief," he said.

"In this case, the law is very clear," Kaney said. "It provides that this presentment must remain sealed until scrutinized by the court and determined to be lawful and proper. "

Evans' motion also argues that The News-Journal has a stake in the unusual and caustic court battle between two state attorneys.

"(The) News-Journal, for itself as a newspaper publisher and as a representative of the public at large, has a right to be heard on the issue of public access to public records and judicial records, including grand jury presentments," according to the motion.

"The grand jury has spoken and the public interest is best served by allowing the grand jury to be heard," Evans' motion states.

But Kaney said that it's wrong to say that this part of the grand jury process should be public even though the first part in Duval County was secret.

"This newspaper stood by and watched outside the closed door while Harry Shorstein did his evil," Kaney said.

Jim Mullin, former editor of the weekly Miami New Times, signed a letter of intent Tuesday (Jan. 16, 2007) to buy a monthly newspaper -- The Biscayne Times, circulation 25,000.

Seller is Skip Van Cel, who founded the community paper in 2003 as The Biscayne Boulevard Times. Van Cel shortened the name for this month's issue.

Neither Mullin, 57, nor Van Cel, 51, would discuss terms of the sale. But Van Cel, an artist, will continue to write a column.

''Some people say I should have my head examined for investing in the newspaper business when the whole industry seems to be in decline,'' Mullin says. "But in fact, many community papers like Biscayne Times, they're doing well.''

Mullin, at Miami New Times for 17 years, has a steep learning curve. "I've never been a publisher. I have to learn about running the business from the business side. I have to learn to interact with advertisers in a way that I haven't before.''

He will work with a substantially smaller staff than at Miami New Times, which boasted a circulation of around 100,000 during his tenure. There, Mullin supervised as many as 14 reporters and editors. The Biscayne Times has just four full-time staffers -- a writer, art director, ad salesman and office manager.

(In 2005, Miami New Times named BBT the ''best neighborhood newspaper'' -- a "small, scrappy monthly... that comprehensively tackles nearly every neighborhood issue, from big-picture to the picayune....Art exhibits, landlord-tenant disputes, new businesses, city politics, development, crime...'')

Mullin aims to bring in new advertisers -- national chains, along with local businesses. The paper is printed at Florida Today's plant in Melbourne, trucked to Miami and hand-delivered free to homes and businesses along the Biscayne corridor -- from 15th to 163rd streets, including Edgewater, Morningside, Belle Meade, El Portal, Miami Shores and Arch Creek.

Van Cel never intended to become a newspaperman. "I referred to myself as the 'accidental publisher.' I just wanted to give the neighborhood a voice, up there on the Boulevard.''

Van Cel will return to art full time. He recently exhibited at Art in Bloom and owns White Vinyl Space in Little Haiti, where he shows his work and that of other artists. He posts examples of his art on skipvancel.com.

The term "family newspaper" implies content suitable for everyone in the family -- in particular, children.

The Sentinel, being a family newspaper, observes limits on offensive words and disturbing images.

That's as it should be. If you figuratively invite journalists into your home, you should be able to expect them to respect your sensibilities.

The newspaper's online alter ego, OrlandoSentinel.com -- although appealing to a somewhat younger audience than the printed Sentinel -- exercises less restraint.

That became obvious recently in the tragic case of Carlos "CJ" Otero Jr., an Orange County teenager who died in a high-speed crash in a car his family gave him for Christmas.

As the Sentinel's Henry Pierson Curtis explained in a Dec. 29 article, Otero's friends quickly began posting memorial messages on the teenager's Internet page. Curtis' article, though, soon began drawing its own response on the Sentinel's online message board -- not all of it sympathetic.

Some postings had harsh comments about the dead youth. Others criticized his grieving family. Still others expressed outrage at the mean-spirited other comments.

With this, the Sentinel certainly had achieved the objective, outlined in the statement of philosophy for its message boards, of encouraging "free discourse in ideas." The statement goes on: "We recognize this could quickly lead to expressions that are uncomfortable, even offensive, and that do not meet the standards of accuracy or fairness that we would use if we were publishing those same expressions in the printed newspaper."

In the printed newspaper, those expressions are screened beforehand and edited, which is not the case in the message boards. Online messages "must have their own standards," the statement explains, "appropriate to their medium."

Included in what is regarded as appropriate is language that would never appear in the printed newspaper. The message boards' philosophy is to "provide a 'clean, well-lighted place,' " but "even in a clean, well-lit place, cursing happens."

The boards' recommended practices acknowledge that "racists, bigots and those who spew hatred will try to participate," but the goal is to keep the boards "from being an effective platform" for such people.

To accomplish that goal, the Web site uses automatic language filters and a monitor who periodically reads the posts and has the authority to remove comments involving racism, stalking, harassment, threats of physical violence, incitement to riot, obscenity, pornography and other objectionable content. Online producers regularly do the same.

In fact, readers are invited to call to the attention of those monitors any post that they find objectionable.

That's a good-faith effort, but it strikes me as a little like editing unsuitable material out of the printed newspaper after it is delivered.

Having endured a couple of weeks of scathing comments -- many of which monitors already had removed -- a relative of Carlos Otero Jr. called the Sentinel to complain.

This is a sensitive issue -- not only because of the nature of the comments but also because of the newspaper's commitment to free expression. The Internet complicates the situation because -- unlike the printed newspaper, in which comments appear once -- message boards can remain available in perpetuity.

Weighing the elements, Anthony Moor, the associate managing editor who oversees OrlandoSentinel.com, decided that the issue had run its course and removed the Otero discussion from the Web site.

So the newspaper has broadened the definition of what it regards as acceptable for young eyes -- and done so specifically for a medium used by younger readers. And now the Sentinel is in the awkward position of deciding whether to preserve online comments that likely never would appear in its "family newspaper."

A Sentinel family conference may be in order.

After 19 years, Gerhard J.W. Munster, founder, publisher, and editor of the Winter Park/Maitland Observer and the Senior Observer, announced today (Jan. 4, 2007) that due to health reasons he will retire from his newspaper career. The January 4th, 2007 issue of the Winter Park/Maitland Observer and the January 2007 issue of the Senior Observer, will be the last issues published by Munster.

Kyle P. Taylor, an experienced magazine publisher and his wife Suzette, have acquired Winter Park Publishing, Inc., and will continue to publish both, the Winter Park/Maitland Observer and the Senior Observer.

Munster herewith expresses his gratitude to the faithful readers, advertisers and supporters of the newspaper. There will be no major changes at the newspaper, due to the acquisition.

The writings, stories, reviews and opinions of Carole Arthurs, Louis Roney, Chris Jepson, Roger Franklin Williams, the Winter Park City Column by City Manager James Williams and the Maitland City Column by either Mayor Douglas T. Kinson or City Manager Dean Sprague, editorial view by syndicated columnists Rich Lowry and Roger E. Hernandez, will all remain.

“My heartfelt THANKS!!! Go out to all those who have helped make this little voice of Winter Park and Maitland possible over the many years. A special “Thank You” goes to Carole Arthurs, Fern Schopfhauser and my wonderfully supportive wife Karen for putting up with me for such a long time! Time to move on – Happy New Year and good luck to all of you." says Munster.

The 2006 FPA Better Weekly Newspaper Contest is now accepting entries. Contest categories and circulation divisions have been designed to allow FPA monthly, semi-monthly, weekly, semi-weekly, and tri-weekly member newspapers to compete for the Better Weekly Newspaper awards.

One major change for the Better Weekly Newspaper Contest this year is the judging will be conducted by staff members of Florida newspapers, whereas previous years have been staff members from out-of-state newspapers. Last year the Hoosier State Press Association recruited judges from their member newspapers to decide the winners.

Each newspaper that submits an entry will be required to send at least one representative with newsroom experience to the judging. If a representative is not present, your contest entries could be disqualified. If a representative can not be provided, a written request asking to be excused due to hardship can be submitted. The contest rules define hardships that will be taken into consideration.

The FPA Better Weekly Newspaper Contest winners will be announced on Friday, June 22, 2007, at the FPA/FSNE Annual Convention at the Sawgrass Marriott Resort & Spa in Ponte Vedra, Florida. All entries must be postmarked by February 23, 2007.

Entry forms and contest rules can be downloaded at www.flpress.com.

For further information contact FPA’s Member Services Coordinator Thelma Givens at 850.521.1161 or tgivens@flpress.com.

The Associated Press Florida Legislative Planning Session will take place January 31, 2007 at 9:00 am on the 22nd floor of the capitol building. In attendance will be Governor Charlie Crist, Attorney General Bill McCollum and Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink. Also attending will be Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty to discuss Florida’s insurance crisis.

To attend or find out further details contact AP correspondent Brendan Farrington at 850.224.1211 or e-mail bfarrington@ap.org.

Following the session, the Florida Press Association and Florida Society of Newspaper Editors will sponsor a reception tentatively scheduled from 4:30 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. at the Park Plaza Hotel, 415 North Monroe St., Tallahassee.

The National Newspaper Association is calling for entries in its 2007 Better Newspaper Contest and Better Newspaper Advertising Contest, the premier national contests for community newspapers. “Each year we are incredibly proud to recognize the best in community journalism and advertising,” said NNA President Jerry Tidwell, publisher of the Hood County News in Granbury, TX.

Participation is limited to NNA member newspapers published Jan. 1 through Dec. 31, 2006, with one exception: web site categories, which are judged “in place.” There is no limit on the number of entries that may be submitted to the contest or in any one category.

All entries must be postmarked by Mar. 31, 2007. Each entry must be accompanied by a completed entry form and $20 entry fee. The rules and forms are available on NNA’s web site at www.nna.org/Contests/bncmain.html. Copies of the rules and entry forms will also be included in the January and February issues of NNA’s Publishers’ Auxiliary.

“The National Newspaper Association’s Better Newspaper Contest has made us a better newspaper,” says Larry Atkinson, publisher of the Mobridge (SD) Tribune and 2006 contest winner. “By competing with the best community newspapers in America each year, it continually raises the bar for all of us on the Mobridge Tribune staff to constantly strive to publish a better paper for our readers. It's our readers who benefit the most, but it also raises the morale of our staff by being recognized by our peers for our efforts. Everybody wins in that scenario," he said.

Early-bird incentive: Newspapers submitting contest entries postmarked by Mar. 1, 2007 will be given a chance to win one free registration to NNA’s Annual Convention & Trade Show and a ticket to the Toast to the Winners awards reception and ceremony in Norfolk, VA, Sept. 26-29, 2007.

Additional incentives: Newspapers that submit more combined entries to the 2007 BNC/BNAC than they did in 2006 will receive $5 in NNA Bucks per additional entry. Newspapers that did not submit any entries last year can receive $25 in NNA Bucks if they submit at least five entries

Contest bucks can be used toward the cost of your 2007 convention registration, to help pay contest entry fees in 2008, or to purchase NNA logo items or books. Contest records from 2006 will determine eligibility. Questions? Contact Sara Dickson at (573) 882-5800.

Established in 1885, the National Newspaper Association is the voice of America's community newspapers and the largest newspaper association in the country. The nation's community papers inform, educate and entertain nearly 150 million readers every week.

Contact Sara Dickson, Special Events Coordinator, Phone: (573) 882-5800 E-mail: saradickson@nna.org

The Gainesville Sun will launch a free weekly tabloid full of community submissions from west Gainesville on Thursday.

The Gainesville Voice will be delivered to 12,000 homes that do not subscribe to The Sun and will be available at about 30 stores.

Distribution and content will cover the area from about 13th Street to past Jonesville.

"We think it will fill the need for both the readers and the advertisers in west Gainesville that's not currently being met," said Gainesville Sun Publisher Jim Doughton.

The editor of the Voice is Marina Blomberg.

The weekly will include some staff reporting. Blomberg is asking people to submit photos and news that they would like to read, including school news, community events, recreational sports, neighborhood issues and personal news such as winter vacations.

"We invite anyone and everyone in the community to contribute what they think is important, that a community newspaper ought to be publishing," she said. "It's important news, but there's not always room for it in the mainstream newspaper."

Submissions can be sent through www.gainesvillevoice.com.

The Sun also publishes The Gainesville Guardian, an east Gainesville weekly, and Gainesville Magazine.

Since 1973, Blomberg has been a reporter, most recently in business, as well as the former editor of The Sun's Neighbors section. Her "In the Garden" column will continue to appear in The Sun.

The passing of President Gerald Ford stirred up memories for a former Charlotte County publisher.

Corbin A. Wyant, former publisher of the Daily Herald-News, was a guest of Ford at the White House 30 years ago. Then 40 years old, he and 14 other Florida publishers were invited to Washington, D.C., to discuss a number of issues.

It was the first and only trip to the White House for Wyant, who said the cordial welcome in the nation's capital caught him off guard.

"It was kind of surprising how casually we were all admitted," he said.

Wyant gave his impressions of the trip in a story he wrote in the March 4, 1976, edition of the Herald-News, a predecessor of the Charlotte Sun. In the story, he acknowledged the chilly temperatures by saying he "unwisely" left the warm liner of his raincoat in Port Charlotte.

"I would imagine the security today, the credentials you need to get in, would be incredibly rigid," he recalled Friday. "But by my recollection, it was kind of causal at that time. We got checked in at the gate and we kind of strolled on in. It was a simpler time in America."

The chief topic discussed with Ford in the meeting was Social Security, he said. At the time, the president and Alan Greenspan, then-chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, opposed lifting a cap on the limit a Social Security recipient could earn.

"They thought the cost of doing that to Social Security would be prohibitive, and they pretty much ruled it out," Wyant said.

Wyant said he was impressed with how Ford carried himself and how welcoming he was to a group of publishers who would ordinarily not be welcomed to the White House.

"He was just unpretentious, unassuming, everything you would expect from what reporters have said about his character," Wyant said. "He had real humility. He was strong, but he had humility."

But the trip to the White House wouldn't be the only time Wyant met Ford. Years later, Ford co-hosted a reception for a development that opened in Naples. Again, the two crossed paths.

Wyant said those two meetings certainly left an impression on him.

"I think he was a good president, and in many respects it's too bad that he didn't get to serve more years than he did," he said.

He said he felt pardoning former President Richard Nixon was what ultimately cost Ford the race against Jimmy Carter in 1976.

"History now seems to reflect that as having been an appropriate thing to do, because it stopped the agony that the country was going through," Wyant said of Ford's pardon for Nixon.

Wyant currently resides in Naples. He remains on the Board of Directors of the Sun Coast Media Group Inc., parent company of Sun Newspapers.

In 2002, he became the first president of the newly revived Florida Press Foundation and continues to actively serve as its president today.  In 2006, Corbin Wyant was inducted into the Florida Newspaper Hall of Fame which is sponsored by the Florida Press Association.

Naples Daily News-owned Web sites were named finalists in six of nine categories in the Newspaper Association of America’s Digital Edge Awards.

The newspaper’s six nominations were more than any other new media outlet in the competition. The Washington Post and the Star Tribune in Minneapolis followed with four nominations each.

NaplesNews.com, the electronic version of the Daily News, is in the running for best overall news site for papers with a circulation of less than 75,000, the Newspaper Association of America announced last week. Its competition: the Bakersfield Californian’s Bakersfield.com and the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World.

The Digital Edge Awards, known as the “Edgies,” were founded a decade ago to recognize excellence in the emerging industry of multimedia journalism. Winners of the 2007 competition will be announced Jan. 28 in Las Vegas.

Many newspapers have struggled in recent years with declining circulation as readers turned to the Internet in droves to get information.

Although the Daily News’ print product was one of the few in the country bucking that trend, the newspaper sought to improve its online offerings in 2005. That year, the Daily News hired Rob Curley, a rising Internet star at the Journal-World, to head the paper’s expanded new media operation.

The newspaper made “tremendous strides” to improve its Web offerings under Curley’s leadership, said Daily News Publisher John Fish, who worked with Curley previously at a paper in Kansas.

“We’ve made tremendous strides in the two-plus years I’ve been here,” Fish said. “We’ve made a lot of different improvements mainly by expanding our product portfolio through a wide variety of platforms.”

Adhering to Curley’s “hyperlocal” philosophy, those changes included the creation of an online guide to local restaurants, a redesign of NaplesNews.com that placed more emphasis on reader contributions and an interactive database of housing sales records for an affordable housing series.

The campaign resulted in several Edgie nominations. In addition to the “best overall” category, NaplesNews.com received nods in most innovative multimedia storytelling for its Studio55 Vodcast, most innovative visitor participation for the “Paradise — At What Cost?” housing database, best advertising program for Prime Home Builders’ expandable ad and best local shopping and directory strategy for the restaurant guide.

CoastalBeat.com, a Daily News entertainment site, was nominated in the best local guide or entertainment site category.

The Daily News isn’t resting on its laurels, Fish said.

Another redesign is in the works for NaplesNews.com. Future news stories will incorporate more new media elements, such as video, audio sound bites and interactive databases. And the new media department, which has operated largely as a separate entity, will be merged with the paper’s newsroom in an effort to allow certain responsibilities to be shared.

Fish declined to elaborate on the specifics of the reorganization, saying it would be premature to do so.

Sale of Frisbie Publishing Co., Inc. - publishers of The Polk County Democrat, The Lake Wales News, The Fort Meade Leader, and Polk County Times - to Sun Coast Media Group, effective Jan. 1, was announced this morning to the staffs of the newspapers.

All members of the staffs will keep their present jobs, and S. L. Frisbie, IV, and his wife, Mary G. Frisbie, will remain with the company for at least three years.

Derek Dunn-Rankin, president of Sun Coast, and his son, David, who is publisher of the Sun Coast papers, were present for the announcement, and said no immediate changes in the newspapers are planned. Sun Coast has its corporate headquarters in Port Charlotte, and publishes community newspapers in the Gulf Coast area.

In announcing the change in ownership, S. L. Frisbie said:

“Mary and I are immensely pleased at the prospect of becoming part of Sun Coast Media Group. Derek Dunn-Rankin has been a friend of mine for some 30 years through our mutual membership in the Florida Press Assn. The Dunn-Rankins publish some of the finest community newspapers in Florida, and they have the awards to prove it.

“When our children told us several years ago that they were not interested in going into the newspaper business, Mary and I looked around at our options, and decided that we would like to see Derek's organization own our papers some day.

“We have received several purchase inquiries over the years, both locally and from newspaper brokers, and we considered all of them, particularly the local inquiries.

“But we concluded that Sun Coast has the experience, the expertise, and the resources to meet the needs of our growing communities in the years ahead. We never ‘shopped the deal,' and have dealt exclusively with Derek and David and their key executive staff.”

The initial contact was made with Derek Dunn-Rankin - not surprisingly, at a Florida Press Assn. Convention - several years ago, and serious negotiations began late in August, shortly after The Democrat celebrated the 75th year of its founding on Aug. 28, 1931.

The Democrat was founded by S. L. Frisbie, I, and his son, S. Lloyd Frisbie. Ownership and management passed to their sons, Loyal Frisbie and Richard Frisbie, then to S. L. and Mary Frisbie.

The four generations of ownership of The Democrat by one family ranks in the greatest longevity of family ownership in Florida, and vastly exceeds the national average.

“When I talk about Sun Coast, I am talking about ‘us,' not ‘them,' ” Frisbie told the staff.

“As of the first of the year, I will purchase a significant amount of stock in Sun Coast, and at Derek's invitation, I will serve as a member of the board of directors for three years.”

Frisbie, now president of Frisbie Publishing Co. and publisher of the newspapers, will become associate publisher, reporting to Derek and David Dunn-Rankin. After the transition period is completed, he will devote most of his attention to the editorial and news operations of the papers.

Mary Frisbie, who is vice-president and treasurer of Frisbie Publishing, will report to Alan Walrond, chief financial officer of Sun Coast, and will be Sun Coast's primary contact for financial operations.

Early next year, Sun Coast will appoint a general manager from within its present ranks of employees, who will oversee advertising sales, circulation, production, and other business operations.

The Frisbies are taking part in the interview process, and will be given final approval authority over the selection.

In addition to founding The Democrat in 1931, Frisbie Publishing Co. established a Fort Meade edition - now The Fort Meade Leader - in 1969, created Polk County Times, a monthly niche publication for employees of county government, in 1994, and purchased The Lake Wales News in 1998.

The Bartow, Lake Wales and Fort Meade publications have a combined distribution of about 9,000. Polk County Times is distributed free to some 11,000 employees of Polk County government and the school board.

Sun Coast publishes the local daily newspaper, The Sun, in Charlotte, DeSoto, Englewood, and North Port, with a combined circulation of about 40,000, and publishes the Venice Gondolier Sun three days a week, with a circulation of about 12,000.

The company was established about 30 years ago.

Both Derek Dunn-Rankin and S. L. Frisbie are past presidents of the Florida Press Assn., and presently serve on the board of its educational foundation.

Dunn-Rankin was inducted last year into the Florida Press Assn. Hall of Fame, and was the second person honored with the Mayborn Leadership Award of the Southern Newspaper Publishers Assn. He was recently named Punta Gorda Rotary Club's Man of the Year.

Frisbie was named Bartow Lions Club's Citizen of the Year several years ago, and received Bartow Rotary Club's Medal of Honor for service outside of his vocation.

View this article at:
http://www.polkcountydemocrat.com/articles/2006/12/15/news/01asale.txt

Florida Keys Community College President Bill Seeker has rescinded a Dec. 4 letter canceling all advertisements, printing contracts and most subscriptions with The Citizen in retaliation for its news coverage, but the legal battle over Seeker's action continues.

U.S. Southern District Judge James Lawrence King set an emergency hearing for 10 a.m. Tuesday (Dec. 19, 2006) in Miami. Cooke Communications, owner of The Citizen and weekly Solares Hill and the Free Press newspapers, is seeking an injunction to deter future retribution.

"When a government agency is doing something that is illegal, then they just voluntarily stop, the law says there's no way to know if they're going to do it again," said Cooke Communications attorney Robert Rivas of Sachs Sax Klein in Tallahassee. "The fact that they say they're not going to do it again is not enough. We're entitled to a judgment that says they cannot do it."

John Kent Cooke Jr., publisher of Cooke Communications, said the principle behind the lawsuit transcends money matters.

"We will continue to defend our First Amendment right to provide readers with valuable information that matters to them without the threat of retribution from publicly funded institutions," he said. "This is a serious matter and one that cannot be treated casually, as Mr. Seeker has, by simply stating that he has changed his mind."

In his first letter, Seeker said the college no longer would support newspapers that "choose to trash our institution with unbalanced news, editorial spin and blatant disregard for our professional employees." The Citizen has quoted only people at public meetings who spoke negatively of the college, and failed to cover its graduation for three consecutive years, he wrote.

The Citizen responded to the Dec. 4 letter with the lawsuit, which Cooke said the company will pursue.

"Mr. Seeker's attempt to penalize The Citizen for reporting the news is an effort to quash our newspaper from fulfilling its responsibility to readers," Cooke said. "It is an attack on the freedom of the press. It's an attack on the people of Monroe County, who depend on The Citizen and its related newspapers to accurately, fairly and objectively report the news."

In his second letter, Seeker said he had reconsidered his position.

"Please understand that my decision to maintain our business relationship in no way reflects a change in my opinion that responsible journalism requires balanced reporting with regard to the college," Seeker wrote.

Cooke said The Citizen has, and will continue, to write objective news stories.

"Not only has Mr. Seeker made an attempt to intimidate The Citizen by withdrawing funds from a public institution, but the points he made in his letter are false. The Citizen and its sister publications have presented all sides fairly in their coverage of the college."

Seeker did not respond to phone messages Thursday seeking comment.

Beginning January 1st, Florida Newspaper Advertising Network will be moving their advertising schedule processing to National Newspaper Placement Services (N2PS), a Florida Press company. Ad placement has previously been handled by Associated Press Advantage. N2PS has already placed advertising for Florida Lottery as of December 1st, however additional accounts will not be moved over until the first of the year.

A letter is being furnished to Advertising Directors and Account Executives at newspapers receiving ads from Florida Newspaper Advertising Network. It is requested that newspapers establish an entirely new account number for each Florida Newspaper Advertising Network client to have invoicing and tearsheets sent to…

Florida Newspaper Advertising Network c/o National Newspaper Placement Services
Accounts Payable
2636 Mitcham Drive
Tallahassee, FL 32308

All 2006 schedules (with the exception of Florida Lottery ads placed after December 1st) need to have invoices and tearsheets sent to:

Florida Newspaper Advertising Network c/o Associated Press Advantage
P.O. Box 980126
West Sacramento, CA 95798-0126

It is also requested that any 2006 discrepancies or unpaid balances be brought to the attention of Florida Newspaper Advertising Network before the end of December when the relationship with Associated Press Advantage will conclude.

Any questions can be directed to Robyn Robinson, Operations Manager of Florida Newspaper Advertising Network, 407.420.6109, or Scott Harding, Media Director of National Newspaper Placement Services, 850.521.1171.

Together, Florida Newspaper Advertising Network and National Newspaper Placement Services will continue to provide superior service to its advertising clients and the newspapers.

Florida Newspaper Advertising Network was incorporated in 1989 by owner newspaper Advertising Directors to provide a group sales platform to sell newspaper advertising as a package to prospects that were primarily buying television, radio, and shared mail. Acting as an extension of a newspaper’s sales team, Florida Newspaper Advertising Network has an express mission of presenting the benefits of advertising in Florida newspapers to selected prospective new advertisers.

National Newspaper Placement Services (N2PS) provides a complete solution for implementing a newspaper advertising campaign by region or nationwide. Newspaper owned and operated, N2PS was created in 2001 as a program of the Florida Press Service (FPS) to better recognize the national scope of its advertising services. FPS has been providing these services in Florida, and nationally, since its inception in 1958. FPS is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Florida Press Association, a nonprofit organization of weekly and daily newspapers and newspaper related businesses, founded in 1879.

Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernández Rundle has sent a letter to Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice R. Fred Lewis defending the practice of altering public court records as ''sometimes necessary'' to protect informants and investigations.

At the same time, however, Fernández Rundle told Lewis that she and other Miami-Dade court officials, including Chief Judge Joseph Farina, have agreed to change the way judges shield court proceedings involving informants.

''Any future practice will not include affirmatively falsifying docket entries,'' Fernández Rundle wrote.

The Miami Herald reported last month that judges and prosecutors in Miami-Dade have altered court records and kept secret dockets to disguise what was actually happening in court cases involving informants.

The paper found two cases, but more apparently exist.

Florida law makes it a crime for anyone -- including judges, clerks or ''other public officers'' -- to alter or falsify court records or proceedings. Offenders can be sent to prison for a year.

Miami First Amendment attorney Thomas Julin called Fernández Rundle's remarks to the chief justice "stunning.''

''It appears the state attorney is admitting that she and others in the judiciary have simply ignored a criminal statute that flatly prohibits the falsification of judicial records,'' Julin said.

"This is a classic example of individuals pursuing their own goals, which may well be legitimate law enforcement goals, but in the course of doing so, they have undermined the integrity of the public record.''

SUPPORTED BY LAW

Court spokeswoman Eunice Sigler said, "The assumption that the law has been broken in any instance is premature and unfounded. The practice of maintaining certain records related to ongoing criminal investigations as confidential is a long-standing practice that is supported by Florida law.''

Sigler said Farina ''agrees with the state attorney's office'' and considers the new procedures "a fair balance between access and public safety.''

Chief Justice Lewis is leading a statewide inquiry into the improper hiding of court records. He began it after The Miami Herald reported that hundreds of civil and criminal cases, mostly in Broward County, had been kept hidden from the public by judges and clerks.

Many of those ''super-sealed'' cases were found to be the divorces of politicians, judges, lawyers and high-profile businessmen, raising questions of favoritism.

In letters to Florida Bar officials, Fernández Rundle wrote that a proposal to require public hearings before sealing any court records ''would seriously impede investigative efforts'' and put informants in danger. The use of altered court records ''most often arises in narcotic or special prosecution cases,'' she wrote to Lewis.

Fernández Rundle said the Florida Prosecuting Attorneys Association shared her concerns.

The recommended rule changes by the Florida Bar would impose tough new requirements on those seeking to make civil or criminal court records confidential. They would also bar judges from hiding the existence of entire court cases.

Fernández Rundle told Lewis that altered ''portions of a criminal court file'' are a temporary measure to protect informants, employed only "during the period of cooperation -- generally three to six months.''

Judges, prosecutors and defense lawyers have participated in the practice and ''long believed that this technique is legal, necessary and appropriate,'' she said.

Some altered cases have stayed veiled much longer. On Saturday, The Miami Herald reported the case of informant Michael Scott Segal and how his allegations of murder and corruption were under unusual court secrecy for more than three years.

''A far more rare investigative tool,'' Fernández Rundle said, "has involved the creation of fictitious court documents at the request of law enforcement to aid in the most sensitive criminal investigations.''

USAGE SANCTIONED

She told Lewis an example is Operation Court Broom, a 1990s judicial corruption case in which high court justices sanctioned the use of phony documents.

With regard to both altering court files or creating fictitious documents, Fernández Rundle's letter complains that the proposed rule changes don't adequately "address either of those investigative scenarios.''

Nonetheless, from now on, Fernández Rundle wrote, proceedings involving potential informants in Miami-Dade will be kept temporarily confidential upon written authorization from judges.

Fernández Rundle said dockets would now show that such cases are 'scheduled for `status,' which is a correct representation because the status of the case is not final until the cooperating defendant has completed the terms of his or her plea agreement.''

Cooke Communications, owner of The Citizen, has filed a lawsuit against Florida Keys Community College to stop retaliation for its news coverage of the school.

College President Bill Seeker on Monday sent The Citizen a letter saying he immediately was canceling all advertising and printing contracts, and most subscriptions with the company's newspapers, which include the weekly Solares Hill and Islamorada, Key Largo and Marathon Free Press publications.

"After much consideration and debate with my staff, we have decided that the college can no longer support newspapers such as The Citizen, which choose to trash our institution with unbalanced news, editorial spin and blatant disregard for our professional employees," Seeker wrote.

He accused The Citizen of publishing one-sided stories, failing to cover the college graduation for three consecutive years, publishing the names of employees involved in sensitive personnel matters and quoting only those who criticize the college during board meetings.

Seeker's action amounts to retaliation and a violation of Cooke Communications' First Amendment right to publish newspapers without retaliation from a state agency, said Citizen attorney Robert Rivas, a First Amendment attorney with Sachs Sax Klein in Tallahassee.

"When a government agency withdraws its advertising from a newspaper, while specifically admitting that its withdrawal is a punishment for the government's disapproval of the newspaper's coverage, the courts at all levels in this country have held that that's a violation of the newspaper's basic constitutional right not to be punished by the government for what it publishes," Rivas said. "The law is so clear that I am sure Mr. Seeker did not seek legal advice before he wrote a letter admitting to such serious wrongdoing."

Rivas referred to a 1991 case in which Review Publications, owner of The Broward Review, sued Broward County Sheriff Nicholas G. Navarro for terminating county advertising of sheriff's sales and forfeiture proceedings as retaliation for stories about Navarro's office. A federal court awarded the publishing company more than $270,000 in compensatory damages and attorney costs, according to court documents. The U.S. Supreme Court later refused to hear Navarro's appeal.

In Seeker's letter, which was copied to college board members, county commissioners, city commissioners and top state, utility, school and law enforcement officials, he says the college spends more than $20,000 a year on business with Cooke Communications.

The publishing company filed its lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. It was assigned to Miami-based Judge James Lawrence King. It seeks an injunction to prohibit Seeker from "punishing" the newspapers for exercising their First Amendment rights.

"Mr. Seeker is pulling all college business from Cooke Communications due to his mistaken perception of biased news reporting," said John Kent Cooke Jr., publisher of The Citizen and the Free Press publications. "This action is a blatant violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and will not be tolerated."

A new study from Scarborough suggests that newspaper Web sites attract users who are more likely to spend significantly on online purchases than the average Internet user. The Scarborough study focused on the Web sites of five regional papers-- the Sacramento Bee, Houston Chronicle, Providence Journal in Rhode Island, Orlando Sentinel, and the Kansas City Star.

In each one of these markets, visitors to the newspapers' Web sites were more likely to spend at least $1,000 a year online than the average Internet user. They were also more likely to purchase specific items identified by Scarborough as market leaders in online sales--including airline tickets and travel reservations, books and clothing. They are also more likely to use Internet banking and other online financial services.

Florida's Sunshine Law may shine a little brighter on public records next year, courtesy of a new governor.

Officially, Gov. Jeb Bush has supported and even praised Florida's open records laws, among the strongest in the nation. In deeds, some experts say he fell short.

"There's just been a tone - more than a tone, actually - with the Bush administration, where access to government information seems more like a problem than a constitutional right," said Barbara Petersen, a lawyer and president of the First Amendment Foundation in Tallahassee.

The first of several disputes started on Bush's first day in office, in 1999. He called meetings with the Senate president and House speaker - the two other most powerful leaders in state government - and refused to let reporters attend. Bush's general counsel claimed that "from a purely legal point of view, the press had no right to be there today," but Petersen and others strongly disagreed.

In 2000, the Brechner Center for Freedom of Information at the University of Florida took note of another meeting with legislators where Bush barred the press. In 2001, he was criticized for giving notice of meetings with lawmakers via e-mail as the meetings were taking place. By the time reporters arrived, the meetings had already ended. And in 2005, Bush prevented reporters from attending a morning meeting where an overhaul of the public school system was being discussed, according to the center.

When Gov.-elect Charlie Crist takes office in January, "I anticipate fairly dramatic changes in the government's attitude toward public records," Petersen said.

Crist spokeswoman Erin Isaac said open government "was a priority for him as attorney general, and he does have a good record. And I don't think that any less should be expected" as governor.

Petersen said that when surveys of government compliance with open records laws during the Bush era resulted in scores by her organization of 57 and 58 percent, the proper answer from the governor should have been a scolding for a failing grade.

"But the governor was quoted in various news articles saying, 'Well, I think they did an OK job,'" she said. "That was very disappointing."

In any government many people take note of and follow the example set by leaders, she said.

During one of the surveys, Petersen sent an administrative assistant to ask various state agencies in Tallahassee for public records.

"She came back in tears, saying, 'Do not ever make me do that again, or I will quit my job,'" Petersen said. "They were so hostile. It's like every public records request is met with suspicion."

Bush takes every single public records request seriously and his office works diligently to fill requests as quickly as possible, spokeswoman Kristy Campbell said.

Petersen said that her belief that Crist will do a better job isn't based on just wishful thinking.

"It wasn't just a perception, it was reality. He aggressively made open government a big part of his administration," she said, noting that her organization gave Crist a Friend of the First Amendment award. "It's not just convenient for Charlie Crist; he really believes this."

However, some experts noted that significant variations can exist within any administration. In Washington, there has also been much controversy over public records access under President Bush.

But "certain agencies are extremely good," said Alex Knott, the political editor for the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity. "Certain agencies are notoriously bad, and the IRS is one of those agencies."

In Florida, Gov. Jeb Bush noted in 2003 that technology also plays a role, since governments are custodians of large amounts of private citizen information.

The Internet has improved access to public records but has spurred "some questions of privacy" about the kind of data available, Bush said. "Those sometimes come into conflict with the public's right to know."

Bush has also questioned moves by other politicians to weaken the Sunshine Law. In 2001, for example, the Florida Senate voted to change its rules to permit committees to meet in secret on security and terrorism issues.

Even Bush questioned what need state Senate committees would have to vote in secret.

In the end, it came down to money.

The demise of the Pasco County News, a community newspaper with roots going back more than a century, may have been inevitable as readers turned to other sources for news, Publisher David Ernest said Wednesday.

"It's hard for newspaper people to give up on a newspaper. I'll tell you that now," Ernest said. "But if it had been anything other than a newspaper, we'd have shut it down sooner."

The paper will publish its final issue today (Nov. 30, 2006), ending a 102-year run - and a community institution.

The Pasco County News - formerly the Pasco News, Dade City Banner and Dade City Star - has covered the news and happenings of east Pasco since 1904.

At one point in the 1970s, it came out five days a week, complete with international and national news and a comics section, Dade City Commissioner Scott Black said. Black has been sifting through old articles from the Dade City Banner and its later incarnations for a personal history project about Trilby, where he grew up.

"It was one of those nice hometown newspapers - the way it was supposed to be," he said. As a high school student, Black submitted news about the clubs and organizations. The paper printed them verbatim, he said.

Just as the paper was a part of the community, its reporters, too, became local fixtures.

Mary Harman, 82, wrote about the comings and goings of Zephyrhills for 13 years. She wrote about city council meetings, keynote speakers at Kiwanis and Rotary Club meetings and people turning 100 - the stuff that makes a local paper truly local.

"I would guarantee you that 95 percent of what I write is positive. Too many papers and articles are negative," she said from the Heartland of Zephyrhills nursing home, where she is recovering from a broken leg.

Harman took her own photographs and became involved in the community, helping plan events such as the local hospital gala.

Zephyrhills Mayor Cliff McDuffie said he was disappointed to hear there would be one fewer reporter at Zephyrhills City Council meetings.

"I think they gave a very warm, local viewpoint for what was going on in Zephyrhills," he said.

Nostalgia, however, couldn't keep the newspaper alive. With a 50-cent cover charge - twice that of the weekday Tribune - and increased competition from several free weeklies, the News ran into trouble. In the past few years, the paper shrank from broadsheet to tabloid size, and its zoned sections - the Zephyrhills Sun and the Wesley Chapel Connection - were folded into the main section.

"This paper got a narrower and narrower focus," Ernest said. "If the newspaper doesn't change and it doesn't keep up over time, you can find yourself falling behind, and before you know it, you become something of a dinosaur."

Sun Publications, the Bradenton company that put out the Pasco County News, will continue to publish the Pasco Shopper, a free advertising publication. There also are plans to publish a Wesley Chapel-oriented advertising supplement with bits of local news, Ernest said.

"You just have to make a decision as to whether that business is worth a drag on the resources or reallocate those resources into something more viable," he said.

Reporter Nicola M. White can be reached at (813) 779-4613 or nwhite1@tampatrib.com.

The Florida Times-Union received a grand prize Thursday (Nov. 30, 2006) in The Florida Bar's 51st annual Media Awards for special reports about a state sex offender program with no final stage and a lack of oversight in the state's auto repair industry.

The award was given in the category of newspapers and other periodicals with circulation of more than 50,000.

Reporter Paul Pinkham wrote a two-day series about the Florida Civil Commitment Center, which houses 475 sex offenders who have served their court-imposed sentences but are sent to the Arcadia facility indefinitely for treatment under Florida's Jimmy Ryce law.

The judges said the extensive reporting for the story, published in April 2005, showed readers a well-meaning law doesn't always bring about intended results.

Reporter Jim Schoettler wrote a two-day series about problems consumers and shop owners face in the auto repair industry and the lack of investigators and other personnel needed for oversight of the state's more than 21,000 auto repair shops.

The judges noted how the stories, published in February 2005, led to legislation being introduced to increase staffing for the state's regulatory agency.

Of the award, Times-Union Editor Pat Yack said: "I am very proud of this work. One of our roles as a newspaper is to be a watchdog of government. These pieces shed a strong light on some very important local issues. I am pleased the judges recognized the high caliber of Jim and Paul's work."

Contributors to Pinkham's series included Assistant Metro Editor David C.L. Bauer and photographer Rick Wilson.

Contributors to Schoettler's series included Metro Editor Marilyn Young and photographers Bob Mack and Jon Fletcher.

In the ongoing race to hook Web readers with engaging features, newspapers are trouncing magazines, according to a study released late last week by Washington, D.C. PR agency The Bivings Group.

"In terms of online functionality, newspaper websites clearly outperform magazine websites, even considering all of the problems with the newspaper industry's general online strategy," the report said. "Despite the fact that magazines have succeeded in providing online content that enhances printed content, the availability of various Web 2.0 features on magazine websites was disappointing."

For the study, The Bivings Group analyzed the online offerings of the top 50 most circulated magazines in America to determine the degree to which the magazine industry is using the Internet.

Volatile circulation figures for magazines, coupled with aging readership and declining advertising dollars, place a greater emphasis on the online programs of these publications, as the report makes clear. "By embarking on more aggressive Web strategies that incorporate the technology of today's Web 2.0 environment, magazines can use expanded online readership to supplement print subscriptions."

Possibly the most disappointing finding, the report said, was the lack of reporter blogs employed by magazines' sites.

"Blogs are rapidly becoming a core component of the online habits of American Internet users, and are an easy and effective way to add personality and direct communication to any Web program," according to Bivings. "Therefore, it is a major oversight for 62% of America's top magazines to omit blogs from their online strategies."

In many other core categories--such as video, podcasts, and comments on articles--magazines consistently underperform compared to the Web sites of newspapers, according to Bivings.

Of the top 50 magazines, just 34% offer video content, 14% offer podcasts, and 8% allow users to comment on articles. These figures are dwarfed by the offerings of the top 50 newspapers.

The most popular Web feature for magazine Web sites, RSS feeds, is only offered by 48%--24 magazines--of the nation's top 50 magazines. In contrast, the most popular Web feature offered by the top 50 newspaper Web sites--reporter blogs--is offered by 92% of online newspapers. In addition, just three of the top 50 magazines--6%--used a system of tags for searching and organizing their Web sites: Popular Science, US Weekly, and Parenting.

Of the 50 most circulated magazines reviewed, the report singled out Time as a current model of excellence.

"Realizing that interest in its broad content, weekly news summary format is declining, Time has adopted an especially aggressive online strategy to buoy its readership base," Bivings observed. "While most other magazines use their websites as a supplement to their print editions, Time is one magazine that has the potential to go completely digital, leaving its print version behind."

One initiative taken by Time that was noteworthy was incorporating its content with sister company CNN.com. "This strategy has enabled Time to provide regularly updated news content online and a relatively advanced Web strategy." The Bivings Group also singled out Dennis Publishing's Maxim for its impressive use of the Internet.

Media General, Inc. (NYSE: MEG) announced today that it has entered into a strategic alliance with Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), joining the recently announced national consortium of newspaper companies to deliver search, graphical, and classified advertising to consumers in the communities where they live and work. The national alliance now has more than 200 newspapers.

Marshall N. Morton, president and chief executive officer, said, “We are delighted to deepen our relationship with Yahoo!, with whom we have collaborated on HotJobs in Tampa for over a year now.  This new opportunity will broaden our total online audience and provide us with enhanced technology to meet the growing needs of recruitment advertisers and job seekers.”

Media General will begin working immediately with Yahoo! to transition the online career sections of its 25 daily newspapers to a Yahoo! HotJobs-driven platform. Once the system becomes fully operational, Media General anticipates that all career-related advertising sold through its daily newspaper Web sites will also be posted on Yahoo! HotJobs for job seekers from across the country to access. The addition of Media General’s daily newspapers to the consortium creates one of the most comprehensive job networks in the country that can leverage one of the largest online audiences, new targeting capabilities and enhanced advertising power for its local recruitment customers.

“We have always offered the most active local marketplace for jobs, and now we can better serve local employers who also want national exposure. We can offer a full array of solutions for employers and job seekers, including local exposure in print and online and national exposure online. We can offer job seekers a full complement of advanced tools, such as resume posting and saved search features,” said Mr. Morton.

Neal F. Fondren, vice president of Media General and president of the Interactive Media Division, said, “Our visitors will benefit the Yahoo! state-of-the-art search and targeting features and user-friendly tools. Advertisers can also use contextual, streaming and interactive media to engage job candidates as well as leverage Real Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds, job search agents, newsletters and a job recommendation engine.”

Other members of the consortium are: Belo Interactive, Inc., Cox Newspapers, Inc., Hearst Communications Inc., Journal Register Company, Lee Enterprises, Inc., MediaNews Group, Inc. and Scripps Howard Publishing, Inc. Together with Media General, they will create a comprehensive network that spans more than 40 states.

Mainstream newspapers may be up against dwindling circulation and shrinking advertising revenues, but college papers have become hot commodities.

Spurred by research indicating that about 76 percent of the nation's 6 million full-time college undergraduates read their campus papers at least occasionally, big corporations and advertisers are latching onto student-run publications.

One of the most notable examples of the trend occurred in late summer, when a subsidiary of MTV, one of the country's best-known youth brands and part of the Viacom entertainment empire, purchased College Publisher, a company that runs Web sites for about 450 college papers - nine of them in Maryland.

So solid are the economic prospects for the student-run newspaper at Florida State University, FSView & Florida Flambeau, that it was acquired in August by a mainstream newspaper, The Tallahassee Democrat.

"There's no more local paper than a campus paper," said Dina Pradel, general manager of Y2M, which founded College Publisher in 1999. She said that while large urban newspapers are trying to woo younger readers, college papers have a ready-made audience of adherents, willing to read news about their immediate environment, and to be tempted by ads targeted to their tastes.

The typical campus audience they cater to, she said, is "a very attractive demographic," a group whose members will spend $1 million or more in buying things and services over a lifetime. While in college, many students will be making major first-time purchasing decisions - cars, insurance, electronics - a market advertisers dearly covet.

The health of campus papers is due also, in part, to the explosive growth of the Internet and of Web-based advertising, much of it aimed at the young. About 600 campus papers publish online editions, and advertisers have been quick to exploit their potential. Many campus newspaper Web sites now carry ads from national retail chains and other big-ticket companies.

And students are checking in. A recent survey by Student Monitor, which tracks the buying habits, concerns and activities of students nationwide, showed that, while students watch an average of 10 hours of television a week, they spend 15 hours a week online.

At the same time, college students are still reading the papers' print editions. A Student Monitor study says 76 percent of college students surveyed during the spring semester this year read one out of the previous five print editions of their campus paper. That number has remained roughly consistent for almost two decades, never dropping below the high 60s, said Eric Weil, managing partner of Student Monitor, which twice a year surveys 1,200 full-time students on 100 four-year campuses.

The difference now, he said, is that 38 percent of students regularly read an online edition of their campus paper, and they spend an average of 19 minutes doing so, Weil said.

"From a net readership standpoint, there's no question that the online versions have gained the papers' readers," Weil said. "In fairness to the Chicago Tribune and The New York Times, a college paper is free, and it's about me. For the students at the University of Pennsylvania, The Daily Pennsylvanian is a lot more relevant than The New York Times."

Mainstream newspapers like the Times are struggling to keep the readers they have. While many papers, including The Sun, have seen an increase in Web readers, newspapers' print circulations in general have dropped an average of about 3 percent in the last year. The decline has remained fairly consistent in recent years as the print media industry continues to be hit by competition from the Internet and other new forms of technology. In 1980, 62 million Americans read a daily paper. Last year, that number was down to 55 million.

Readers of campus newspapers, meanwhile, inhabit somewhat insulated ecosystems, with their own news, personalities and events, so that picking up a free copy or browsing for its content online is, for many students, almost automatic.

"We have a captive audience," said Brian Stelter, in his third year as editor of The Towerlight, at Towson University.

Stelter, who has gained renown tracking the television industry on his TVNewser blog, recalled being frustrated as a freshman when he kept seeing "a lot of papers still left on the racks."

No more. The Towerlight prints the same number of papers it did then - 10,000 copies, twice a week - but now they tend to vanish.

"That makes the circulation people happy," Stelter said. With Towson's student population of 18,000 expected to rise to about 25,000 in the next decade, the paper's role in campus life, he said, will rise, too.

"We might not be in print everyday in 10 years, but we'll be online everyday," said Stelter, who oversees 13 paid staff members, as well as a number of freelance writers. This semester, the paper began running Web-based classified ads, a crucial money-earner.

Towson University provides The Towerlight with free office space and Internet access, but the nonprofit paper's $250,000 in annual expenses is supported solely by advertising, said general manager Mike Raymond. Ads have increased in number in the last few years, he said, and so have costs.

"We aren't really growing in leaps and bounds, but we've been able to hold our own," Raymond said, "whereas mainstream papers seem to be losing their audience, to a degree."

This summer's purchase of Y2M, the parent of College Publisher, by the MTV subsidiary mtvU was a clear signal that big-money interests were looking with favor on college newspapers and their Web sites. In addition to providing online tech support to campus papers - as well as adding technologically complex features such as podcasts and video tools - College Publisher acts as an advertising agency, placing national ads on the papers' Web sites in exchange for a share of the revenue.

The student-run papers at nine Maryland institutions - Towson University, the College of Notre Dame of Maryland, Hood College, Morgan State University, Mount Saint Mary's College, Goucher College, Loyola College, the University of Maryland and the University of Baltimore - are supported by the College Publisher technology.

For the MTV subsidiary, the purchase of Y2M and its College Publisher unit was "an amazing opportunity to have a visceral connection with students," said Stephen Friedman, general manager of mtvU. "Advertisers are absolutely comfortable with the very well-lit space of a newspaper site where kids are creating journalism. That's where we realized there's a huge opening here in being able to contribute to that conversation, to students' ability to talk to each other in a brand that everyone is reading."

Friedman said his company is working with 150 national advertisers who are looking to connect with college students. "Advertisers understand that to get inside the college bubble, you need multiple touchpoints - on air, online, in the paper," he said.

Students "have a massive amount of buying power," said Jason Bakker, marketing director at Campus Media Group, a Minnesota-based marketing company that helps ad agencies reach high-school and college students.

Given many students' relative inexperience with what Bakker calls first-time "buying dilemmas," they are prime targets for advertisers. "It's a really great entry point for national advertisers to introduce them to a brand or service and hopefully build brand loyalty at an early stage," Bakker said. "The audience is relatively pure, in the sense that a brand can be pretty much assured they're going to reach their target [demographic]."

At Florida State University, the audience of the twice-weekly FSView & Florida Flambeau was evidently desirable enough for The Tallahassee Democrat, owned by the Gannett Co., the country's largest newspaper chain. The student paper's editor, Brandon Mellor, said the paper's purchase by the big local daily this summer "came as a shock," on the very day the deal was consummated, and that there were fears on campus "that the Democrat would take over" the student body's singular voice.

"It isn't true and it won't be true," said Mellor, a 22-year-old senior who oversees 14 editors and about 25 writers, all students. "It's not that big a deal in the long run. The only thing is that we get paid a little differently, but there's no input as to what we run in the paper."

So why was he told the takeover by the Democrat had occurred?

"They felt they weren't reaching the college audience," Mellor said. "They saw it as a way to reach that audience and make some money at the same time."

Monster, a global online career and recruitment resource and flagship brand of Monster Worldwide Inc., and Freedom Communications, a privately owned diversified media company that owns the Northwest Florida Daily News, Monday announced an alliance to bring recruitment services to all of Freedom’s newspaper, television and online brands across the country.

By partnering with Monster, Freedom provides advertisers with powerful recruitment tools that streamline the hiring process and provide access to the world’s largest resume database, ensuring access to top talent nationwide.

Additionally, Freedom will now offer job candidates hundreds of thousands of diversified jobs nationwide with valuable career advice and guidance.

“Combining the local strength of Freedom newspaper and TV brands nationwide with the power of Monster will provide local employers with superior reach, a best-in-class solution and results that meet their employment needs,” said Michael Mathieu, president of Freedom Interactive.

“This is the first step in an overarching strategic initiative to significantly enhance the products and services offered by all online Freedom properties nationwide,” he said.

Doug Klinger, president of Monster North America, said, “Monster continues to pursue small and medium-sized businesses as one of our major areas of growth, and media alliances help us solidify and grow our presence in the regions where these organizations are based.”

This relationship is designed to benefit consumers and employers alike. Consumers get a complete online solution offering a local focus with industry-leading search and match technology.

Employers benefit from the easy availability of an end-to-end recruitment solution that utilizes print and online advertising components. Businesses can also access the industry’s resume database, which attracts approximately 40,000 new resumes each day from across the country.

Additionally, the hiring and talent management tools offered through the Freedom-Monster program help recruiters and hiring managers save time.

The Freedom classified advertising network will extend into 16 states, giving advertisers and consumers access to the job market from the east to west coast. Monster’s employment product will first be launched across Freedom newspapers in Orange County, Calif., Colorado Springs, Colo., and Mesa, Ariz., by the end of December.

The remaining Freedom newspapers are targeted for launch by the end of March 2007, with the company’s TV stations expected to launch by the end of June.

The Pulitzer Prize Board announced today (Nov. 27, 2006) that newspapers may now submit a full array of online material-such as databases, interactive graphics, and streaming video-in nearly all of its journalism categories.

The board also announced that a category called Local Reporting will replace Beat Reporting as one of the 14 prizes in journalism.

All changes will apply to work done in 2006 for prizes awarded in 2007. The Pulitzer Prizes each year are administered at Columbia University.

Last year, the board for the first time allowed some online content in all categories. However, with the exception of the Public Service category, the online work was limited to written stories or still images.

Now, an assortment of online elements will be permitted in all journalism categories except for the competition's two photography categories, which will continue to restrict entries to still images. The Pulitzer categories range from investigative and international reporting to commentary, editorial writing, and cartooning.

"This board believes that its much fuller embrace of online journalism reflects the direction of newspapers in a rapidly changing media world," said Sig Gissler, administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes.

In two categories, Breaking News Reporting and Breaking News Photography, the board will continue to allow an entry consisting entirely of material published on