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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Huckleberries Online

Spence: Schooled By Boise’s PR Pros

There is a certain sour-grapes snobbishness in the news industry toward our colleagues who trade in their press badges for cushy public relations jobs. Yes, we're jealous of the better hours, much better pay and less-intense daily pressures we think they enjoy. But we also comfort ourselves with assurances that our constitutionally protected role as public watchdogs is a nobler path. It may never earn us free drinks or adoring looks, but it certainly has more cachet than being an anonymous shill for some agency or special interest group. That said, the older I get and less I earn, in inflation-adjusted terms, than I did gutting salmon in my college years, the more my resistance wavers. Fortunately, should I ever sell out and cross the public relations divide, my time at the Idaho Legislature will not have been wasted. The Dark Side skills I've observed here beat anything I could have picked up in grad school/William L. Spence, Lewiston Tribune. More here.

Question: Do you think there's anything wrong with a career in public relations?



D.F. Oliveria
D.F. (Dave) Oliveria joined The Spokesman-Review in 1984. He currently is a columnist and compiles the Huckleberries Online blog and writes about North Idaho in his Huckleberries column.

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