Paper’s focus close to home

Question: Why, for the past several days, has the front page been filled with mostly local news? We thought the Regional section was for local/regional stories. We look to the front page for just a clue on what’s happening on the international and national front. — Dave Christiansen and Jane Kennedy, Elk, Wash.

Answer: Our main focus is on local and regional news. We cover news, sports, business and features in the Spokane and North Idaho area because that’s where our readers live, work and play. Our readership surveys consistently show us that readers rank local news as their No. 1 interest and they expect us to provide extensive local coverage.

We also feel it is important to provide readers with a healthy amount of national and international stories. I would argue that we provide more national and international news than your letter acknowledges. We do in fact place many important national and international stories on the front page every day.

Our local report is what distinguishes us from any other paper in our circulation area. Our reporting is thorough, wide ranging and sophisticated. We don’t ignore the major developments on the national or international front, but we’ll always give local news the home field advantage when it comes to story selection, story placement and staff resources. — Gary Graham, managing editor

Need more valuable interaction

Question: I have had a chance to read the blogs at the S-R Web site. And, quite frankly, the “Ask the Editor” stuff is not very interesting. I think most well-read people have a general idea of how a newspaper works, why it prints what it prints, and why it doesn’t print some things. Most often, the people who write to that site are actually asking, why you did or didn’t do this certain offensive thing. It is a more “how dare you” type interaction.

This community doesn’t need that kind of exposure. It is an open invitation for the uniformed and “logic-impared” members of the community to parade their ignorance in front of your readership. Witness your letters to the editor section, which I have contributed to in the past.

I think it gives some people the impression that the paper is trying to be “fair and balanced” by publishing those opinions. Of course that is false. If some type of screening or even solicitation of truly informed individuals was instituted, it would be valuable, instead of the circus it now is. — S. Bergstrom, Spokane

Answer: Actually, I find some of the interaction on this blog to be relatively thoughtful.

But the more important issue raised by the writer is whether or not we should screen or limit comments to this blog and letters to the editor for intelligence and quality of thought. That’s not a role I want.

Our letters columns are messy, noisy and confused — and sometimes thoughtful, articulate and purposeful. But ideas I find ludicrous, comments I find silly or stupid will resonate with someone else who finds them valuable.

The letters columns are not built to make us look fair and balanced. They are there to give people a voice and we do our best to give those voices freedom to be profound or silly, thoughtful or thoughtless. — Steve Smith, editor

Who writes wire headlines?

Question: I am curious as to whether the editors sometimes revise wire submission headlines? There have been mornings when wire story headlines have been outrageously editorial. If too blatant, do review editors ever modify them? — Terry Lamb, Sagle, Idaho

Answer: We write the headlines to all the content in our newspaper, even content provided by our wireservices and syndicates. Some services will offer suggested headlines or so-called “slug lines” that summarize a story. But on-the-page headlines are written by our copy editors as they piece the paper together at night. If a headline is off the mark in some way, it’s our responsibility. — Steve Smith, editor