Fiery journalism in Española

by
By Robert Trapp, Publisher
Rio Grande Sun, Espanola, NM
Published Thursday, March 12, 2015
Reprinted with permission

It’s challenging to operate your own business, especially in Española. A scientific survey fictionalized for this editorial states 5 percent of our population creates 99 percent of the problems we all have to tolerate to live here. That 5 percent keeps law enforcement and a good newspaper in business, in spades. But it’s a double-edged sword.

We know there is a portion of the population that doesn’t like what we do here. A nice quiet chamber of commerce cheerleader that runs press releases, without asking questions, is more to their liking. Those readers don’t want to know how badly the schools are doing, lack of city services, problems in police departments and county job bids that are illegal and padded.

That would be so easy to do. We could operate on half the reporters and they’d require no news writing education, training or experience.

But that’s not what we do. We do what journalists everywhere used to do, before bowing to advertisers, money, pressure and threats and the easy road. When a newspaper informs readers in such a manner, whether they wish to be informed or not, certain risks come with that, including bullet holes in windows, occasional paint-balling and the ever-so-popular rocks.

But to start a fire? Understanding the anger or the arsonist’s lack of ability to cope with a problem is just beyond all of us here at the Rio Grande SUN. Richard Beaudoin states it very well in his letter on page A7 (of the Sun): write a letter, come talk to us or start your own cheerleader and print what you want.

(Read Trapp’s complete editorial here) http://bit.ly/18HX3MF

Original link…

http://www.riograndesun.com/articles/2015/03/12/opinion/editorials/doc5501b60880ad9388407895.txt