EPA Compresses Press Access

One nice thing about being a reporter is that we usually get rather open access to a range of ordinarily closed venues—from the White House and various Cabinet level agencies, to behind-the-scenes settings at museums, university labs, industrial centers, control rooms in nuclear power plants, even the command center on ice breakers in the Arctic Ocean (yes, I was there, ferried to the deck on a Coast Guard chopper from Barrow, AK).

We also get an opportunity to ask questions—and usually are rewarded with answers—from newsmakers, like the Environmental Protection Agency Administrator, last Thursday. These events are called press conferences even though increasingly, the reporters who take part don't publish in materials that actually run through presses.

June 14th's press conference was a virtual one in every sense of the word. First, EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson wasn't in town, but on a farm in New England, and patched into reporters by phone. The reporters, similarly, didn't go to the event. We just dialed into a conference call to listen to a host of disembodied voices.

What was particularly weird about this one—on the launching of a study to sample air emissions from confined-animal-feeding operations, or CAFOs—was that it started on the dot at 12:15 p.m. EDT and ended 15 minutes later. Johnson was joined by three other individuals, including the Purdue scientist who was leading the study. All said a little to reporters.

Then, they opened the event to questions. But not many.

Each news organization, we learned, would be allowed one question. But not every news organization would get to ask one because after about five, time was up and they ended the press conference.

Mind you, they told us so little during the introduction, that most of the details had to be elicited, bit by bit, during our one-question-per-reporter access. And with time for few questions, little information was exchanged.

I've NEVER attended a news conference that was so brief and conveyed so little data.

Yes, I'm annoyed at the new limits on access to newsmakers. But the big loser is the public. We get to serve as its voice, asking the questions our readers or listeners would like to if they were here.

Of course, we were directed to check the agency's website for more info. But as one might expect, that information was limited and certainly didn't answer my questions. Less than a minute after the press conference ended, I was on the phone to EPA's news office to ask a public-information officer for more details. I was put into his voicemail, and got a call back long after I needed the information.

This isn't an isolated instance. I'd heard of this happening before from colleagues, but has thought they must be exaggerating the brevity of access. Even my husband, a reporter and bureau chief for a major energy publication, has encountered this phenomenon—the excessive truncation of news conferences.

Remember, it's the public that is really losing access here, and in this case to the people that are supposed to be their servants.

I think the real message is that public servants are short-changing we, the people, on service.