| Topics: Civic Communication St. Paul Pioneer Press
Peirce Report The Pioneer-Press commissioned author and syndicated columnist Neal Peirce and a team of urban affairs experts to study St. Paul and its future and to recommend a plan of action. The effort was financed with assistance from area foundations and the Knight Foundation, and developed in cooperation with Twin Cities Public Television. The result was published in November 1991 in a 16-page tab, focused on culture, leadership, and neighborhoods. It also was summarized in a 90-minute video report broadcast by the local PBS affiliate and discussed in three community forums, organized by civic groups and foundations. An ad hoc group of community leaders, organized by one of the foundations involved, is tracking the report and has taken it further. Related efforts included neighborhood candidates' forums during the 1992 mayoral election, organized and financed by the paper; a year-long editorial-page focus on positive neighborhood developments; and a series of 1993 forums about trends in city planning and governance, cosponsored by Macalester College, whose speakers included Peirce. In early 1994, the paper devoted its editorial pages for two weeks to riverfront development, prompting a mayoral conference that drew 1,200 citizens. A case study by Project on Public Life and the Press
New York University, Department of Journalism,10 Washington Pl.
New York, NY 10003, (212) 998-3793 © Project on Public Life and the Press,1994 The Project is funded by a grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. St. Paul Pioneer Press (newspaper)
345 Cedar Street
St. Paul, MN 55101-1057
(612) 228-5544 (phone)
(800) 950-9080 (toll-free)
(612) 228-5564 (fax) Ownership
Knight-Ridder
No. newsroom employees: 180 Circulation
219,000 (daily)
278,000 (Sunday)
Circulation Area (pop.)
Three Minnesota counties: Ramsey, Washington and Dakota; three Wisconsin counties: Pierce, Polk, St. Croix (800,000) Initiative
Peirce Report Dates
November 1991 Lead Editor
Ron Clark, editorial page editor Executive in charge
(If different from above)
Walker Lundy, editor When and how did this initiative get started?
When the city was adrift after the resignation of a strong, long-tenured mayor, Editorial Page Editor Ron Clark found his concerns about the city's direction were shared by leaders of two area foundations. They were willing to fund a project. The concern coincided with Knight-Ridder CEO James Batten's call for stronger community leadership roles. What are the goals of the initiative?
To initiate a productive dialogue about the community's future that could lead to more far-sighted action. What does the initiative entail?
Clark lined up foundation funding and the assistance of public broadcasters. Peirce and his team of two interviewed 75 area leaders to develop the printed and video versions of the report. During publication week, the video report was broadcast, the local Citizen's League co-sponsored two forums and one of the sponsoring foundations sponsored a third, featuring Peirce. How many people are working on it?
At the newspaper, Clark took primary responsibility for the report, though graphic artists, photographers and the usual design team saw the project through publication. What does it look like in the newspaper?
The Peirce Report was published in four parts and reprinted in a 16-page broadsheet. Response to the Initiative In the newsroom:
Dismal. Newsroom staffers believed they could have produced a report as good as Peirce's, given similar resources. Lack of newsroom buy-in for a project initiated by the editorial page staff has hindered ongoing coverage of the recommendation in the report. Elements incorporated into regular newsroom routines and/or culture:
On the editorial pages, Clark initiated a year-long focus on neighborhoods, following a report recommendation, and has helped organize subsequent community issues forums. In the community:
Among opinion leaders, support for the project was generally solid. However, a Peirce criticism of the city's public employee union generated considerable controversy and in some ways overshadowed many other of its elements. Reaction among political leaders:
Following a central Peirce recommendation that St. Paul capitalize on cultural resources, the mayor established a commission to evaluate those resources. Chaired by the publisher of the Pioneer Press, the group recommended a 1/2-cent sales tax to improve the civic center and strengthen the cultural corridor. The tax took effect in late 1993. In 1994, concentrated editorial-page focus on riverfront development prompted a mayoral conference. Did any outside group pick up the newspaper's initiative and carry it further?
One of the funding foundations, and other interested parties in the community, organized an ad hoc group of leaders around the report. They produced an inventory of community needs, assets and liabilities and a series of benchmark studies. The St. Paul Chamber of Commerce placed a number of Peirce recommendations on its agenda, including plans to launch a trolley and the possibility of creating a cooperative university center to pool academic resources. Overall lessons - successes and failures:
Clark would push for early and extensive newsroom buy-in on any future projects, working more actively with the editor to "get it on their radar screens and keep it there." He also would include more area organizations to promote and organize dialogue around an initiative to make understanding of issues involved broader and deeper. Case study written by Lisa Austin, Assistant Director of the Project on Public Life and the Press, October 1993. Lisa is also a member of the CPN Journalism ditorial team. Update Public journalism is still an edit page "banner" with the rest of the paper apparently looking the other way. Skepticism persists among those who simply have not been drawn into the concept and its practice. Editorial Page Editor Ron Clark wonders if he, himself, should be more evangelistic at his paper, absent other leadership to make the case for public journalism. Clark continues to innovate on the editorial page. In early 1994, both editorial and op-ed pages focused for two weeks on riverfront development in St. Paul, an attempt to generate public interest on par with the engagement Twin City residents have with their lakes. This led the city's new mayor to hold a conference "on a Sunday in windowless conference room in St. Paul and 1,200 people came out," Clark recalls. The goal of the riverfront project, Clark explains, was to incorporate the journalism approaches of his editorial page into the daily life of the newspaper. "But we're not there yet," he says. "The project really did not advance us very much. We hope to do it more frequently. At least we have broken down many walls that once divided the community." Many citizens are calling and writing to ask why the paper doesn't do more similarly focused projects. Clark agrees with Kettering Foundation findings that citizens simply do not have enough places to gather information on issues. Clark believes newspapers can help provide such space; but, as with the Pioneer-Press, they do not do it often enough.
- RCN, 5/94 More Information Project on Public Life and the Press
New York University
Department of Journalism
10 Washington Pl.
New York, NY 10003
(212) 998-3793 Back to Communication Index | 
