What Sunshine?

Vermont's major news outlets have been surprisingly unwilling to editorialize or report on the news event that is the hottest topic of conversation in every one of their newsrooms—the firing last week of Chris Graff as Vermont bureau chief of the Associated Press. Notably, the Burlington Free Press and the Rutland Herald /Times-Argus group have hewn to the AP's line that this was a mere "personnel issue" and was entitled to secrecy, we mean privacy. No, we mean secrecy.

But this is not a privacy issue. The AP has nearly a monopoly on providing national and international news to small papers. How the AP reports the news, and what policies it dictates to its top reporters are clearly matters of important public concern. The abrupt firing of Graff, a non-controversial, highly respected and likeable font of Vermont lore and considered judgment for 27 years, is huge political and social news. Vermonters have a clear right to know what was behind the story.

The Valley News did one good piece of reporting, and the Brattleboro Reformer wrote a strong editorial, but generally the best reporting has come from two Vermont weekly newspapers—from Peter Freyne's column in Seven Days and from Shay Totten's all-Vermont newcomer weekly, The Vermont Guardian.

It is generally accepted that the immediate reason for Graff's firing is that he put out on the AP wire an opinion column by Sen. Patrick Leahy, which was written as a comment on "Sunshine Week." The column strongly condemned the Bush Administration's retreats from public openness. The column was clearly labeled as an opinion column, as opposed to AP's usual hard news. AP withdrew it from circulation within an hour, though a Leahy column on the same topic had been accepted the previous year. Nobody's saying whether the column episode was the culmination of various differences between Graff and his AP bosses, or not. Nobody's saying anything, which is a sad state of affairs for a news organization and a reporter.

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Strangely, the best and most fearless comments have come from politicians—in a letter to AP signed by Vermont's governor and the entire Congressional delegation. With thanks to the Vermont Guardian for supplying the text of the letter, here is part of that letter:

"Along with our Vermont constituents, we are stunned, outraged and saddened by the summary dismissal this week of longtime head of AP’s Vermont Bureau, Chris Graff.

"…The public has placed its trust in AP and, in turn, the public expects a degree of openness from AP that has not been forthcoming. Accordingly, we expect a substantive response to our requests.

"…By any appropriate measure, Mr. Graff has been fair, objective, public-spirited, courageous and dedicated to the public’s right to know the truth. He has been a tremendous credit to AP in Vermont and beyond.

"…There have been many reports suggesting the reasons for Mr. Graff’s abrupt termination. Although we choose not to fuel speculation, we believe that if any of these reports were founded, it would represent a serious breach of trust by AP with its loyal Vermont readership. If AP wants to repair this rift, it must work to clear the air — to let the sunshine in — on this most unfortunate conclusion.

"We support Chris Graff’s immediate reinstatement, if that is what he would want. Beyond that, we also ask for answers to questions that continue to proliferate in the wake of this decision.

"Chris Graff is the personification of the great attributes of good journalism: professionalism, courage, steadiness, and public service by honoring the public’s right to know. We would like to believe that attributes like these, lived day-to-day by devoted reporters like Chris Graff, will never go out of style."

The letter was signed by Sens. Patrick Leahy and Jim Jeffords, U. S. Rep. Bernie Sanders, and Gov. Jim Douglas. We thank them for standing up to be counted.