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The Rocky Mountain News expects to soon be an official sponsor of the Jefferson County public schools under an agreement that calls for the newspaper to provide everything from high-school journalism workshops to commencement speakers. In return for $95,000 a year for the next five years, the News will get to advertise in district sports stadiums and school gyms and will be able to make subscription pitches to students and their parents.
But that agreement has raised eyebrows among media watchdogs, who see it as a blatant conflict of interest for a daily newspaper that is supposed to impartially cover the school district on a regular basis. The deal may also bring up constitutional issues, because rival newspapers such as the Denver Post may challenge the agreement if it excludes them from public facilities.
Linda Sease, vice president of marketing at the News, says she can’t give specific details about the agreement because it’s still being negotiated. But she makes it clear that the News sees the sponsorship deal as a golden opportunity to reach new readers in a district with 88,000 students, the largest in the state.
“There are all sorts of opportunities for selling the paper in the schools,” says Sease. “There are some very unique things we can do together.”
Besides advertising in the schools, the News will be able to peddle subscriptions to students and will also participate in school fundraising projects. The News’s editorial staff will meet with student reporters and editors at each high school to critique school newspapers and will sponsor a district-wide journalism day for students. The agreement also calls for the News to provide speakers for high-school commencement ceremonies.
All of that is enough to make one local journalism professor see red.
“The whole thing gives you reason to pause, and it may make the hair on the back of your neck stand up,” says James Brodell, a professor of journalism at Metropolitan State College.
Brodell says sponsorship agreements like this one can create conflicts of interest that could influence how a newspaper covers the news. He points out that the Jeffco schools will ask voters to approve a $174 million bond issue this fall, and the News will be covering that proposal.
“I’d hate to think the Rocky would soft-pedal its coverage of that because of this agreement,” says Brodell. “In the stories I see, they seem to take everything the administration says as gospel.”
Sease insists the deal will have no impact on the News’s coverage of the school district. She says the newspaper also has sponsorship agreements with Elitch Gardens, Colorado’s Ocean Journey aquarium and the Colorado Rockies, and she claims those agreements have not affected the paper’s news coverage.
“The Rocky Mountain News is part owner of the Colorado Rockies, yet every day we write things that don’t please them,” says Sease. “That hasn’t prevented us from covering the Rockies in an unbiased manner.”
The News’s involvement with the team did become controversial in 1990, when metro Denver voters were asked to approve the sales tax that funded construction of Coors Field. The News was very pro-stadium in its coverage and editorials; the paper’s ownership stake in the new team was not disclosed until after the election. Brodell says the News has been a leader in forging questionable alliances with organizations it covers, even though such agreements are becoming more common in the newspaper industry.
“The News has pioneered this trend,” says Brodell.
Other Colorado newspapers are also trying to get into the sponsorship game. The News beat out the Denver Post, which had also been seeking a deal with the Jeffco schools.
The sponsorship agreement may also raise legal questions about whether or not a public school district can agree to restrict circulation of newspapers that haven’t cut a deal with the schools. Would the agreement forbid teachers in Jeffco from using the Denver Post in classroom instruction?
“That’s a question the attorneys have to answer,” says Sease. “There are legal issues both sides have to address. We’re not interested in not allowing the Denver Post to be in school libraries.”
School district officials also declined to give details of the proposed agreement, saying it is still being negotiated. But they acknowledge that any effort to stop the circulation of papers other than the News could be challenged in the courts.
“Right now we have all kinds of newspapers in the schools,” says district spokeswoman Marilyn Saltzman. “As we negotiate contracts with any vendor, we’re careful to safeguard the impartiality of the school district.”
The Jeffco schools already have a business relationship with Jeffco Publishing Company, which publishes the Jefferson Sentinel and several other weekly newspapers in the county. That firm publishes the Jefferson Schools Quarterly and the R-1 Messenger, which go to parents and staff in the district. That agreement has not affected news coverage, according to Saltzman.
“If you talked to the journalists who cover the district, they’d say the business side is separate,” she adds.
Saltzman says the proposed sponsorship agreement is part of the district’s effort to raise $8 million for a new sports stadium in north Jeffco. The school district has already inked a seven-year deal with Pepsi that should net more than $7 million, and US West has paid $2 million for naming rights to the new stadium. Many school districts around Colorado are forging similar agreements, allowing companies to advertise on school buses or stick their logos on football helmets.
Brodell says the most important issue is whether newspapers other than the News will still be distributed freely in the Jeffco schools.
“The critical point is, would they stop the other guy from circulating,” he says. “If they say, ‘You have to pay $95,000 to sell newspapers on public property,’ I’d have a real problem with that.”
Tom Botelho, the Post’s vice president for marketing, figures the News is primarily concerned with putting up its signs at gyms and stadiums. But the scope of the contract is also of some concern to him. “I don’t know if they think they can lock up the schools because they’re paying a lot of money,” he says. “They can’t do that. There are First Amendment rights involved.”
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