Hi everyone,

	Kaye Spector

 

Every year, SPJ's Region 4, which includes Ohio, holds a regional conference where journalists can spend a day or so sharpen their writing, editing and reporting skills.

 

This year, Region 4 (Ohio, Michigan, Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia) and Region 5 (Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky) partnered to hold a joint regional conference in Cincinnati April 1-2. I was a member of a 12-person committee that met throughout the late fall and winter by phone to plan the event.

 

This is the first time I'd been involved in planning such a large event, and it was a wonderful experience. It was so exciting to see it all come together: 14 panels, 48 speakers, 27 sponsors and nearly 200 registrants.

 

A highlight for me was a panel discussion (see photo below) on how cameras are impacting law enforcement and newsgathering, and how police, prosecutors, attorneys and journalists - not surprisingly! -- have widely varying views on whether dash-cam, body-cam and surveillance camera footage should be immediately available to reporters and others. Several panel members argued such recordings are investigatory and, as such, can -- and should -- be withheld from the public until the police investigation is completed. Journalists will need to stay vigilant on this issue as technology continues to take us to places we haven't been before.

 

Also of interest was the silent auction organized by the industrious SPJ student chapter at John Carroll University (see photo below). Assisted by SPJ Cleveland board member (and John Carroll University assistant professor of communication) Carrie Buchanan, the students raised $500 for the Student Press Law Center, after paying back their expenses. The students gathered items for bidding, publicized the auction with social media and website postings of donations before the conference, set up the tables with the items and bid sheets, then took turns supervising the auction and attending sessions with help from University of Cincinnati student Huy Nguyen. Congratulations to the John Carroll Campus Chapter for a successful effort and thanks to all the chapters and individuals who contributed items.

 

As a side note, I would like to give my heartfelt thanks to the dozen or so Cleveland-area journalists who helped the Cleveland Pro Chapter recently by volunteering to judge the many entries for the Press Club of Long Island's annual journalism awards. The Ohio SPJ chapters in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati belong to a pool of professional journalism groups that help judge each other's annual contests.

 

Many thanks to current and former journalists Tom Breckinridge, Stan Bullard, Stacey Frey, Holly Hammersmith, Amanda Harnocz, Chris Hyser, Ellen Kleinerman, Michael Norman, Tom Moore, Chris Mosby, Harlan Spector, Lorrie Taylor, Natalie Trusso Cafarello and Sue Walton for their time and effort in supporting quality journalism.