Kudos for Public Insight Journalism — and Cheese

“The Future of Journalism itself”: Minnesota Public Radio’s Public Insight Journalism got some national recognition last night. MSNBC wrote up the citizen-media project, calling it “the most advanced effort thus far in involving the audience in the news-gathering process,” adding that this kind of media “may well be a model for the future of journalism itself.” PIJ has a database of some 20,000 sources in the community, and these “analysts”/audience members can be tapped to comment on stories, generate story leads or convene smaller groups of citizens to discuss issues.

A cruel cut: The Star Tribune’s belt-tightening has hit the newsroom particularly hard — so hard that former politics reporter Dane Smith likens the brain drain brought on by two waves of buyouts to a lobotomy. But cost-saving efforts have cut much deeper: SaveTheStrib reminds us of the firing of four telephone switchboard operators, the sale of the employee parking lot to the Minnesota Vikings and the death of the charitable Star Tribune Foundation (which stayed in the hands of McClatchy when the paper was sold).

But City Pages reports on a particularly cruel cut. On Aug. 3, the paper will end an eight-year relationship with Lifeworks, a nonprofit that helps developmentally disabled people get office work, leaving 11 mailroom employees without jobs. City Pages couldn’t get a response from the Strib’s human resources VP, writes Paul Demko. “Evidently, she was too busy looking for puppies to kick.”

Cheeseward Bound: In a kind of farewell to readers of her Detroit Free Press column, Desiree Cooper writes about her decision to leave Motown for Minneapolis (er, St. Paul) to become co-host of American Public Media’s “Weekend America.” Hemming and hawing over leaving a city and career behind, she found herself like the rats in the book “Who Moved My Cheese?” She writes, “As a mother approaching midlife, I fully expect my cheese to be where it’s supposed to be. And when it moves, I’m finding it harder to embrace change and try a new path.” While the cheese metaphor seems about 35 miles off — in Wisconsin — Cooper will be moving. Her broadcast will air Aug. 18, and she’ll be commuting for the next year between St. Paul and her family in Detroit.

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