PCI CALLED FOR L.A. PRIEST ABUSE CASE

Public Communications Inc. is helping the Carmelite order deal with sex abuse charges brought against one of its priests, Rev. Dominic Savino.

PCI president Richard Barry and his son, Pete, are handling those damage control efforts. "It's a sensitive issue," said Pete, a senior account supervisor, when asked about what PCI is doing for the Order.

Savino was removed from the president's post at the 470-member all-boy Crespi Carmelite High School in Encino, Calif., on March 22. The allegations were lodged 23 years ago and involved ten boys aged 16 and 17. The Carmelites conducted the probe that led to Savino's suspension.

The Los Angeles Daily News ran a story on March 25 in which parents, students and alumni of Crespi voiced support for the embattled priest.

PCI was called in to handle the Los Angeles case because it represents the Carmelite Province of the Most Pure Heart of Mary, the Carmelite U.S. headquarters that is based in Darien, Ill. Barry said PCI has been handling the Order on a "spot basis."

H&K SUSPENDS CHICAGO STAFFER

Hill and Knowlton suspended without pay Chicago staffer Brian Gill following his arrest in New York City for allegedly collecting money for a bogus fund for families of firefighters killed in the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

Gill, whom the New York Post dubbed a "Chicago con man," gathered those "donations" in a Manhattan bar following the St. Patrick's Day Parade on March 16. The PR exec, along with an accomplice, must have collected thousands of dollars, according to bar owner Ciaran Staunton.

The March 22 Post ran a picture of Gill with an article headlined "What a Vulture!" Gene Reineke, H&K COO and Chicago GM, issued a statement regarding Gill. "We do not have specific knowledge surrounding the facts and circumstances as they pertain to this matter. If someone did engage in this behavior it is deplorable and shocking," said Reineke.

David Crane, a former advisor to Sens. Trent Lott and John McCain, joins The Washington Group, which is Ketchum's lobbying unit...Jonathan Schaffer, a VP at the Morgen-Walke unit of Cordiant, joined the Brod Group as a principal. Betsy Brod, a managing director at M-W, started the firm last year.

UNWIN TO SUCCEED HAMPEL AT UBM

Geoff Unwin, 59, will become chairman of United Business Media on Oct. 31, replacing Ronald Hampel, 68, who will retire. Clive Hollick, 55, is CEO of UBM.

Unwin, who is one of the longest serving UBM board members, was CEO of Cap Gemini Ernst & Young, London, until he voluntarily left the company in December, 2001. He remains a director.
As CEO of Cap Gemini Sogeti in 1993, he led the acquisition of the consulting activities of Ernst & Young, creating the fifth largest consulting and information technologies company in the world with 56,000 employees and revenues of 8.4 billion euros.

UBM (NASDAQ symbol UNEWY) shifted its focus from mass market U.K. media to U.S. high tech media (CMP publications) and press release distribution (PR Newswire).

Sales declined 50% in 2001 to $1.32 billion.

LILLY REBUTS RAP ON PROZAC

Eli Lilly says the U.K.'s Independent was wrong when it ran a March 26 report claiming its antidepressant Prozac, which is used by more than 40 million people, may be linked to brain tumors. The paper, which cited a Birmingham University study, reported that Prozac may spur the growth of tumors by blocking the body's natural ability to destroy cancer cells.

Anne Griffin, spokesperson for Lilly, told this NL the report was "very inaccurate" and a "gross distortion" of research conducted by professor John Gordon. She also noted that Gordon conducted "test tube research" and didn't use either humans or animals for the study. At best, she said, the findings are "very preliminary."

Lilly, on the prozac.com website, maintains that the "safety and effectiveness of Prozac have been thoroughly studied in clinical trials with more than 11,000 patients."

Chamberlain Communications Group, New York, handles the Prozac account.

The company says it managed the Prozac life- cycle from its transition to generic formulation to the introduction of two line extensions.

Richard Chamberlain could not be reached. His assistant said a "number of people work on the Prozac account." They were all said to be in meetings when this NL called.

KETCHUM, F-H AGAIN DOMINATE ANVILS

Ketchum and Fleishman-Hillard are again the dominant PR firms in PRSA's annual Silver Anvils.
Ketchum, which leads with 46 winners in the past eight years, currently has ten of its programs nominated for Anvil awards.

F-H, a close second to Ketchum with 41 Anvils in the past eight years, has been nominated for Anvils in 12 categories.

The nominations were announced March 27 by PRSA.

Final choices will be revealed June 6 at the Equitable auditorium in New York.

Attendance was 454 last year when a total of 189 awards were announced. This included, besides 46 Anvils, 41 Anvil "Awards of Excellence," 39 Bronze Anvil awards (brochures, videos, etc.), and 63 Bronze Anvil "Awards of Commendation."

The 87 Anvil Awards were presented individually to the winners who accepted the awards on stage.

Carmichael Lynch Spong PR, Minneapolis, a unit of Interpublic, has seven contenders for Anvils. Edelman PR Worldwide and Hill and Knowlton each has three Anvil nominations.

Ketchum Mum on Entry Total

Robyn Massey, who handles agency PR for Ketchum, would not reveal the number of Ketchum entries either for this year or previous years.

Ray Kotcher, CEO of Ketchum, an Omnicom agency, and David Drobis, chairman, could not be reached.

Massey said Judith Rich, former creative director of Ketchum, played "a key role" in Ketchum's Anvil program for many years but could not be described as being in charge of the program.

A Ketchum executive in the San Francisco office reportedly has succeeded Rich but Massey would not confirm this.

Sources who have been judges in Ketchum's "Kudos" internal awards program said it is set up to involve all offices and that Anvil judging rules are followed. This includes putting major emphasis on four areas-research, strategy, execution and measurement.

Sources said that about a dozen of them spend an entire day at a Ketchum office in the fall judging programs from throughout the U.S. The day includes a lunch for the judges. They said "some mechanism" for measuring results is a required.

Ketchum employees, they said, receive awards of some type for their work and that they work on Anvil awards throughout the year.

Some past Anvil judges said Ketchum may submit 40 or more entries in a single year. Massey said this number is "proprietary."

The closest PR firm to Ketchum and F-H in terms of Anvil winners in the past eight years is Edelman, with eight.

Porter Novelli, Burson-Marsteller and H&K have three each; Manning, Selvage & Lee and Ruder Finn, two, and one each for Weber Shandwick, BSMG Worldwide and Ogilvy PR. Cohn & Wolfe and GCI Group have won none in the past eight years.

BURSON CALLS FOR PR FOR PR

The PR industry must "go out of its way to show everyone, including the media, what we do," Harold Burson, founder of Burson-Marsteller, told members of the Iona College chapter of PR Student Society of America March 12.

He made the comment in answer to a question about the "negative image" that PR allegedly has among the media.

Burson said journalists may say they do not like PR, but they can all cite PR people who do a good job and help them in reporting news.

Congress also scores low in opinion polls but people have plenty of positive opinions about individual Congressmen, he noted.

Asked about integrated marketing, he said that it provides a framework for the various disciplines and that each should strive to do its best.

Also discussed was the role of the major ad/PR conglomerates. Burson says the conglomerates are growing and have a need for many PR people.

SEC REBUFFS EXXONMOBIL ON RESOLUTIONS

The Securities and Exchange Commission has rejected ExxonMobil's request to block two resolutions proposed by social responsibility groups from its 2002 proxy statements. The contested measures call for ExxonMobil to develop renewable energy sources, and to link executive compensation to environmental and social performance.

Lee Raymond, CEO of ExxonMobil, has expressed his doubts about the potential of renewables. He claims the company shelled out about $500 million in the `80s for solar, wind and battery power before throwing in the towel. The CEO, in the March 12 Financial Times, took a shot at Europe for hiking auto fuel emission standards. European governments tell people what cars they can drive, while Americans like to make their own decisions, said Raymond. That's why they left Europe in the first place, he told the FT in its article headlined, "A Dinosaur Still Hunting for Growth."

ExxonMobil, however, does doff its hat to social responsibility. It has posted on its website a March 21 speech by Frank Sprow, VP- safety, health & environment, in which he talked about how "community involvement is essential" to the company's long-term business success.

LEYDEN HANDLES 'PASSOVER MASSACRE'

Israeli PR counselor Joel Leyden was five blocks away with his wife and year-old baby when a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up at the Park Hotel in Netanya, killing 19 people and wounding 120 others. He rushed to the scene and helped Mayor Miriam Feierberg with interviews with reporters from CNN and Associated Press.

Leyden filed a report for Israel Radio, and was interviewed by Fox News. He told Fox how he saw five bodies lined up outside the hotel, including a woman dressed in her holiday best.

TURN LOCAL NEWS INTO NATIONAL NEWS

Ned Barnett, who is managing partner of Barnett Communications in Las Vegas, said turning a local media placement into national news "may seem impossible, but it's not."

"Except for breaking news, almost everything you see on TV or in national newspapers and magazines began as a 'local' story," Barnett writes in his column for PR Fuel, a website run by eReleases, a press release distributor. "With the right story, you can do that, too," said Barnett, who offers these tips:

--"First, obtain your local newspaper's permission to echo this story on your web page.

--"Pitch the national media via a brief e-mail with a link to the page you've echoed.

- -"Following up that e-mail, call your highest-priority national reporters. Very briefly make the case why they should use this story."

National May Help Local Coverage

Occasionally-with just the right story-publicists can generate national coverage that will help them get local news coverage, said Barnett.

For example, a local school and the community hospital put on a health training program for young school kids. The nurses used sock puppets to get their important message across.

The school took a publicity photo, using the children of the school's teachers to avoid problems with "permission." This photo, along with a short paragraph about the program, was sent to a national nurse-education publication, which used it as human-interest filler.

The school then went to the local newspaper, which had not been interested in the story originally, showing them this national coverage. The result was front-page coverage.

Barnett has been a PR professional for two decades, authored eight books, and taught at three colleges and universities.

PLACEMENT TIPS

The New York Times will start publishing a new leisure section, called "Escapes" on April 5. The Friday section will have articles on weekend travel, weekend homes, cars and diversions.

The paper also will begin national distribution of the "Arts," "Dining" and "House & Home" sections, which will replace the "The Living Arts" section.

Trish Hall, a former editor/reporter for the Times, is consulting the Times on the new Friday section.

The Wall Street Journal's op-eds and letters-to-the-editor are handled by Max Boot and Ned Crabb, respectively.

Boot, editorial features editor, looks for op-ed articles that make "a strong argument about an issue in the news," and the article is exclusive to the Journal.

If the piece is in response to a Journal news article, it should be submitted as a letter-to-the-editor to Crabb, who is letters editor.

Boot said op-ed writers should read the editorial page on a regular basis to get an idea of what the Journal is looking for.

The Journal prefers the submission to be between 600 to 1,200 jargon-free words, typewritten, and double-spaced.

"A cover letter giving a brief summary of your article should be included along with the author's fax number, day and evening phone numbers, address or e-mail address if possible," said Boot.

"We will contact authors on timely articles that are of interest to us as soon as possible by phone or fax," said Boot. Articles that are not useable, will get a response by fax, e-mail or mail within 10 business days.
Boot said writers should not call to confirm receipt or check for a status until 10 business days have elapsed.

He accepts op-eds by fax (212/416-2255); e-mail ([email protected]), or mail: The Wall Street Journal, 200 Liberty st., New York, NY 10281.

Crabb is at the same fax number or the letter can be e-mailed to [email protected].

Parade, which is distributed by 335 Sunday newspapers every week, is looking for stories with an inspirational message.

The magazine also is partial to features that are unusual and have not been published. "If your story doesn't make you happy or sad, angry or elated, excited or curious, chances are Parade readers won't care that much either," said Paula Silvermam, who is articles editor.

Silverman, who helps filter feature submissions for assistant editor Steve Florio, prefers to get pitches via e-mail ([email protected]). The pitch should explain the story idea in three to four paragraphs, according to the guidelines.

Great Lakes Publishing, a Cleveland-based publisher of city and regional magazines, including Ohio Magazine, published the first issue of Long Weekends magazine this week.

The travel publication starts with a circulation base of 250,000 in eight states in and around the Great Lakes region-Western New York, Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois and Michigan.

Mary Beth Brendza, marketing director, said the mission is to deliver travel stories about destinations within a one-day drive for most of its readers. The magazine will provide travel ideas, stories about privately owned inns and B&Bs, and events in the coverage area.

Publicists may pitch Richard Osborne, who is editorial director of Ohio Magazine, and is overseeing the new publication. He is based in Columbus at 614/461-5083.

(Media news continued on next page)

'SPOKESMAN' GETS QUOTED MORE

A study by Bob Williams, reporter for The Raleigh (N.C.) News & Observer, shows the use of spokespeople as primary news sources has shot up in recent years.

He found the words "spokesperson," "spokesman," or "spokeswoman" turned up 530,101 times in a computer search of articles appearing in top newspapers in 2000, up 81% from the 292,308 times those words appeared in the same newspapers in 1995.

At his own paper, Williams said the jump was 44%, rising to 4,755 times last year, compared to 3,301 in 1995.

"One big problem with the increasing use of spokespeople is that it can compromise two of the basic principles of journalism ethics: accuracy and fairness," said Williams, who made his findings public in a report he wrote as a Poynter Ethics Fellow.

"By talking to a spokesperson first, the reporter is making a conscious decision to rely on secondhand information," according to Williams. "Making matters worse, the reporter is choosing to use secondhand information from a source with a clear mandate to make the boss or client look good in print or on TV."

Ken Huskey, a California-based consultant, told Williams that spokespeople help accuracy and fairness. Huskey said spokespeople are necessary to level the playing field for news sources as they deal with what he believes is an increasingly "carnivorous and sophisticated" press, said Williams.

"A spokesperson understands how the media works and how something will come across on TV or in the newspaper. It just makes the whole process a little more fair," Huskey told Williams.

PEOPLE

Myrna Blyth is stepping down as editor-in-chief at Ladies Home Journal and More to become editorial director of Meredith Corp.'s New York-based magazines and new product development. That includes overseeing the development of Living Room, a new magazine aimed at younger female audiences, which will publish its third test issue later this year. Susan Crandell was named to replace Blyth as editor-in-chief of More magazine.

Lee Walburn, 65, will retire as editor-in-chief of Atlanta magazine on Aug. 31. Rebecca Burns, who is the current editor of Indianapolis Monthly magazine, will succeed him.

Joselyn Noveck, 42, has replaced Sam Boyle as New York bureau chief for The Associated Press.

Albert Jeffcoat, 77, former Paris bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal and a PR professional, died March 10. After leaving the Journal, Jeffcoat held PR positions with IBM and Ford Motor, and then opened his firm in New York-Jeffcoat, Schoen & Morrell-which is no longer in business.

Kathryn Kross was promoted to VP/bureau chief of CNN, in Washington, D.C., succeeding Frank Sesno, who joined George Mason Univ., Fairfax, Va., as a professor of public policy and communications.

Steve Redisch, previously executive producer of "Wolf Blitzer Reports," has replaced Kross as deputy bureau chief and executive editor. Matt Speiser was named director, newsgathering.

Victoria Sanchez-Lincoln was named fashion director of Latina magazine to oversee the fashion department, style fashion shoots, forecast and interpret runway trends and manage a team of fashion writers. She was previously senior fashion editor of Mode.

Joe Schlosser, previously Los Angeles bureau chief at Broadcasting and Cable magazine, has joined Hallmark Channel, Los Angeles, as VP/communications and publicity.

Caryn Brooks, managing editor news, WFLD-TV, joins WGN-TV, Chicago, as executive producer, morning news.

Joan Voight, Adweek's roving reporter for nearly eight years, based in San Francisco, has resigned.

Jacob Young was promoted to executive editor of Reader's Digest magazine. He will handle book excerpts, features and profiles.

RUKEYSER DROPPED AS HOST

Louis Rukeyser has been dropped as host of "Wall $treet Week with Louis Rukeyser," which is co-produced by Maryland Public TV.

Rukeyser, who hosted the show for 32 years, said he will start "another weekly program with me as host and commentator."

MPTV said guest hosts will anchor the program, starting March 29, as it prepares to launch "Wall $treet Week with Fortune" in June.

The first two guest hosts will be Marshall Loeb, 72, who is currently senior correspondent of "CBS Marketwatch," and Ray Brady, former business correspondent for the "CBS Evening News with Dan Rather."

MEDIA BRIEFS

Playboy used PR Newswire to distribute a press release that asked current and former women employees of Enron to send a recent photo of themselves in a bikini. The magazine is planning a "Women of Enron" photo spread.

"Media Matters," a TV show hosted by Alex Jones, director of the Joan Shorenstein Center for the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard Univ.'s Kennedy school of government, will profile Jorge Luis Mota, a reporter for Exito, the Spanish newspaper, published by The Chicago Tribune. The national show aired March 28 on local PBS stations.

Two groups are refusing to give us their directories of members—the Canadian PR Society and the National IR Institute (U.S.).

PRSA, meanwhile, will donate 150 copies of its new members directory to editors "to help them to do their jobs." This volume lists 19,000 members and cross-indexes companies, associations and PR firms. Such listings help reporters. PRSA previously gave directories to editors who sought one.

Tony Iavarone, president of CPRS, said he personally feels we and other reporters should have the directory of 1,600 members. "You have a right to know who our members are," said Iavarone.

A new Canadian Privacy Law stops groups from sharing member information without written permission. CPRS is collecting this. Both PRSA and CPRS sell their lists to qualified buyers.

NIRI is a horse of a different color. It insists that neither this nor any other publication has a right to its directory listing 5,300 members. It won t sell the book to reporters nor let them join NIRI.

The book is "not made available to those outside the NIRI family," said PR counsel Doug Parrillo.

Family?! We thought NIRI was a national trade association.

Two years ago, NIRI president Lou Thompson personally sent us the members directory with a hand-written note expressing good wishes.

Why the change in policy? We think it s because we started asking tough questions, such as why are dues $425 when NIRI has $4 million+ in the bank (Dec. 31, 2000, latest figure) and netted $1.4M on its 2000 conference? We also noticed its 16-member elected board (plus Thompson) was practically all-corporate and that 11 of their companies put "pro forma" earnings first in their reports. Diebold, whose IR head Don Eagon is now chairman of NIRI, also puts pro forma earnings first. Thompson has said "real" earnings must now come first.

We have criticized the NIRI staff, which consists of Thompson, 15 women, and Thompson s son, Eric. It is gender-unbalanced and flawed by nepotism. It can well afford a full-time PR director.

Arthur Andersen's remaining employees have mounted a campaign to disassociate themselves from the errant executives in the Houston office who caused the Enron debacle. But their logic flies in the face of the previous sales pitch which stressed Andersen s seamlessness—the fact that teams of AA experts roved the globe ensuring that the highest standards were met.

This same "seamless" theme is stressed by the ad/PR conglomerates and can lead to pressure on the entire organization if something goes wrong. Interpublic and Omnicom, which formerly described themselves as "only holding companies" having virtually nothing to do with their ad/PR units, have now reversed that pitch and are selling themselves as single worldwide brands (with the same type of roving teams of experts available for certain accounts)... IPG, OMC, WPP and Havas were described as "Advertising's Big Four" in the March 31 New York Times. It said the firms "hold incredible sway over the media," and can "indirectly set network TV schedules and starve magazines to death or help them flourish." The article did not touch on such topics as the debt structures of the agencies, executive pay and options, unidentified acquisitions, etc.

There is a chance that Ketchum will win as many as ten PRSA Silver Anvils in the 2002 contest (page one). Fleishman-Hillard could win up to 12. John Graham, CEO of F-H, says F-H has no special program for winning Anvils but encourages staffers to submit. Julie Wohlford, principal of Carmichael Lynch Spong, which has seven finalists, says it has an internal program in which past winners help new entrants. Ketchum appears to have the most elaborate program, with judges brought in from the outside for a day of judging and "Kudos" and other prizes and awards given out. We have sought to research the Ketchum program, but the firm, although a devout believer in research, has declined to provide many details. It regards the program as "proprietary." The big ad agencies and packaged goods companies have a similar attitude toward research (it s O.K. for them but not onthem)… research needs to be done into the way Johnson & Johnson won an Anvil in 1983 and then a "special Anvil." J&J entered in the emergency category following the 1982 Tylenol murders. It was bested by the entry for Hygrade Food Products by PR Assocs. of Detroit. Anvil chair Don Hill told Beverly Beltaire of PR Assocs.: "`You beat Tylenol…your campaign had so many creative angles and was done for so much less, " Beltaire said she was told by Hill. But Hill then told her that the judges were over-ruled by the Anvil committee. The judges had picked Hygrade partly because J&J gave no budget figure and getting a "big bang" for a low budget is a major factor in winning an Anvil. But the committee decided that Tylenol was more than emergency PR and "lifted the level of PR."

The Tylenol story is one of the myths of PR (perpetuated by "The Insider" movie), that J&J acted immediately to remove the product. The recall did not take place until eight days after the first murders and came after most stores had already pulled Tylenol products. J&J has advertised in every issue of PRSA's Strategist since it started taking ads in the fall of 1995. PRSA should amend the misleading Anvil description of Tylenol on its website.
-- Jack O'Dwyer