VERMONT SEEKS PR FIRMS.
Vermont has issued a request for proposals to earmark firms eligible for PR, marketing and advertising projects over the next two years.

The Green Mountain State, which spent close to $4M on marketing communications (excluding trade shows, web work and some outreach programs) last year, wants to hear from firms which can handle assignments for various public agencies from January 1, 2006 through the end of 2007. Two option years could extend eligibility for firms.

The two main categories of work solicited are creative/design/advertising and PR/public information/ and media relations.

An optional bidders conference has been scheduled for Sept. 29 in Montpelier and proposals are due on Oct 18. Kenneth Feld ([email protected]) is contracting officer and copies of the RFP can be downloaded via the state’s procurement web page (http://www.bgs.state.vt.us/pca/bids/bids.php).

DUNLAP COUNSELS AMERICAN RED CROSS.
Dennis Dunlap, CEO of the American Marketing Association for the past six years, has been tapped to the new post of chair of communications and marketing for the American Red Cross.

Charles Connor, senior VP of communication and marketing, said the Red Cross in the years ahead will need to have more of a marketing focus than it has right now. Connor said Dunlap will advise him directly.

The Red Cross said 145,000 volunteers trained in handling disasters are currently working through the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. In all the group counts about one million trained volunteers and 35,000 paid staffers across 900 local chapters in the U.S.

YULISH STEPS DOWN AT USEC.
Charles Yulish stepped down as VP-corporate communications at USEC Inc., the leading supplier of enriched uranium fuel to commercial nuclear power plants, on Sept. 23.

The 68-year-old executive joined USEC in `95. Yulish handed the company’s privatization program, and the “Megatons to Megawatts” effort in which the U.S. pays Russia to convert its nuclear warheads into fuel for U.S. plants. Ten percent of this country’s power comes from decommissioned Russian nukes.

Prior to USEC, Yulish was at E. Bruce Harrison and partner of Holt, Ross & Yulish PR, an energy/environment firm.

Elizabeth Stuckle takes over for Yulish at USEC.

EDELMAN TOUTS WAL-MART KATRINA AID.
Wal-Mart Stores has hired Edelman to promote its Hurricane Katrina relief as part of the overall effort to improve the image of the hard-nosed retailer. The PR firm has set up a war room dubbed “action alley” at Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., and one at its Washington, D.C., headquarters to make sure journalists get the word about Wal-Mart’s relief work.

The $282B retailer has donated $15M to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund, gave another $2M in cash for emergency relief and has established mini-Wal-Marts in the Gulf Coast region to dispense clothing, diapers, food, water free of charge to those in need.

Edelman has hired RedState.org blogger Michael Krempasky as part of its effort to boost Wal-Mart. Vice chairman Leslie Dach told O’Dwyer’s that Krempasky’s ability to connect with conservative audiences was among the reasons for his hire.
Wal-Mart also has used Fleishman-Hillard and Hill & Knowlton for PR.

RF PROMOTES IRAQI ART TOUR.
Ruder Finn will be the PR firm for the “Gold of Nimrud” tour of Iraqi antiquities, a road show that has sparked controversy in certain art quarters.

The firm’s D.C. office will handle the effort. Executive VP Ron Christie, a former special assistant to President Bush and Dick Cheney, and VP Andy Rosenberg, who worked for Sen. Ted Kennedy, are in charge of the effort. Both joined RF last year.

The 300 gold and ivory artifacts date from the 8th Century, and were unearthed in ’89 at the Assyrian capital of Nimrud.

The collection was housed in Baghdad’s central bank vault, which was flooded during the “shock and awe” bombing campaign.

U.S. occupation forces arranged a two-hour display of the pieces in July ’03 at the looted Iraqi National Museum. That exhibit was dismissed as an “act of propaganda” by experts like New York University professor Elizabeth Stone, an Iraqi archaeology specialist.

RF was hired by Copenhagen-based United Exhibits Group, which is arranging the tour. Christie has not returned a call about GON.

PRSA COO Catherine Bolton received a $30,000 raise in salary to $294,168 in 2004, according to IRS form 990 made public on Sept 21. Pension payment was the same at $28,000. Louis Thompson, COO of NIRI, had a salary of $375,023 in 2004, off from $393,438 in 2003. Pension was $48,283.

ASG PROVIDES PR FOR BLACKWATER.
Washington, D.C.-based PR and lobbying firm Alexander Strategy Group is working on behalf of defense contractor Blackwater USA, which has provided security troops to supplement and protect U.S. government personnel in Iraq and during the Katrina disaster on the Gulf Coast.

Anne Duke, a senior associate for ASG, has been serving as a media contact for the company of late. She issued a statement about the company’s mourning of three Blackwater employees and a State Department official who were killed near Mosul, Iraq, by a suicide bomber on Sept. 18. Twenty-one Blackwater employees have been killed in Iraq.

Duke has not returned an inquiry from O’Dwyer’s about the Blackwater/ASG relationship. Her job description on the ASG website says she implements PR plans, manages accounts and serves as a media contact for clients, in addition to legislative work.

ASG is headed by Ed Buckham, former chief of staff to then-Majority Whip Tom DeLay.

Blackwater has earned its share of ink since emerging with a ubiquitous presence in Iraq. It was Blackwater contractors that were executed, mutilated and hung from a bridge in Fallujah while escorting a food delivery, prompting a U.S.-led siege of that Iraqi city.

Left-leaning publications have demonized its employees as “mercenaries” and “paramilitaries” and were critical of the company’s presence in New Orleans.

Blackwater secured a $21M contract to protect Paul Bremer, who oversaw the aftermath of the Iraq invasion as head of the Coalition Provisional Authority through June ’04. It continues to work for the State Dept.

CRC REPS WOUNDED TROOPS.
Creative Response Concepts is handling PR for the Coalition to Salute America’s Heroes, a non-profit group formed to help wounded and disabled veterans in the “war on terror.” More than 14,000 troops have been wounded in Afghanistan and Iraq wars.

SAH, which is in McLean, Va., provides disability-adapted new or renovated housing for wheelchair-bound veterans, family counseling, and employment services.

The Coalition also sponsors the “Road to Recovery Conference and Tribute.” The conference held in Dallas last month featured seminars and workshops for veterans at the Brooke Army Medical Center. Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach and Texas Rangers manager Buck Showalter were among speakers at the event.

CRC is the firm that handled the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth smear campaign on John Kerry, and promotes “intelligent design” on behalf of the Discovery Institute.

DIANA DIES AT 70.
Patricia Diana, 70, who was PR director of the American Bible Society in New York, died Sept. 21 at the Troy Hills Nursing Home in Parsippany, N.J.
Diana, who retired in 2000 from ABS, had previously been president of Diana Assocs., an ad/PR firm in Bloomfield, N.J., and a former executive director of the Bloomfield Chamber of Commerce.

PALMEIRO IS NOT A RAT, SAYS CLS&A.
Chlopak, Leonard, Schechter & Assocs. is helping fend off reports that Baltimore Orioles slugger Rafael Palmeiro “ratted out” a teammate by saying he was supplied steroids by a fellow player.

Palmeiro, the most prominent Major League Baseball player suspended for steroid use, fingered out Miguel Tejada in testimony to the House Government Reform Committee and MLB officials, according to the Sept. 22 Baltimore Sun.

Jim Beattie, executive VP of the Orioles, however, said Tejada supplied Palmeiro vitamins, not steroids.
On behalf of Palmeiro’s law firm, CLS&A released a statement saying that Palmeiro “has never implicated any player in the intentional use or distribution of steroids, or any other illegal substance, in any interview or testimony.”

Palmeiro, who is rehabbing in Texas from ankle and knee injuries, was to return to the team for its final homestand against the Boston Red Sox. Interim Baltimore manager Sam Perlozzo now says Palmeiro’s season may be finished.

CLS&A is part of Omnicom’s Gavin Anderson unit.

JONES JOINS APCO.
Elizabeth Jones, who was U.S. Ambassador to Kazakhstan, is now executive VP at APCO Worldwide. The 35-year foreign service veteran becomes a member of APCO’s “business diplomacy” unit. She is to tackle government relations, energy, corporate social responsibility and economic policy issues.

APCO’s business diplomacy team includes former Sen. Don Riegle, ex-under secretary of state for economic, business and agricultural affairs Stuart Eizenstat, ex-Rep. Don Bonker, former Washington Post and PBS reporter Charles Krause, ex-Ambassador to Morocco Marc Ginsberg and France’s former Minister of Trade Christine Chauvet.

At the State Dept., Jones devised U.S. policies for NATO, European Union countries, Russia and Ukraine. She also was executive assistant to then-Secretary of State Warren Christopher and deputy chief of mission for U.S. embassies in Germany and Pakistan.

KETCHUM GUIDES IR FOR CNOOC.
Ketchum’s Hong Kong office is handling investor relations work for China National Offshore Oil Corp., the state-run oil company that made a failed $18.5B bid to acquire Unocal this summer.

A Ketchum spokeswoman said Ketchum Newscan PR, based in Hong Kong, is working on IR for the company without any U.S.-based element to the work. That office was set up in 1980 and became Ketchum Newscan in 1996. It staffs about 60.

CNOOC had enlisted a global PR team of Brunswick and Public Strategies to guide its takeover bid in the U.K. and U.S., but the bid was withdrawn in August amid significant political opposition in the U.S. Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and Burson-Marsteller’s BKSH & Assocs. represented CNOOC in D.C. for the deal.

Brunswick told O’Dwyer’s it is not currently working with CNOOC. Public Strategies did not return a call.

AP STARTS YOUTH-AIMED NEWS SERVICE.
The Associated Press has started a separate news service, called “asap,” which is aimed at 18-34 age group.

The new service will provide original news using text, photos, video and audio to U.S. newspapers.

The information will cull some breaking news from the AP’s main news feeds, but the vast majority of the material on asap will be produced by its own staff, according to Ted Anthony, who will oversee the news service and its current staff of 20, a number he expects to rise to 25 by the beginning of next year.

Lisa Tolin, previously a national desk editor in New York, was appointed editor of asap, and Eric Carvin was named news editor. The service has reporters in Denver, Los Angeles and New York.

On its first day of operation, asap featured a first-person account by a U.S. Marine serving in Iraq, a memoir by a reporter going mountain biking with President Bush, and a photo essay on Hurricane Katrina.

Ruth Gersh, director of online services for AP, said about 200 papers had signed up for the service.

JOURNAL REVAMPS MONDAY EDITION.
The Wall Street Journal will put new emphasis on coverage of management on its “Marketplace” page, which runs in the Monday edition.

Starting with a major story on management news or trends on the front of the second section, the coverage will extend inside the section with regular features on management ideas called “Theory and Practice.”

Scott Thurm was named chief of the expanded management news bureau.

Other changes in the Monday edition include a new feature on the front page of the “Money & Investing” section that will give readers a summary of key market-moving data or earnings coming out that week.

Each week, a different aspect of the stock market will be explored in depth, with rotating subjects that include looks at the best performing stocks based on style and size or market capitalization.

On page two, the paper’s economy feature, “The Outlook,” will now offer readers an expanded analysis of economic issues and themes that shape business and political decisions around the world.

USN&WR TOUTS ‘FORWARD-LOOKING’ NEWS.
U.S. News & World Report editor Brian Duffy said “significant strategic changes” will be made in the way the magazine and website is produced and edited.

“In broad strokes, the new strategy will involve less routine newsgathering and features, more emphasis on forward-looking news analysis, more investigative and enterprise reporting, an expansion of the magazine’s franchise subjects like Best Hospitals, Personal Finance, and Best Colleges, and investment in the rapidly growing strength of usnews.com to make it more relevant than ever,” Duffy and publisher Bill Holiber informed the staff on Sept. 21.

They said the new strategy will involve changes in the job descriptions of a number of people as “we embark on creating a new model for producing the magazine and website.”

Among the new offerings is the expansion of the health portion of usnews.com through relationships with the Cleveland Clinic, Johns Hopkins Medical Center, Harvard’s Jostin Diabetes Center, The Mayo Clinic, and the Stanford Univ. Hospital & Clinics.

The magazine has also entered into a partnership with the National Committee for Quality Assurance to help readers and visitors to the website select the best health insurance plans. The feature also debuts next month and will be an annual offering of the magazine.

A third element of the magazine’s new editorial plan is a partnership with Harvard Univ.’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and the Center for Public Leadership. The objective is to produce an annual report on America’s Best Leaders. It is also scheduled to debut next month.

PLACEMENT TIPS________

Brides magazine will publish an annual “Hot List” of the best of the best of all that is bridal.

Millie Bratten, editor-in-chief of Brides, said editors will scout out the 100 most influential, innovative and interesting people, places and products for the bride-to-be.

The first hot list appears in the Nov./Dec. issue, which is on newsstands, and it will run annually.

Mass Appeal, a bimonthly magazine reaching more than 781,000 urban culture-artists and trendsetters on four continents, focuses its coverage on urban culture, featuring articles about music, art and style.

Samantha Moeller, who owns Missbehave Boutique on Manhattan’s lower East Side, is managing editor, and also writes about fashion and distribution.

Maclean Jackson, who edits and develops story ideas, and Chris Yuscavage, an avid hip hop fan, are associate editors. Gavin Stevens is photo editor, and Shane Nash is art and photo assistant.
The magazine is based in Brooklyn.

Garden Design, which is increasing its frequency from six issues per year to seven in 2006, is adding a new section, called “Abroad,” which will highlight international influence on American garden design, and a new column focusing on the impact influential designers have had on the field.

Bill Marken is editor-in-chief of GD. He is based in Winter Park, Fla., and can be reached at 650/949-3321; e-mail [email protected].

MEDIA NUMBERS________

3 million—The number of General Motors vehicles that have factory-installed XM satellite radios.

75—Fortune magazine’s Sept. 19 issue celebrates the 75th year of publication of the business magazine, which was started in 1930, as the U.S. began the Great Depression.

(Media news continued on next page)

MERCK STARTS OWN HEALTH MAGAZINE.
Merck & Co. in Whitehouse Station, N.J., has started a bimonthly health magazine – Your Health Now – to put “useful, timely and unbiased health information directly into the hands of the general public.”

An online version of the magazine is available online at www.YourHealthNow.com.

David Ruth, VP/corporate communications, said Merck has a “rich history of providing people with accurate, unbiased health information.”

The magazine will focus on a health topic or theme that has been selected based on the most frequently accessed topics on the Merck Manuals websites.

Ruth said the Merck Manuals have attracted more than 20 million visits thus far this year.

Each issue also will feature an expert guest editor who will weigh in on a timely health issue related to that issue’s theme.

Dr. Robert Berkow is editor-in-chief and Dr. Mark Beers, who is editor-in-chief of the Merck Manual of Medical Information, is managing editor.

To ensure independence, an advisory board of leaders from several health organizations will review each issue to make sure the magazine’s mission of objective, relevant, consumer-friendly and non-promotional content is achieved.

MEDIA LESSONS LEARNED FROM KATRINA.
Colburn Aker, managing partner of The Aker Partners in Washington, D.C., said Hurricane Katrina made one thing “strikingly clear: Communication must be a top priority during times of crisis.”

He offered these tips derived from his agency’s experience in working with the media in the hours and weeks following a crisis:

—Establish yourself as a credible information source from the first day;
—Provide frequent updates – avoid long gaps between contacts;
—Be prepared to answer hard questions;
—If an issue is outside your expertise, say so;
—Be available to take calls and interviews, 24-7, and note the news doesn’t stop on the weekends. Reach out to weekend media.

PR PROS MAKE DISNEY TOUGH TO COVER.
Tim Arrango, the New York Post’s media business reporter, said Disney has been the “toughest to cover because the company’s PR folks are so combative.”

“It’s tough getting answers to even the simplest questions out of them. It’s been hard developing any sort of relationship with that company,” Arrango said in an interview with IWantmedia’s editor Patrick Phillips.

Arrango, who first reported Time Warner is in talks to sell a stake in America Online to Microsoft, said “deconsolidation” is the big media story right now.

“After years of getting big, now they are paring down and selling off assets, and reconfiguring the assets they have,” said Arrango, 31, who joined the Post in Sept. 2002 after reporting for the financial news site TheStreet.com.

Arrango said the Post’s main competition in the business section is the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.

“When it comes to reporting on media, we certainly have a different audience. We view ours as the executives in the industry and the Manhattan elite – those are the people picking up the Post every day to read the business section and read about the media business.”

J-DEPT. CHAIRMAN LAUDS BINN’S MAGS.
Samir Husni, a magazine industry analyst and chairman of the journalism dept. at Univ. of Mississippi, said Jason Binn’s city magazines, which put paid product placements in articles, are a “perfect example of when marketing and journalism merge into one entity.”

Boston Common, published by Binn’s Niche Media, made its debut last week at 352 pages.

Husni, who was quoted in the Boston Globe, said he knows “a lot of people in the media hate his (Binn) guts, but it’s a matter of jealousy. I think he’s doing a marvelous job.”

Kevin Allman questioned Husni’s comments in a letter on Romenesko’s website: “Am I just old, or is it just wrong to hear the chairman of a university journalism department laud the melding of marketing and journalism? And is that what they’re teaching at Ole Miss these days?”

WALKER RETIRES FROM O’DWYERS.
Jerry Walker is leaving O’Dwyer’s on Sept. 29 after 18+ years of reporting news for Jack O’Dwyer’s Newsletter, PR Services Report, and O’Dwyer’s PR and Marketing Communications Website.

Walker, who is 69, was a reporter and managing editor at Editor & Publisher magazine for 19 years prior to joining O’Dwyer’s as media editor in 1987.
A graduate of Spring Hill College in Mobile, Ala., Walker served more than four years on active duty in the U.S. Army as a lieutenant.

He began his journalism career at the New Rochelle (N.Y.) Standard Star in 1965.

CARNEY NAMED TIME’S D.C. BUREAU CHIEF.
James Carney was named Washington, D.C., bureau chief for Time magazine, succeeding Michael Duffy, who will devote himself fulltime to writing and reporting stories for the magazine.

Carney, who has been Duffy’s deputy for the past two years, joined the bureau in 1993. Duffy, who joined Time in 1985, has been bureau chief for eight years.

PEOPLE________

Tina Johnson and Beth Fenner were named to lead Women’s Health magazine as editor-in-chief and executive editor, respectively.

Ed Korczynski has returned to Solid State Technology magazine in Nashua, N.H., as senior technical editor.

Ed Scannell has joined CMP Media’s VARBusiness as senior editor, covering technology beats based in Waltham, Mass.

Question: Is an association a “public” or a “private” organization?

We have three different opinions from the three big PR/IR associations – PR Society of America, International Assn. of Business Communicators, and National Investor Relations Institute.

Membership totals are 20,000, 14,000 and 4,500, respectively.

Judith Phair, president of PRSA, has repeatedly said, as late as last week, that PRSA is “not a public organization, we’re a private organization.”

Although PRSA, like any group with $25K+ in income, must provide a 990 public report of its finances to the IRS, PRSA exists primarily for its members, she says. “We have to run the organization the way we see fit,” she added.

In the opposite camp is IABC chair Warren Bickford who says, “Under the terms of the IRS, IABC is a public organization.” It files a 990 each year and makes it available to anyone who asks.

He said IABC will consider our suggestion that it put a PDF of the 990 in a prominent position on the IABC website, accessible to the public.

IABC, like PRSA, only puts its financials in the members’ area, for which codes are needed.

Louis Thompson, president and CEO of NIRI, consulted with NIRI’s lawyers who told him NIRI is a “a private organization” but is “increasingly behaving like a public one.”

Thompson said Sarbanes-Oxley does not apply to non-profits but “a few are adopting SOX standards voluntarily.”

[Ed. Note: SOX says non-profits (and others) must provide a secure “whistleblower” function so anyone can lodge an anonymous complaint without fear].

NIRI lawyers said that although NIRI doesn’t pay taxes, it does not receive federal or state funding. They note that its finances have to be made public.

Thompson adds that the annual meeting of NIRI is “open to members” while board meetings are not.

NIRI is voluntarily being audited by an outside law firm and auditing firm “to ensure our governance and internal financial controls are setting a gold standard for non-profit organizations even though we are not required to be audited,” said Thompson. NIRI has always had an annual audit, he added.

The NIRI IRS Form 990 is 21 pages with attachments and has lots of information including Thompon’s salary of $375,023 plus pension of $48,283. Also provided are the pay of secretary Linda Kelleher ($171,852 plus $40,922 pension) and treasurer Carolyn Wheatley ($135,285 plus $21,814). Income sources are listed and spending in 14 categories. PRSA’s 990 has one salary–COO Catherine Bolton’s, up $30K to $294,168 (plus $28,000 pension).

NIRI’s occupancy costs of $311,270 are 5.6% of revenues while PRSA’s costs of $685,390 are 6.5%. PRSA’s costs rose 21.8% as a result of its move downtown last year to Two Federal Reserve Plaza.

There’s no question in our mind that associations are as public as can be although many groups don’t acknowledge this.

We never heard of a private organization that has to file a complete report of it finances with the public.

The fact that a SOX has not been passed for non-profits is testimony to their political clout.

IRS rules say that groups are allowed to keep profits without paying taxes because they are supposed to “promote or improve the industry represented by the association” (source: American Society of Association Executives).

Groups are not supposed to provide benefits to individuals or treat non-members differently.

The APR program of PRSA, on which $3,074,871 has been lost since 1987, violates these principles. The program only benefits a small portion of PRSA’s members and does not benefit “the industry.” Non-members pay more to take it.

There are at least 350,000 people practicing PR, according to the Census Bureau, and only about 4,000 APRs.

But the APRs have controlled PRSA since 1973 and have splurged this money on themselves in a program that has almost collapsed. Only 149 new PRSA APRs were created in 2003-04 at an average cost of $1,652 each to the Society.

Also violating IRS principles is the fact that PRSA is charging non-members $300 more than members for the conference in Miami ($1,425 for non-members vs. $1,125 for members).

Governance reform of PRSA, whose urgent need is illustrated by the ill-fated legal action against a staffer who criticized PRSA management, must start in the Assembly.

National leaders since the early 1980's have done everything they can to cripple the Assembly including cutting it in half (to one meeting a year instead of two); blocking experienced chapter members (three-year limit for delegates is stringently enforced), and blocking discussion among delegates by scheduling nearly eight hours of speeches, reports, awards presentations, elections, etc.

In many years, the Assembly is simply “dis-assembled” into 12 or more “focus groups” and sent to private rooms throughout a hotel.

Delegates pay the full $1,125 conference fee while the 17 national board members go free.

In 2004, $42,255 in travel, meals and hotels was spent on PRSA leaders for the conference, which was in New York (eliminating travel expenses of staffers).

We hope many of the 55 non-APR chapter presidents will represent their chapters in the 2005 Assembly, restoring some balance of power to the chapters.

This is the first time since 1973 that non-APRs can vote in the Assembly.

– Jack O'Dwyer