Latest news with #MassachusettsNewspaperPublishersAssociation
Boston Globe
27-07-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Rolling a boulder up Beacon Hill, for 14 years
'There was no reason to broadcast it,' Lynch said. 'There was no suggestion of the authorities not responding appropriately. It was used simply for ratings, for entertainment.' Lynch, who lives in Winchester, spent a career in advertising, and had never engaged in politics before. But that mother's voice moved her to act. She contacted her state representative, now state senator, Jason Lewis, a Winchester Democrat, with a simple question: Why is this legal? Lewis sympathized with her concern and filed the first of many bills that would put restrictions on broadcasting 911 calls without consent. Advertisement 'The broadcasters oppose it, naturally,' Lynch said. Every legislative session, the bill gets reported out favorably. 'Then it dies,' Lynch said. 'It doesn't get voted on. The session ends and we have to file the bill again.' More recently, the bill has been stewarded by Advertisement Under the bill, an audio recording of a 911 call would be released only with the written consent of the caller, or, if the caller objected, by a court order finding that the public's interest outweighs the privacy interests of the caller. That would create hurdles, and some legal bills, for news organizations, bloggers, and social media mavens. But Lynch believes that's better than the current system, which relies on common decency outweighing commercial or prurient interests. It's not just broadcasters who have opposed the bill. 'This same bill has been floating around for years, and we've opposed it for years,' said Robert J. Ambrogi, executive director of the Massachusetts Newspaper Publishers Association. 'Our position is that in many cases the audio recording is important to understanding what occurred, and the nuance that you don't get from a transcript.' Hearing the audio helps journalists hold 911 operators and the entire emergency response system accountable, Ambrogi added. Jordan Walton, executive director of the Massachusetts Broadcasters Association, said his group had not taken a formal position on the legislation, but said in principle its members would oppose it. 'All journalists, I would think, would have a problem with it,' he said. That said, Walton said broadcasters in Massachusetts are accountable to the public they serve and sensitive to the privacy of individuals in traumatic situations. 'I think our members treat these matters respectfully,' he said. But Day said placing restrictions on access to tapes of 911 calls, while safeguarding public access to transcripts of all 911 calls, is a fair compromise. Advertisement 'Emergency calls to 911 usually occur during the most stressful and distressing moments of the caller's life,' Day said. 'The caller is relaying, in real time, a tragedy or emergency they are experiencing firsthand, with the belief that they are calling for help from first responders, not that they are providing fodder for sensationalist broadcasters or internet scavengers.' That last part is a key acknowledgement of how the media landscape has changed, and not necessarily for the better, since the first bill was filed 14 years ago. When deciding whether to broadcast distressing 911 calls, you'd like to think most broadcasters would apply a common decency standard, or at least be subject to the deterrent of public outcry if broadcasting such a call was seen widely as in egregiously poor taste. When it comes to social media, however, there are no guardrails. Anything goes. 'Plug in 'distressing 911 calls' on a search engine and see what you come up with,' Lynch said. I did. Some of it's ugly. Day said more than good taste and common decency are at issue. 'The fear that a call might be used in a broadcast or a post can have a chilling effect on the caller's willingness to place the call or to be honest during it,' he said. 'That chilling effect is squarely at odds with the public interest in a robust and effective emergency communication system.' At least a half-dozen states, including New Hampshire and Rhode Island, restrict access to 911 recordings. Day said the Massachusetts bill seeks to strike a balance between the public's right to know, news organizations' mission to hold public officials and agencies accountable, and the privacy of those making 911 calls. Advertisement The Judiciary Committee has voted the bill out favorably on a regular basis, but it has never reached the full House or Senate for a vote. In the current session, the committee is still taking written testimony on the bill, and a committee vote has not yet been scheduled. Having the state's newspapers and broadcasters lined up against the legislation probably explains the lack of appetite among politicians to put the bill up for a full vote of the Legislature. Lynch sometimes thinks of her cause as Sisyphean, and the thought of rolling the bill up Beacon Hill every session only to watch it roll back down is mentally exhausting. But she won't give up. 'It's going to pass some day,' she said, 'and then I can die thinking I've made the world a little better.' Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Coalition: Lack of press shield law makes Mass. an outlier
BOSTON (SHNS) – Massachusetts is one of just nine states without a 'press shield law' that a media advocacy coalition says would to protect journalists from being required to disclose their confidential sources and other sensitive information in court. Coalition members including the Massachusetts Broadcasters Association, Massachusetts Newspaper Publishers Association and Boston Globe Media say they're making a stronger push this session for a bill (S 1253, H 1738) that would provide 'clear safeguards' for confidential sources and sensitive material so that journalists can fulfill their 'constitutionally protected watchdog role.' 'It is absolutely obvious that we are in a time where we need to pay attention to the shortfall and failure, to date, of Massachusetts to actually pass a press shield law that we so desperately need, given what is happening in the national sphere,' longtime bill sponsor Sen. Becca Rausch said on Wednesday. No version of the bill has ever cleared the Judiciary Committee. Organizers said the bill has been proposed for around 15 years, but that they tracked the concept back to the 1970s. The bill is modeled after the federal Press Act, which the U.S. House passed unanimously in 2024. According to Bob Ambrogi, executive director of the Massachusetts Newspaper Publishers Association, one of the reasons the coalition chose the federal bill as its model was because it had been 'vetted by pretty much every major news organization in the country' and leading media lawyers. If passed, journalists would not have to name sources or disclose confidential newsgathering information unless the disclosure is necessary to prevent 'an act of terrorism' or 'a threat of imminent violence, bodily harm, or death.' Unless a court finds similar threats, state officials would not be able to force third-party email or phone providers to disclose sensitive records, and journalists and news organizations would be notified before their records are sought by state officials. Organizers referenced Massachusetts cases in which journalists were challenged when protecting their anonymous sources, namely a 2022 case between the Berkshire Eagle and the Springfield Diocese and another case involving the Boston Globe, Dana Farber Cancer Institute and a physician at the hospital. Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel of Boston Globe Media Dan Krockmalnic said the Globe has filed more than a dozen motions in the last few years to fight subpoenas for information about reporters and sources. The financial burden and time-consuming nature of those kinds of cases, House bill sponsor Rep. Rich Haggerty said, puts local news specifically at a disadvantage. 'Every single time we see a local news organization challenged, spending resources and money on protecting what should be a First Amendment right already protected — and this law would help that — we know they're not spending those resources on informing our communities,' Haggerty said. Past opposition includes law enforcement, which media lawyer Jon Albano said was concerned that its ability to investigate a crime that has been in the news could be stymied if they aren't able to subpoena a reporter to find out who they've spoken with. 'In general, there's probably some other way they can figure out how to get to that source or get to that information, but it's kind of a shortcut to subpoena the reporter and say, 'Where did you get this information?'' Albano said. While concerns have existed in the past about shield laws potentially unduly protecting sources in criminal investigations, 41 states and Washington, D.C. have a press shield law, Krockmalnic said. 'The sky has not fallen anywhere there. It will not fall here. And we know that authorities in those jurisdictions regularly and successfully prosecute crimes that are reported on by the press despite the existence of a robust shield law,' Krockmalnic said. 'But here in Massachusetts, sources provide their information at their own peril. They know that their names and information that they provide can be demanded by the government or by private litigants and must rely on the press's ability and funds to fight on their behalf to try to convince the court that we deserve protection.' The bill defines a 'covered journalist' as 'a person who regularly and credibly gathers, prepares, collects, photographs, records, writes, edits, reports, investigates, or publishes news or information in a professional manner that concerns local, national, or international events or other matters of public interest for dissemination to the public.' 'It is our intention to not overly constrain how a journalist or journalism or the act of newsgathering is defined in legislation,' Krockmalnic said. 'If you are plausibly engaged in the act of newsgathering, then the law should apply to you.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
