Officials Give Mixed Reviews to Cable Coverage

Some City Council members, bristling at newspaper coverage of this city’s political turmoil, say cable television is the best thing that has ever happened to the public’s right to know.

Councilman C. L. (Clay) Bryant, now facing a recall campaign against him, said live weekly cable broadcasts of council proceedings give residents a chance to see what’s really going on. He said viewers tell him: “It’s not the same show the Progress-Bulletin is reporting.”

But Mayor Donna Smith, who has been at odds with Bryant and other members of the council, said the council looks worse on television than it does in print. “We’re coming off as a bad influence,” she said.

Because of the strained relationship with the press, the city’s then-interim city administrator, Tom Fee, several months ago established a policy requiring reporters to go through his office before speaking to other city employees. Fee, who has since returned full-time to his job as fire chief, said the policy is not intended to conceal anything, but to keep reporters from going to the wrong sources for information.

“We had patrolmen talking about the homicide rate. . . . They don’t have all that information,” Fee said.

Julio Fuentes, who took over as city administrator this week, said he will have to review the policy before making any changes.

James Fulton, editor of the daily Progress-Bulletin, a favorite target of council criticism, said the restrictions on access at City Hall have not hampered his newspaper’s coverage of city government, and he insisted his paper has been accurate and fair.

Fulton said he doesn’t regard newspapers and cable television as rivals. Television has some advantages: “After all, we can’t write down every word that is spoken during a council discussion,” he said. On the other hand, he added, newspaper readers can get a summary of what happened without sitting through a six-hour meeting.

Steven Perry, community programming director of Continental Cablevision, said his company does not try to cover Pomona City Council meetings as news. The cable broadcasts, he said, simply offer unedited, gavel-to-gavel coverage. “We’re not in the business of journalism,” he said.