Bookstore Reporter Program Honored

A cable TV program about the importance of protecting the confidentiality of news sources that was produced and moderated by Phil Bevis, the owner of Arundel Books in Seattle, Washington, has won an award from the Alliance for Community Media, an organization committed to expanding public access to electronic media. The program, "Shining the Light on Reporters and the Law," part of a series of reporter talks sponsored by the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression and the MLRC Institute, won a "Best of the Northwest" Award in the "Democracy in Action" category and will now become an entry in the Alliance's national competition.

The 2008 Seattle event is one of series of programs in which reporters visit bookstores to talk about the role that confidential sources play in reporting. The series launched in 2006, when concern was high about the efforts of public officials to force reporters to reveal the names of their sources. (This year, a federal "shield" law to protect sources has been reintroduced in Congress year as the Free Flow of Information Act [H.R. 985]).

In most cases, the reporter programs have been held in bookstores, but Bevis asked the Downtown Seattle Republican Club to sponsor the event in a downtown hotel. The discussion featured four journalists, including the publisher of the Seattle Times; Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna; two area Congressmen, Republican Dave Reichert and Democrat Jay Inslee; and media attorney Bruce Johnson of Davis Wright Tremaine. The program was broadcast statewide on several cable access channels and is viewable online.

To date, more than 40 bookstores have held reporter programs. The latest were hosted this week by Talking Leaves Books in Buffalo and Robin's Book Store in Philadelphia. Future events are planned for R.J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, Connecticut; Books & Books in Coral Gables, Florida; Annapolis Bookstore in Maryland; Page One in Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Visible Voice Books in Cleveland, Ohio.

The talks are part of the MLRC Institute's First Amendment Speakers Bureau, which was created in 2005 to educate the public about the First Amendment. Development of the Speakers Bureau has been funded by a grant from the McCormick Foundation.

Learn more about the award-winning Seattle event and the participation of Congressmen Reichert and Inslee from our BTW archives.