NewsLanc’s mission evolves for the new decade

First, let us say that we are thrilled and thank the public for an estimated 50% increase in website viewers during 2009.

Second, NewsLanc has gradually been transitioning, from limiting its attention to Lancaster concerns, to providing a platform for reporting and discussing matters of importance to Lancastrians, be they local, national, or international.

NewsLanc was established three years ago as a counter measure to the Lancaster Newspapers, Inc., which had lost its journalistic way largely as a result of its involvement as a limited partner in the Penn Square Partners.

Despite a century of faithful service to the community, its standards suddenly became so compromised that the State Attorney General accused the Intelligencer Journal editor and its reporters of conducting illegal activities and a lawsuit for libel against the Lancaster Newspapers, Inc. and a columnist is now wending its way through the courts. Normally such a suit on behalf of former Commissioner Molly Henderson would be dismissed because she is considered ‘a public figure’, but apparently the Chester County judge (a change of venue was granted) has found sufficient validity to the accusations of purposeful and repeated misstatements by the newspapers to allow the suit to proceed.

The poison had spread to the LCCCA where the heavy handed conduct of Chair Ted Darcus was deplorable. Mayor Rick Gray did not distinguish himself as he played Hamlet over the convention center during his initial election campaign and then flip flopped immediately upon his election to become an ardent supporter of the project…only to flip flop once again (apparently from a pang of conscience) when he attended a commissioners meeting and called for a true feasibility report…which he later denounced and ignored.

A further ramification was the notorious witch hunt in the pose of a Grand Jury Investigation conducted by then District Attorney (and now Judge) Donald Totaro which was allowed to jump from one false accusation to more than twenty others over the course of a year by President Judge Louis Farina, an apparent attempt to discredit the County Commissioners who did not want the citizenry to the guarantee convention center debt.

(Neither did 78% of the respondents to random calls to approximately 500 Lancastrians by a national polling service engaged by Fox 43. The public overwhelmingly sided with the commissioners in opposing a county guarantee! But what is the public’s will compared to that of Penn Square Partners!)

But now that sorry era of misconduct by the publisher, editors, and some reporters of the newspapers is behind us. The Lancaster Newspapers have returned to their task of reporting what is taking place, to the extent it does not inconvenience advertisers and undermine circulation. After all, they are in business.

Our principal mission will remain to help create a better Lancaster. We will continue to expose those we consider predators and especially report on the actions and inactions of the leadership at Lancaster General Hospital, a charitable foundation that reaps over a hundred million dollars in profit largely through high insurance policy rates resulting from its market domination, yet in large part gives lip service but in fact turns it back on the health and social needs of the community. We will scrutinize the actions of Franklin & Marshall President John Fry, not so much because his initiatives are unworthy, but for the manner in which he pursues them. And the actions of the High Group will not go unnoted, although we hardly oppose ‘free’ enterprise so long as it is ‘fair’ enterprise.

More and more the Watchdog will forage daily among a half dozen important worldwide publications and mention matters of interest that would likely go otherwise unreported by the newspapers.

We want NewsLanc to increasingly become a forum for bright, knowledgeable persons from all walks of life, be they college professors or sanitation workers, sharing their special knowledge, experience and viewpoints. In that way, NewsLanc will be institutionalized and be able to serve long after the participation of any one publisher or editor.

Moreover, we will continue to nourish controversy, allowing people to take both popular and unpopular positions. At times we will even overstate our positions in order to stimulate debate on important matters.

In conclusion, NewsLanc is not meant to supplant the Lancaster Newspapers, which, on the whole, have recently re-earned our and the community’s respect. Rather we will serve as their ombudsman while providing an opportunity for Lancastrians to share their experience and thoughts with thousands of their fellows on our website.

We can only do this with your participation. We thank you in advance. Please pass the word about NewsLanc.com along to friends.