Thursday, September 10, 2009

Congratulations to the Washington County Quorum Court for voting down the permit for a limestone quarry

I was busy last night and didn't watch the Quorum Court meeting live on Government Channel, City 16 on Cox Cable, until it was rerun this morning. I tuned in and got to hear maybe the last half of the comments. It was awe-inspiring!
I knew the meeting would run long and didn't bother to look for a story about it in either newspaper. Back during the newspaper war in the 1980s-early 90s in Little Rock when the final press run for the city edition didn't begin until 1:30 a.m., the story would have been published. And there was always the "chaser," when the press was stopped as soon as printing plates with the latest version of the story was ready to hang on the press. That allowed some portion of people who got the city edition to read the story even if the meeting didn't end until after the press deadline.
That will never happen in this market. But breaking news on the Internet is an obvious way for many people to get the news. Too bad radio stations and TV stations are mostly just automated parroting of prepared programming through the night.
They certainly COULD put the news out in a timely manner if they chose to have an all-night reporter and technician on duty.
I don't know of any bloggers who got the word out immediately after the meeting. But I am sure that email and phone calls spread the word among those most concerned about it!

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