Failure and the Media

Sometimes those of us in the media miss the real story. Recently, the county, with advice from the EDA, approved making application to join a number of other communities in becoming one of Michigan’s logistics hubs. The taxpayers would bear the cost. That story received fair coverage in the news. What we did not cover properly was the outrage of the taxpayers, who, within 45 days gathered more than 4400 signatures in an attempt to force the issue to a county wide vote. That is the real story – citizens rising in huge numbers to say stop the spending. Gathering that many signatures in such a short time is a remarkable event, and certainly very newsworthy. Until recently it has gone largely unreported. In the media we don’t always get it right.