I was just cleaning up my favorites sites on Internet Explorer. I have not updated my links section on this blog in awhile. I use these favorites for both my work as a fire department PIO and as a marketing and public relations professional for a national not for profit organization. Over the weekend I will hopefully add some of these new sites to my links page.
I present to you the most often visited PR sites that I rely on for information.
I was recently looking at the “competition’s” websites as I often do to see what other departments are posting and updating. There are some really great fire department sites on Long Island. Unfortunately it dawned on me that even some of the top sites, and even in their contact areas, do not list an email address to reach.
There was a time in life when folks would not receive a “free pass” for their indiscretions. Recently I was pounding away on the computer in the conference room at the firehouse when two of the younger guys walked in and sat at the table to shoot the breeze.
One of the guys was talking about a friend who cheated by hanging out with his girlfriend. When he confronted the friend, he admitted to his misdeeds and was forgiven. He got a “free pass.” In my younger days a similar situation would have ended with fists flying. That might not have been the correct resolution to the problem, but it did replace the “free pass.”
I have always feared the comma. Am I using it in the right places, not using it when I should, overusing it? There has been a lifelong cloud hanging over me in terms of my relationship with this grammatical little guy.
To come up with some rules of thumb pertaining to the comma, we direct your attention today to the comma guru, Don Ranly, who is a professor emeritus of the Missouri School of Journalism. Hopefully we can all gain from his commatic expertise.
One of the more hotly contested Senate races taking place this fall is in Nevada where Sharon Angle is trying to unseat majority leader Harry Reid. I think it is safe to say that Angle, who was leading Harry Reid and is now trailing slightly in the polls, is starting to be looked upon as a “wingnut.” She certainly is not making any new friends in the media. Angle held a so called “press conference” recently in which she invited the media but bizarrely refused to even acknowledge their presence when they tried to ask her questions after the event ended.
One of the challenges of writing a daily firematic blog and serving as a PIO of a volunteer department is making sure that my opinions do not affect my department negatively. This is what I must do regarding the general public’s perception of my department and this is also what I must do in the blogosphere.
I do report on my own department and how we handle public relations and crisis communications occasionally, but I would, in my own opinion, be a fool to make my department look foolish to the folks from across the country who read this blog.
Ever since the enactment of The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 confusion has reined in our profession about exactly who and what is covered in the law, and what we can and cannot report on and take pictures of. I think allot of what we hear is fact but allot of the interpretation of the legislation is based on “folk law” handed down since the passing of the bill.
I recently received an e-mail from a fellow PIO and newsman asking for assistance in mucking through the separation of fact from fiction.
To volunteer fire departments across the country local community newspapers are our bread and butter vehicle for getting news out to the community. Unfortunatly, like many other print publications, local papers are also suffering through hard times. I think it is our responsibility to tell as many members of our communities as possible that these new sources are vital to spreading the local word.
My “office” at the firehouse is in a corner of the conference room. I have a desk against one of the walls. On the wall in front of my desk is a bulletin board that has all the current 2010 new clippings from press the department has received. It’s just about full, and that’s both good and bad. Good for the press we have received on stories concerning fire prevention, community award ceremonies, parade appearance and member recognition but bad for those clipping that resulted in devastating fires and MVA’s or loss of life.
Anyone who has been in the public relations field for any length of time has used the AP Stylebook to help them at least try to look literate. For those novices a little background -
The Stylebook was first produced in 1953 as a stapled collection of rules totaling 60 pages, and has grown to a publication of more than 450 pages today. The book’s creation was prompted in part by a technical change in the way the AP transmitted news as well as a need for consistency among a worldwide editorial staff that produced stories for newspapers with a variety of style preferences. There have been major periodic revisions over the past few decades, the last in 2008, and the print edition is now updated annually.
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