Washington Courts: Judicial News Report Detail

Twenty-five Years of Clippings

What should be done to make Judicial News a better, more reader-friendly product?

Not much, according to readers who responded to a survey distributed recently by the publication.

"Best thing since sliced bread!" a probation officer wrote on his survey form.
"Great as it stands!" a judge declared.
"It's not broken--please don't fix it!" another judge implored.

Though only 55 of the publication's 770 subscribers returned survey forms, those that did came up with some interesting responses. For example, a quarter of the respondents said they liked the publication, but they were not interested in paying a subscription fee to get it.

A quarter century

Collecting and distributing clippings to members of the state's judicial community and other friends of the court, is not new to the state Office of the Administrator for the Courts. It was probably during the early-to-late 70's, when Phil Winberry was the state court administrator, that the agency began pumping out periodic collections of clippings to its constituents.

Laboriously produced on Gutenberg-era photo copy machines, clippings were mailed at monthly intervals. For awhile, subscribers paid a fee for the service--about $10 a year--but the agency gave up that practice after engaging in several yes-I-did-no-you-didn't disputes concerning subscription payments. Then, many called it the "clipping service." Many still do.

Early efforts

Some of the early efforts were slap-dash affairs. Clippings were arranged this way and that, and identifying names of newspapers were scribbled over each clip. After they were photo-copied, the packets were stapled at one corner and thrown into a mail sack. In one version, clippings were painstakingly cut and pasted to appear like original, typeset material.

But it was extremely labor-intensive and Howard Primer, Winberry's successor, discontinued the service for much of 1981. When readers asked for its return, he asked his staff for advice. A memo proposed a simple solution: give copies to the presidents of the dozen or more judicial associations, and leave it up to them to copy and distribute the packets to their members. Primer returned the memo with a succinct, handwritten reply: "I concur."

But it didn't work. Soon after, Jim Larsen was chosen to succeed Primer as administrator. Where ever he went, judges, administrators, clerks and others pressured him to add them to the clippings mailing list. Soon, OAC--then, it was called "AFC"--was mailing as many clipping packets as it ever had.

With the urging of Larsen's successor, Mary McQueen, the product was totally revamped in the late 80's. First named Judicial Clippings, it displayed clips in a vertical, magazine format. A pre-printed cover page carried the agency's then-new, designer logo and provided space for a feature clip and "teasers" highlighting other articles in the packet. Neatly typed titles identified the origin of each clipping, and clippings were run on each side of the page.

New element

A new element was added: original articles, written by OAC staffers. Meant to serve as a sort of statewide court employee newsletter, the articles described program initiatives of local and state courts, and statewide judicial associations. Produced by the agency's public information section, originally the publication came out every Monday. Later, after it was renamed Judicial News, it was issued only twice a month.

Original articles were written and produced by a succession of public information "interns" who served temporary, six-month terms with the agency. Then as now, agency receptionists pasted up the clippings, then passed them on to the mailroom crew for reproduction. For them, it was a chance to step up. If they could stay sane while pasting several hundred clippings each week--in between the four to five hundred phone calls they handled each day--they had a good chance of promoting up to other positions in the agency.

Without modern technology, production of the publication would have been impractical, even impossible--it would have taken too many hands and too much time to clip and collate, then hand-staple and mail the book. Even now, the part-time work of several people is required to write, edit, paste up and print the publication.

Today's publication

Today, a modern phone system takes much of the pressure off of the receptionist, giving her more time to cut and paste. Run by skilled operators, a computerized Xerox machine prints and collates each page, adds back and front covers, then binds each book. The 30-foot-long machine copies images of each page onto its "memory" then transfers them to paper. The machine also performs a kind of reproductive magic: with an operator's manipulation, it can make clippings and pictures look better than the originals. Copy quality far exceeds that of a quarter century ago.

Since 88, the purpose of the publication has remained the same: to show the judicial community what "they" are saying about "us," and to provide specialized information readers might not otherwise get.

OAC's public information officer for the past 16 years, Bob Henderson is managing editor of Judicial News. Wendy Killian, public information assistant, is its editor, using her computer to write and lay out the publication's "OAC Reports" section. The latest in a long line of agency receptionists, Connya Sheatsley has pasted up more than 75 issues of Judicial News since she joined the agency three years ago. Every two weeks, computerized reproduction services technicians Mike O'Malley and Larry Shibler take about a day each to copy and mail the product. Lynn Chakos, longtime OAC support person, also helps in the production of the publication.

The stuff it's made of...

It's an eclectic collection. One issue of Judicial News included several clippings from the Times--the New York Times, the Seattle Times and the Davenport (Washington) Times.

Each workday, OAC staffers clip four, in-state daily papers, plus newsletters, state and national professional journals and a variety of other publications. A professional clipping service provides clips from other papers across the state, as do volunteer enthusiasts who contribute clippings gathered on personal and professional trips out of state.

Gratuities are always gratefully accepted, as long as they are about courts, the people who work in them, commentaries on their role in society, and the special things they do.

It's not for everybody...

Grandfathered in years ago, many of today's Judicial News subscribers are neither judicial officers or employees. But to cut down on the use of agency resources, OAC began several years ago to restrict distribution to those who serve the judicial branch of government. To them, it is delivered free of charge, but not automatically--only to judges and court administrative personnel that ask for it.

Reader Survey Highlights:

• 52 out of 55 respondents said they regularly read "OAC Reports" feature articles.
• Top seven judicial-related clipping topics:
  • unique trial court cases
  • judicial ethics and discipline
  • state/local judicial initiatives
  • ethics
  • judicial elections/selection
  • proposed laws re: judicial system
  • judicial community "people" items
• A majority (47 respondents) feel that being published twice monthly is "about right."
• While a majority (39 respondents) would be willing to pay for a subscription to Judicial News, 14 respondents said they were not willing to pay.