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Vol. 23, No. 1/Fall 2001

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The Post-Standard Library (Syracuse, New York)
By Jennifer O'Neill

In September of 1973, in Chile, Laura Soto-Barra was working in a library that was raided by military personnel, looking for Marxist literature in a mining engineering collection.

Twenty eight years later on Sept. 11, 2001 Laura was packing for a Freedom Forum workshop she was going to be giving in South America. Despite the fears of some of her colleagues, Laura was still trying to get a flight just two days after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, DC.

"I think my trip is more relevant now than ever. Sharing information is one of the most important factors in stopping terrorism," she said in an e-mail to The Freedom Forum two days after the attacks. "I'm not afraid because I believe in freedom of speech and I know what it is NOT to have it. I also feel I have something to contribute." Despite Laura's resolve, The Freedom Forum put her trip on hold and is unsure when it will reschedule the workshops.

Charlene 

            Wheeler, Johnathan Croyle, Laura Soto-Barra and Lauri DwyerCharlene Wheeler, Johnathan Croyle, Laura Soto-Barra and Lauri Dwyer.
Bonnie Ross and Jan DempseyBonnie Ross and Jan Dempsey.

Laura received her undergraduate library degree in Chile in 1973 and her Masters degree from the University of Toronto in 1990. A seasoned librarian with international experience in different types of libraries, she started as a mining engineering librarian at the University of Chile.

Laura began her American adventure at The Florida Times Union in Jacksonville, Florida. Laura started as the library systems administrator in 1997 and when she left in January 2000 she was library director.

At The Post-Standard, she is the paper's first assistant managing editor/library. Laura participates in the management meetings in addition to the daily news meetings. She is also a member of the Editorial Board.

The staff at The Post-Standard library consists of Bonnie Ross (librarian, MLS), Jan Dempsey (researcher), Charlene Wheeler (library systems administrator), Lauri Dwyer (library assistant) and Johnathan Croyle (library assistant), who works part time.

"The Post-Standard library prides itself on having the interest and encouragement of its management," Laura said. This has led to the acquisition and development of new informational resources for the newsroom.

The library has an excellent relationship with the publisher Stephen Rogers. He supports library projects and is aware of the resources and new projects the library is undertaking.

Management approved desktop access for Nexis.com and Dow Jones Interactive for the entire newsroom. Editors lead the newsroom in the use of information resources, even attending training sessions for DJI, Nexis.com and the newspaper's intranet. Laura says, "Editors at The Post-Standard understand the value of information and research in journalism." This attitude has allowed her to initiate several e-commerce ventures. The Post-Standard content is being distributed by Newsbank, Gale, ProQuest and several other sub-licensors. A webhosting project (http://syracuse.com) is under way.

Laura also credits the editors at The Syracuse Newspapers (owners of The Post-Standard and several other Syracuse-area newspapers) with being attuned to new developments in information. She said, "The management is forward thinking and up to speed when it comes to library issues. This makes The Syracuse Newspapers an exciting place to work."

Staff members are encouraged to actively participate in the information gathering to help reporters write better stories. The library staff participates in the process, doing research at different levels: daily, weekly planning, and daily news meetings. Researchers are credited in the newspaper for significant contributions, especially in series or major projects. One librarian has a weekly column in the Technology section another has a weekly guide of web sites on specific topics.

The Post-Standard library was ahead of the pack when it came to electronic archiving and achieving a partnership with the newsroom. In 1986, the newspaper established the very first SAVE library. Some other newspapers at that time had begun archiving text electronically, mostly in centralized data servers maintained by archive vendors. The Post-Standard was the first Vu/Text customer to create its own local database of archived text. As a result, reporters and editors in Syracuse have been accustomed to electronic retrieval of information from computer workstations in the newsroom for 15 years.

The Post-Standard library database contains all locally produced stories, including obituaries, letters to the editor, anniversary and wedding announcements from The Post-Standard, as well as the former Syracuse Herald-Journal and Sunday Herald American. SAVE is available through a web browser and can be accessed from the start menu of every PC on the newsroom network. It also can be accessed through The Post-Standard's intranet, called SNAP. Library staff members archive an average of 150 stories a day in addition to the 400 daily photos that they manually index and file.

Bart Pollock, managing editor/operations at The Post-Standard, says the development of SNAP in 1998 was a "collaborative effort." The management decided to play to the strengths within the various departments of the organization. Journalists led the project, identified the kind of information that would be useful and set priorities. They relied on IS professionals for technical development, infrastructure and programming expertise. Librarians obtained, organized and updated information resources. They involved staff artists in designing user interfaces and used the staff development manager to assist with training.

Instead of creating a cadre of elite newsroom experts, they tried to level the playing field for computer-assisted reporting by making sophisticated data analysis tools easy to use and available to everyone. Teaching traditional CAR skills with spreadsheets and database management programs a secondary goal. The primary objective was the development of a newsroom intranet.

Laura says they add new information or update databases and documents in SNAP every week. Those improvements become part of a permanent resource, not dependent on the privately held knowledge of an expert, but the common property of the entire newsroom.

The forward thinking environment continues at The Post-Standard. "We are proud of what we have built, but aware that it will change, perhaps even beyond our recognition, as the years go on and new information resources are developed to meet the needs of journalists in the future," a memo written in September about SNAP by Pollock, states. "I like to think that our greatest accomplishment is not what we have created, but what we have started."


Jennifer O'Neill is the Library Director at The Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville, Florida. You can contact her at joneill@jacksonville.com.