by Tony Palmeri
August 16, 2001
There's no doubt that over the last several years Jim Fitzhenry has been a breath of fresh air on the Oshkosh Northwestern editorial page. The editorial page editors who immediately preceded Mr. Fitzhenry--Larry Peterson and Jim Metz--did not do as much as Fitzhenry to make the editorial page a true marketplace of ideas. Unlike his predecessors, Fitzhenry has been willing to launch pointed, signed criticisms at local elected officials and institutions (such as Representatives Gregg Underheim and Carol Owens, Senator Carol Roessler, and the Oshkosh Chamber of Commerce) that in the past were able to consider the Northwestern their personal newsletter. Peterson, I have been told, attended one of my 1996 state assembly campaign debates against Gregg Underheim and literally took notes at the debate on Underheim's office stationery. And while Jim Metz expressed anger at and frustration with the Oshkosh "Joe Lunchbuckets," Fitzhenry actually has an appreciation for Oshkosh's working class tradition and has tried hard to make sure working class views are represented on the editorial page.
Fitzhenry is no longer the Editorial Page editor, but even in his new position as Managing Editor he has continued to write a column appearing every Monday. I don't expect to agree with Fitzenry every week, and I usually end up thinking he has gone either too far in his criticisms of County and School Board officials (i.e. Jane Van De Hey, Joe Maehl, Ron Heilmann, former School Board President LuAnn Bird), but not far enough in his criticisms of the Oshkosh Common Council. I have to believe, for example, that if County Executive Jane Van De Hey was found to have attempted to use the County Attorney to "nail to the cross" a resident whose web site she didn't like, Fitzhenry would come close to calling for her resignation. Yet when Oshkosh Mayor Jon Dell'Antonia was found to have made such an attempt, Fitzhenry's criticism of the Mayor was limited to his (Dell'Antonia's) tendency to put his foot in his mouth. Still, even when I disagree with Fitzhenry I can always count on his columns being well thought out and provocative.
The one exception is on the discussion of downtown redevelopment. There Fitzhenry, like the paper's executive editor Stewart Rieckman, seems unwilling or unable to focus the editorial page discussion in a way that might actually encourage healthy downtown development. Take Fitzhenry's August 13, 2001 column ("Downtown Plan Faces Critical Juncture") as an example. Fitzhenry does two things in that essay that are in my opinion the major features of the newspaper's "dumbing down" of the downtown discussion.
The first is the need to "categorize," sometimes in demeaning ways, the various opinions toward downtown development. Back on May 6, Executive Editor Rieckman identified 4 categories of Main St. opinions:
*A small number who think Main St. can return to the retail center it was in 1969, complete with department stores.
*Those who want to do nothing and let downtown die.
*Those who support revitalization but disagree with some components of the plan and want to slow down.
*Those who believe in the vision created by the community in conjunction with consultants and want it on a fast track.
Fitzhenry labels his own categorizations as "threats." These "threats" are the "do-gooders" ( " . . . the same inbred group of community hobnobs who are now embracing downtown revitalization after holding back progress for years"), the "conventioneers" whose interest in downtown is obvious, the "do nothings" who " . . . seem to confuse their dislike for Mayor Jon Dell'Antonia with anything proposed to improve downtown and the central city" and the "pie-in the skiers" who keep waiting for some sure sign that redevelopment will actually happen.
The problem with such categorizations is that they are based on no formal or even informal surveying of the people of Oshkosh. We have literally no idea whether such categories of opinion actually exist or are merely the fantasies of the editorial page writers. Why not send a reporter out to try and find out in a more rigorous manner what kinds of attitudes about downtown actually exist and how strong or weak are those attitudes?
Worse, we are never told who exactly is in each of the categories. Who exactly are these "do-nothings?" Who are the "do-gooders?" Absent the naming of names for each category, it becomes almost impossible for a reader to respond. It would be like a teacher, on the first day of class, announcing that there are "4 types of students at this school." There are the "brown nosers," the "burn outs," the "jocks," and the "good students." Imagine being a student in that classroom. How could you communicate with such a teacher? If you give a speech in class supporting the decriminalization of marijuana, is he going to conclude that you are a burn out? If you compliment the teacher on delivering a stimulating lecture, is he going to conclude that you are a brown nose? If you request a day off from class to participate in a track and field event, is he going to conclude that class isn't important to you because you are a jock? And what exactly does this teacher mean by "good student?" Students who get high grades? Or students who sit quiet and agree with the teacher?
By analogy, if Jon Dell'Antonia--who for years told us that the real downtown was Koeller St.--tells us that we must now embrace downtown revitalization, is he one of the "do-gooders" that Mr. Fitzhenry is talking about? If a person would like to see an expanded convention center downtown, does that reduce her to a "conventioneer?" Does being opposed to the LDR plan, which is after all only one way of conceiving of downtown redevelopment, make a person a "do nothing?"
My point is that categorizing individuals in the manner that Fitzhenry and Riekman seem to do when they are discussing downtown issues does nothing to encourage thoughtful discussion or help to build a consensus. Rather, such categorizations only create defensiveness (e.g. "no, I'm not a conventioneer!") or withdrawal (e.g. "I'm not going to tell Fitzhenry my opinion if he is only going to take it and put me in an undesirable category"). If editorial writers are somewhat like teachers--and I think a good argument can be made that they are--then the worst thing that writer/teacher could do is categorize his readership in a way that produces defensiveness or withdrawal. You won't find many outstanding teacher award recipients who categorize (and as a result silence) their students.
The second thing that Fitzhenry does in his essay that is part of the dumbing down of the downtown discussion is the tendency to engage in what I'll call a "heads I win, tails you lose" kind of reasoning. For example, Fitzhenry will praise the LDR International Downtown Revitalization Plan when it can be used to justify a downtown park, street-scaping, razing an eyesore, or other projects supported by the newspaper editorial board. Yet when the proposed office building for the 100 block of North Main St., a type of project for which not a shred of support can be found in the LDR report (the report consistently urges projects for Main St. that are consistent with the block's historic character), is supported by the editorial board, the LDR report is treated as if it does not even exist! Instead, Fitzhenry reduces opposition to the office building as the work of those who dislike Jon Dell'Antonia. Huh? Isn't it possible and in fact likely that many of the opponents of the 100 block office building have actually read the LDR report and realize that an office building on that block will set back the cause of downtown revitalization by miring the city in the same kind of "suburban" solution to downtown that has gotten the area in so much trouble in the first place?
The same kind of "heads I win, tails you lose" reasoning is found in Fitzhenry's take on how to build community support for downtown redevelopment. On the one hand, he praises the LDR consultants for hosting town meetings and "fostering a spirit of community inclusiveness and input into the process." On the other hand, when former Common Councilor Matt O'Malley would hold town hall meetings to discuss downtown issues, the Northwestern would not even send a reporter as such an event somehow was not "news." Likewise, when sincere and thoughful citizens urge the city to take a look at a City Hall or water park for the 100 block, these ideas are referred to by Fitzhenry as "zany." What he doesn't seem to understand is that if the LDR report is truly the guiding force in the revitalization process, the only project for the 100 block that is truly "zany" is the office complex. Had the common council attempted to hold a town hall meeting to gauge support for the office building, "zany" would have been one of the more polite terms they would have heard used to describe it.
"Categorizing" opinions and engaging in "heads I win, tails you lose" reasoning are two ways that Mr. Fitzhenry [and the Oshkosh Northwestern Editorial board in general ] succeed in dumbing down the discussion of downtown redevelopment in our community. I believe the newspaper could serve a much more vital leadership role on downtown redevelopment by doing the following:
1. Insist on an open redevelopment process: District Attorney Joseph Paulus' investigation of the process used to secure a development project for the 100 block demonstrated that the city of Oshkosh Common Council and city staff did as much as they could to minimize public input in the project. If the editorial board truly believes in "community inclusiveness and input" then it must demand that the Council and city staff end their practice of hiding behind the most narrow possible interpretation of state statutes to justify keeping the public "out of the loop" on major development projects.
2. Provide editorial support for "smart growth" discussions: In a previous essay, I argued that "smart growth" is an opinion about dowtown redevelopment not mentioned by Mr. Rieckman in his musings about downtown. Nor does Mr. Fitzhenry mention the smart growth model in his essay. In Green Bay, by contrast, the editorial boards of both the Green Bay Press Gazette and the Green Bay News Chronicle have encouraged a discussion of smart growth planning. The Press Gazette has opined that smart growth is key to Green Bay's future. They have even taken the lead in explaining smart growth principles to readers.
3. Host town hall meetings: If the Northwestern is really interested in what citizens think about downtown, then perhaps the editorial board should sponsor community forums and town halls at which people could participate. If nothing else, the events would give the editorial writers more "categories" with which to label divergent views!
4. Add reader representatives to the editorial board: The new Executive Editor of the Appleton Post-Crescent recently announced several steps that will be taken to make the P-C more "reader friendly." One step that I find intriguing is the following: "The addition of a reader representative to the Editorial Board, starting in September. Our first representative will be announced on the page in a few days. We'll rotate new readers into the job every three months." In terms of the discussion of downtown redevelopment, the addition of reader representatives on the Northwestern editorial board would be very refreshing. Perhaps the Northwestern could find representatives of the various "categories" discussed by Fitzhenry and Rieckman and allow those reps to actually have space to argue their positions.
Mr. Fitzhenry's August 13 column closes with an important point. He says that downtown revitalization won't happen " . . . if the city's various political factions go back to their old ways." He is of course correct. What he doesn't point out is that the Northwestern itself has for years been one of the "political factions" retarding fruitful revitalization. In his time as editor, I think Mr. Fitzenry has done much to move the paper away from its historical tendency to "dumb down" discussions of most issues of importance to the city. All I am asking is that he does the same when it comes to the issue of downtown redevelopment.