This blog is designed to give readers a glimpse of our editorial-page operation and how we make our decisions. We’ll let you know who we’re meeting with, what they’re telling us, what events and issues we’re looking at. We’ll also pass on information and observations that may not make our print editions. In addition to the editorial board members who post on this blog, the board includes Publisher David Zeeck, Executive Editor Karen Peterson and Managing Editor Dale Phelps.
Editorial board bloggers
Editorial page editor Patrick O’Callahan oversees the online and printed opinion sections of The News Tribune. He came to The News Tribune in 1987 and has worked at Washington newspapers since 1979. E-mail him at patrick.ocallahan@thenewstribune.com
Editorial writer Cheryl Tucker, in addition to writing commentary, manages the daily production of the editorial and op-ed pages and edits letters to the editor. She began her journalism career in 1974 at a Virginia newspaper and came to The News Tribune in 1978. E-mail her at cheryl.tucker@thenewstribune.com.
Editorial writer Kim Bradford manages the online opinion section of The News Tribune and writes commentary. She joined The News Tribune in 2005 after working 11 years at newspapers in Washington and Maryland. E-mail her at kim.bradford@thenewstribune.com.
Guest bloggers
Editor emeritus David Seago retired from The News Tribune in 2008 after 41 years at The News Tribune. E-mail him at sds99@harbornet.com.
Richard Davis’ column on state politics frequently runs in the print edition of The News Tribune. He was president of the Washington Research Council, a statewide think tank, from 1986 through 2006. Currently, as a principal with The Simeon Partnership, Inc. he coordinates the activities of the Washington Alliance for a Competitive Economy, a business coalition founded by the Research Council, the Association of Washington Business and the Washington Roundtable.
Karen Irwin of University Place, a mother of four, has been a frequent contributor to The News Tribune's print editions. She has also written for Seattle's Child, Puget Sound Parent, the Tacoma Weekly, the Fayetteville Observer Times and the political blog Right Meets Left. She graduated from California Lutheran University with a degree in English literature and is currently working toward a history degree.
Michael Allen, professor of history at the University of Washington Tacoma, was born and raised in Ellensburg. He served with the U.S. Marines in Vietnam from 1969-70. He has written five books, including the prize-winning "Patriot's History of the United States: From Columbus' Great Discovery to the War on Terror," "Rodeo Cowboys in the North American Imagination" and "Western Rivermen, 1763-1861: Ohio and Mississippi Boatmen and the Myth of the Alligator Horse." Allen lives in Tacoma and Ellensburg and has three children.
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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition. It is the 12th and final of a monthly series on The News Tribune’s core institutional values, commemorating the newspaper’s 125th anniversary this year.
By the mid-1980s, Tacoma’s Union Station was a sad old relic. A domed-and-vaulted masterpiece of neoclassical design when it opened in 1911, the train depot was decrepit, filthy and probably headed for a date with the wrecking ball.
Then, in 1985, a letter to the editor changed everything. The author, Seymour Johnson, urged U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks to throw his weight behind a plan to renovate the old station into a federal courthouse.
Dicks took note. Eight years later, a gloriously rehabilitated Union Station – its copper dome shining like a newly minted penny – reopened for a second tour of duty as a great architectural landmark. Its resurrection spurred the rebirth of the surrounding district, now a regional showcase that features the Museum of Glass, the Washington State History Museum and Tacoma Art Museum.
And just across the street, the University of Washington Tacoma.
The publication of that letter demonstrates a newspaper’s unmatched power to focus attention on big problems, mobilize action and bring about change. In this case, the champion of change was a letter writer – a “citizen journalist.” The newspaper’s opinion section was the vehicle of his message.
In response to the August shooting death of a hiker by a 14-year-old hunter, state legislators are talking about reinstating a law that requires young hunters to be accompanied by an adult.
The state had that requirement until 1994. Lawmakers did away with the rule then, but no one seems to remember why.
“That’s one of the damned good questions to which nobody’s got an answer,” Ed Owens, a lobbyist for the 56,000-member Hunters Heritage Council, told the Spokesman-Review. “We would absolutely support restoration of the limitations that were in effect in 1994.”
Come on. Someone has to know why the rule was struck from the books. Or why lawmakers didn't respond when the state Fish and Wildlife Department asked that it be reinstated on six different occasions.
Those memory lapses are awfully convenient. If the rule had been in effect, a hiker might still be alive.
Could it be that no one wanted to take a chance on riling the politically powerful gun lobby? I can't come up with any other reason that lawmakers would think it's a good idea for there to be no age restriction on kids hunting alone.
We editorialized on the subject back when the shooting occurred. Here's what we said:
