I don’t know what the editors are thinking about down at The Kansas City Star these days, but they certainly appear to be losing their grip on timely news.
At 1:15 p.m. today, The Star posted on its website a headline “Ozarks man used racial slur, tried to run over black traveler at Wal-Mart, police say.”
Not all stories The Star carries under the “Latest News” category are local, but when stories are written by Star staff members, I think it’s reasonable to expect them to be local.
I got a surprise on that front when I clicked on the Ozarks story, which was under the by-line of Star staff member Max Londberg. As I started reading the story, I immediately had questions. The first sentence was, “An Ozarks man targeted an out-of-town truck driver in a racially fueled attack, police records indicate.”
What town? Kansas City? Independence?
The second sentence didn’t help much: “Steve Pennington of Conway, Mo., allegedly tried to run over a black man multiple times with his SUV and then pulled out a knife and pursued him on foot, Lebanon police and several witnesses reported.”
The Lebanon reference was the first indication this was not a local story. Londberg didn’t say where either Conway or Lebanon is, but I checked and they are northeast of Springfield.
So, this incident occurred a long way from Kansas City.
Londberg then went on to describe what happened — Pennington, an obvious racist and loon, tried to run down the black man, whom he’d never met, in a Wal-Mart parking lot after accusing him of stealing some items from the store.
The biggest surprise in this story, however, came in the 12th paragraph — third from the end — when I found the incident occurred in September!
Actually, it occurred on Sept. 3, but Londberg didn’t report that because, I assume, he realized people would quickly compute that the story was more than three months old. In “breaking news” time, that’s synonymous with antiquity.
Not only was Londberg writing about history, then, he was also writing about an incident that occurred 175 miles from Kansas City!
Another galling aspect of this misadventure is that Londberg put his byline on the story, as if he did the original reporting and writing. Not so. A quick Google search showed that Londberg merely rewrote a Springfield News-Leader story from Sept. 7. No way he deserved a by-line. The whole thing is a sham.
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The ultimate wonder about all this, obviously, is why the hell is The Star wasting time on an outdated, downstate story when there aren’t nearly enough reporters to cover what’s going on in the Kansas City area?
Besides City Hall, The Star has stopped covering other local governments regularly, and its coverage of local school districts is just about zilch. (I can’t remember the last time I saw a story about the Kansas City School Board, which used to be covered religiously.) Crime coverage is haphazard and, for the most part, superficial, and the paper seldom covers appearances by noteworthy authors and national newsmakers.
The focus now is on targeted, in-depth stories, like the secrecy in Kansas series. That’s certainly a valid way to go in the absence of a hefty reporting staff, but it makes it especially curious that editors gave one of their precious few local reporters — Londberg — a couple of hours to waste on a story so old it should be on parchment.
If The Star plans on continuing to dredge up old news and try to pass it off as current, it should at least come clean and put it under a new heading. I suggest this: “Old News, Perhaps of Passing Interest.”
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Note: Minutes after I published this post, The Star removed the Ozarks story from the “latest news” category and put it under the more general “News” heading.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
Jim: a sad commentary on the state of local journalism within the shell of a former great newspaper.
Welcome to the Comments Dept., Randy.
I do not enjoy hammering The Star, where I had 36 excellent years, but some of the things I see are indefensible.
Speaking of the Star’s (many) weaknesses, how about this headline that is online right now: “Former Jackson County exec Sanders used disabled friend to run illegal kickback scheme.”
It should at least be modified to read “Former Jackson County exec Sanders ALLEGEDLY used disabled friend to run illegal kickback scheme.” Regardless of how things look for Sanders, he is still entitled to his day in court before the Star convicts him.
Pretty bold, indeed, of a newspaper that, in a headline last month, said David Jungerman was “never suspect in slaying of lawyer.” I guess they’re finding their “voice.”
It’s not bold or finding their “voice;” it’s unethical. It’s simply unfair to Sanders to blare in the headline that what he did is illegal when (as far as we know) he hasn’t even been charged with a crime yet.
At a minimum, the Star needs to add “alleged” to the headline.
Hi, James …
You’ve asked the question – and you’re from the business. You tell us: it makes no sense for the Star to run an article from a distant location from a distant time about race. Yet someone intentionally approved the article – who and for what reason? And someone pulled it down – who and for what reason?
Of all the things the Star could have written about, and then retracted, they chose this. What is the process that allowed this to happen? And is it common practice for a reporter to literally steal content from another source?
Show some transparency, KC Star, pull back the curtain and show us how you operate!
They didn’t “pull it down” or retract it; they moved it from one heading to another.
Race has nothing to do with it.
It’s for the clicks, Michael. McClatchy is evaluating reporters on how many readers their stories get (https://twitter.com/byrosenberg/status/862751157327806464?lang=en). That’s why you can always tell a Lisa Gutierrez story from its headline. And that’s why a local reporter is writing up a news item from Virginia: http://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/article188764384.html#storylink=twt_staff
Seems like there is a vetting process by which these stories are approved; I would imagine they are provided to the larger McClatchy network, too. But it is a waste of local resources, which has me stirring in my grave.
It’s clickbait. Reporters are now evaluated by how many clicks their stories get.
That is jaw dropping stuff, Mr. Nelson. They’ve lost their moorings down at 18th and Grand. You are right to be stirring in your grave.
Who is the editor who approved this racial story based on the criteria it would “attract extraordinary readership”? And what makes the Star think such a racial story would “attract extraordinary readership”?
Because KCMO has a large black population that would be guaranteed to read the story. Unfortunately, they might not also read far enough to see that this is not a local story and you wonder why a cooperating victim is gunned down for no reason? Stories like this could certainly generate a demand for retribution from someone looking to rationalize their criminal acts.
I recall reading a story out of DC that I originally read in The Post. A few hours later I saw a similar story in The Star using identical quotes, but making it appear as if the Star writers had done the interviews. Only at the bottom of the story did it mention that it had included some content from The Post.