AFTER DEADLINE

By Jerry Burris
Advertiser Editorial Editor

While on the Mainland not long ago, I dropped by the annual convention of the National Conference of Editorial Writers.

As the name not so subtly suggests, this is an organization of editorial writers, editors, columnists and others in the opinion racket.

Now, before you start snickering, this can be quite a lively gang once you get them out of their Ivory Towers.

The conference covered a variety of topics, from First Amendment issues to techniques in handling readers and bosses. One of the livelier panels focused on something you'd think everyone already had a handle on: How editorial topics and opinions are created.

There was a lot of curiosity in the group how others came up with editorial topics and how they decided what they thought about them. There was quite a range.

Some papers leave the decision virtually up to the individual editorial writers. As one editor said: "We come in, sit down at our desks and start writing." At the end of the day, he sorts through what has been produced, chooses the best as editorials and converts the others into columns.

Another editor said her newspaper follows a rigorous and deliberate system, in which the entire editorial board sits down, kicks topics around and then works out in great detail what will be said. Some in the audience said this sounds like writing an editorial by committee, hardly ever a recipe for brilliance.

If people in the game are curious about how others do it, it occurred to me that readers might be interested in how The Advertiser comes up with its daily editorials. Our critics might suggest editorial writing might be thrown in with those other two things one should never watch being made: Laws and sausages.

But here goes, anyway:

On a daily basis, the first cut at choosing editorials for the next day's paper happens each morning, as the core editorial department sits around a table and goes through the paper and the news of the day. That would be myself, editorial writers Yasmin Anwar and Dave Polhemus, editor John Strobel and cartoonist Dick Adair.

To broaden our thinking, we meet each Wednesday for an hour with a rotating group of community members, who bring their own ideas and experience to the table — a valuable addition.

But typically, we'll come up with a short list of three to six subjects and talk about what our approach will be in general terms.

Once those ideas are shaped up, we send a brief message to Editor Saundra Keyes and Publisher Mike Fisch as a sort of heads-up on what will be coming. Keyes will sometimes sit in on the meeting or come by to discuss editorials-in-the-making.

Then comes a period of thinking, research, checking the clips. Most of the editorials are written by mid-to-late afternoon and then edited. Full copies of the editorials are then sent on to Keyes and Fisch for review.

Assuming there aren't any major last-minute changes (which rarely happens) the editorials are then fine-edited for style and length and put into the paper.

As soon as that is done, we begin thinking about the next day.

Occasionally, on major topics — political endorsements would be a prime example — the process is more formal. The day-to-day editorial board will sit down with Fisch, Keyes and perhaps others to hammer out our position.

And, in case you are wondering, the editorials are unsigned because they reflect the collective thinking of the editorial board, not the work of a single person.