After being called out by journalists for failing to disclose ties between Phil Anschutz’s family and a key player in a story covered by the Denver Gazette, which Anschutz owns, the Denver Gazette included the following disclosure in its Jan. 9 and Jan. 21 articles about a campaign to change a near-final plan for lane modifications along Alameda Avenue in Denver.
“Among those opposed to the original plan was Jill Anschutz, who lives near the project site and helped to organize a petition opposing the original design. The Denver Gazette’s parent company, Clarity Media Group, is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Anschutz Corporation.”
The disclosure wasn’t included in the Gazette’s July article, headlined, “Wash Park neighbors in uproar over Alameda ‘road-diet’ project in Denver?” Nor in its November story, “Wash Park neighbors celebrate a compromise in ‘road diet’ plan for Alameda?”
Why did the Gazette start including the disclosure in stories on the controversy?
Executive Editor Vince Bzdek didn’t return two emails seeking an explanation.
But the disclosure, which obviously should have stated more explicitly that Jill Anschutz is married to Christian Anschutz, the son of the owner of the Denver Gazette, appeared after 9News reporter Spencer Soicher called out the Gazette in a Dec. 3 piece, which was spotlighted by journalist Corey Hutchins in his weekly newsletter, Inside the News in Colorado.
Soicher wrote that the Gazette had covered the issue but not mentioned Phil Anschutz. The Gazette, Soicher reported, “did not mention that the pushback to [the traffic plan] came from the wife of Anschutz’s son. Jill Anschutz lives near the project site and organized a petition opposing the original design.”
After quoting Soicher’s piece in his newsletter, Hutchins added, “That son, Christian, is on the editorial board of the Denver Gazette.”
Did the pressure from fellow journalists prompt Bzdek or other Gazette editors to start adding a disclosure to stories about the issue when they hadn’t previously?
I asked Bzdek a bunch of questions, but that’s the one I’d really like answered.
Because if the peer pressure made a difference, more journalists might be inspired to call Bzdek out when they see problematic Gazette coverage — and not leave it to Hutchins or 9News, which may disappear as we know it this year due to a merger.
Criticizing the Gazette newspapers isn’t something local journalists — with some exceptions — like to do. (Here’s one sad story about what I mean.) And it gets more important to do so, as Anshutz’s chain of local newspapers expands in Colorado and other state news outlets teeter or fall.
I’m not saying the Gazette’s disclosure is worth much, especially because Jill Anschutz is mostly absent from the Gazette’s weak coverage itself, but the Gazette deserves some credit for publishing it.
In any case, it appears that the Gazette’s disclosure may have been a compromise between the owners or their representatives and the journalists there. Why wasn’t Jill Anschutz’s relationship to Phil Anschutz stated in the disclosure? A reader would be forgiven for thinking ownership didn’t want to name Phil’s son, Christian Anschutz, in the disclosure, perhaps at his request. But maybe some of the excellent Gazette journalists insisted on something to avoid ongoing embarrassment. (Unfortunately, they’re used to it.)
Why the Gazette would want to keep Jill Anschutz out of the coverage in the first place is beyond me because she’s featured in other reporting, even as a spokesperson for the group Act for Alameda.
Most other outlets (Denverite, Denver7, Westword, Denver Post, Fox 31) named Jill Anschutz but also touched on her role as a key opponent of the original plan and as the daughter-in-law of Phil or the wife of Christian Anschutz.
On 9News’ Next show Dec. 11, reporter Spencer Soicher, focused on Jill Anschutz’s role in a piece headlined, “A plan to make a street in Denver safer was scrapped amid opposition from Colorado’s richest man. They live in the neighborhood.” He reported, “Records obtained by 9News show that Jill Anschutz, daughter-in-law of billionaire Phil Anschutz, complained about the possibility of traffic backing up near her home, and internal e-mails show the city changed the project to ‘triage some high level community and leadership concerns.”
Other journalists writing about the Alameda traffic plan should have joined Soicher in asking questions publicly about the Gazette’s coverage of the same story they were covering.
But it looks like there will be opportunities for them to do so in the future. The Gazette’s problems aren’t going away.
CORRECTION 1/31: The name of Corey Hutchins’ newsletter was incorrect.
