Labor & Employment Law

Website Supports Access to Gulf Spill Information

By James Parks

Concerned about reports that members of the media are being denied access to people and places they need to cover the largest oil spill in U.S. history, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) has launched a new website.

Visitors to the site, www.aftra.com/access4media.htm, will be able to monitor published and firsthand accounts of reporters being denied access or censored in their coverage of the BP oil rig explosion and spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Journalists also can link to safety resources and related information to assist them in safely covering the story.

AFTRA is encouraging newspersons who have been denied access to information by the government or a corporation to share their stories via the new website or by e-mailing stories to access4media@aftra.com. 

Says AFTRA President Roberta Reardon:

We are concerned about continuing reports that journalists are being denied access to sources and public places necessary for them to fully cover this important story. The causes and effects of the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon must be uncovered and analyzed, and our only hope of getting to the truth is through investigative journalism by professionals with unfettered and unfiltered access to the sources.

AFTRA represents broadcast journalists, entertainers and other on-air performers

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on July 02, 2010 (boomark / email).