Paso Robles City Manager Ty Lewis got his settlement. Albeit a crappy one.
After denying his $2.2 million complaint with the city last August over an alleged hostile working environment Lewis said was caused by appointed—not elected—City Councilmember Chris Bausch and Bausch’s co-conspirators, Paso budged in January. Lewis received about $366,000.
Sounds like a pittance.
In fact, it actually sounds pretty standard for forcing someone into early retirement.
According to The Tribune—the community’s self-proclaimed “relentless” pursuer “of the truth”—$200,000 of that settlement was for damages. Of course, Lewis can’t talk about the settlement and neither can anyone else who was in on the deal—those pesky non-disclosure agreements really cut into my tea-time—so we’ll never know what exactly those damages were.
Maybe the Trib can tell us, and I’m sure it will try.
By my last count, the Trib had dedicated at least 24 of its news stories and multiple reporters to covering this one specific issue in Paso Robles over the last three months. That does not include opinion pieces, some of which were penned by the Trib‘s own editorial board. That’s a lot of coverage.
They’ve given us stories about naked hot tub photos, a surreptitious recording, Bausch’s cellphone, self-styled “investigative reporter” Karen Velie‘s misinformation campaign, a conspiracy, restraining orders, Public Records Act requests, legal threats, extortion allegations, an anonymous couple that became un-anonymous, exclusive interviews, fact-checking, setups, threats of violence and a citizen’s arrest, the Trib‘s pursuit of the truth, opinion pieces that were taken down— more than this office appliance could keep up with. It’s been confusing to say the least.
Has actual light been shed? I mean, did the Trib reveal a smoking gun? No.
Is that journalism’s job? Sort of.
Ferreting out the truth, talking to sources, holding truth to power, and distilling it down into something understandable for the community is absolutely journalism’s job. A play-by-play of every little piece of information? Not journalism’s job.
There’s a lot of he-said, she-said wrapped up in the stories the Trib ran and also speculation, to take a page out of the national media’s playbook.
Not to drag out something that is so last week, but a little birdie named Aaron Ochs decided to weigh in with his journalism “expertise.” He asserted that the ultimate principle of journalism is accountability.
Accountability to whom?
For him, that accountability seems to revolve around fact-checking CalCoastNews.
As a media ecosystem, SLO County has pursued that path before. Going tit for tat with Velie about what’s true and what’s not. Trying to push back against her image of being “the only, one true investigative reporter that this county has to offer, the only one tracking down the truth about how corrupt local government is.” Sound familiar?
She publishes a lot of unsubstantiated, unverifiable rumors. He-said, she-said accusations. Salacious information. Hit pieces. She isn’t great at fact-checking (the sign of a truly impeccable journalist), finding documents to back up the allegations, or attributing sources. Her ethics are questionable, and she seems to like a good personal vendetta. Libel lawsuit be damned.
It’s the definition of sensationalism, and it absolutely impacts the community. Sometimes her stories even turn out to have elements of truth, which always pisses me off.
There could be a whole fact-checking website dedicated to her stories. Maybe Ochs could start one. Oh wait, he wrote a whole book about CalCoastNews and its “fake news,” so I guess he at least practices what he preaches.
So, who is the media supposed to be accountable to? Readers. Sources. The truth. Journalism itself. Its ethical principles. Balance. Restraint.
Not clicks. But that’s where we are.
Just look at the LA Times for a good view on how the media covers stories these days. That outlet has written several stories daily about the catastrophic fires—an arguably important event to inform its readers about—for weeks. When does good coverage veer into sensational territory?
That is a question that everyone in the media should be asking, especially when it comes to once again covering the tRump administration. Did we actually learn from the mistakes we made in covering every orange “presidential” utterance during his previous term? It all sounds so important until it becomes background noise.
Why exactly is the Paso story so important again?
In case any of you were still wondering, Trib Editor Joe Tarica told New Times that it was because a sitting City Council member was accused of conspiring with a reporter to oust a city manager. It cost the city of Paso time and resources. It impacts city business and residents. It’s unusual. It matters.
It’s important and worth covering, absolutely. Trib journalists pursued it with vigor and did some good journalism along the way. But if the actual story gets lost in headline after headline—sometimes three in the same day—the story loses its importance. The community misses out on reading about other news items that don’t get covered. That’s not balance. That’s not being accountable to readers. That’s not practicing journalistic restraint.
It’s a free-for-all, and it’s unfortunate. Because the story got lost in its own importance. Δ
The Shredder might get shredded. Send paper to shredder@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Feb 6-16, 2025.
At least the Tribune hasnt print a recipe on how to make METH like new times has.