Quoted: Tash and Brown’s comments get an endorsement from Kathleen Bartzen Culver, who directs the Center for Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
A government loan doesn’t automatically cause a conflict of interest, she said. But “I would . . . ask what [a] local news organization will do to counteract any potential conflict.” Her suggestion: “Any news organization that takes funds should report on that and reassure readers that they will continue to see fair, hard-hitting reporting, including on the government’s approach to an economy wrecked by an epidemic.”