Some years ago this magazine tilted a lance at NBC for what we thought was dishonest investigative reporting. Now we do the same for Time, whose reporting on the Sununu affair clearly demonstrated they had precious little respect for truth. To us, and others, it looked like a widespread media vendetta to “get the White House chief-of-staff,” with Time in the self-appointed role of lead jackal. In their frenzied urge to discredit Sununu, their brush egregiously tarred the American Ski Federation and the honorable ceo’s of two great members of our industry, the New Hampshire resorts of Waterville Valley and Loon.
We limit ourselves here to two specific instances of distorted reporting with which to demonstrate Time’s irresponsible handling of the story.
Time’s story implied that Sununu had intervened on Loon’s behalf with the Forest Service to help Loon’s then CEO, Phil Gravink, get expansion approvals. They cited a letter Gravink had written Sununu after skiing with him at Vail during the 1989 Ski Magazine Week. The letter thanked his former Governor for his advice. Time then juxtaposed this with a report of a telephone call from Sununu to the Supervisor of the White Mountain National Forest.
Well, it turns out the advice given by Sununu to Gravink was, “Talk to your Congressman and Senators if the process isn’t working.” A civics lesson, but hardly insider advice! And, yes, Sununu had indeed called the Forest Supervisor — but what Time conveniently neglected was that the call had been made while he was Governor, long prior to his White House appointment. The Forest Service considered the call normal. Obviously! For a Governor to lend a hand to one of his state’s major tourist dollar producers in its struggles with the federal bureaucracy is a totally appropriate action. You know it is. Time! For shame!!!
The second instance was, if anything, an even more chilling example of Time’s vindictiveness. Four years ago, Waterville Valley was asked by the trustees of the Christa McAuliffe Sabbatical Trust Fund, a 501(c)3 charitable organization, to conduct an annual fund-raising celebrity ski race to benefit the trust fund. Waterville Valley was authorized to organize and run the event, acting as an agent for the trust fund. With authorization from the trust fund, Waterville Valley management opened an operating account at a local bank, and has run each year’s event through that dedicated account, which is not used for any other purpose. There is no co-mingling of funds, it is not a corporate account and it is not a Waterville Company or resort account. All expenses of the event are paid out of this account and all revenues are deposited into it. Technically, the account and all monies in it belong to the trust fund. All Sununu expenses were paid out of this account every year on exactly the same basis as for any other invited celebrity. Approximately $445,000 has been raised in four years.
These, it turns out, are the “corporate interests” that Time fingered as having paid for Sununu’s expenses to attend the charity event. Time knew these facts before they ran the story, because they had been patiently laid out and documented for them by Tom Corcoran. They ran their version anyway.
As Corcoran wrote in a letter to Time, “To state that the corporate sponsors of these fundraising events were paying for Sununu family ski vacations is not only asinine but a gross distortion of reality and the truth. And not what I told you. … You can’t even get the name of the Trust Fund right. I’ve always thought better of Time.”
Then the Associated Press followed up on Time’s story, Corcoran again explained the facts and AP chose to put out a release that Corcoran corroborated the Time story.
Is the media hard of hearing? Yes, if it doesn’t want to hear. Of course, there are big issues involving truth and media responsibility, but they won’t be played out here.
One thing this tacky story does not mean is that the ski industry should shun its friends in public office simply because the press might rough them up for going skiing. Jerry Ford, we love you!
