Katie Fairbank

Katie Fairbank was the reporter for the Dallas Morning News that made the harsh claims against the Garland animal shelter in a series of articles (listed at that previous link) and blog posts that accused the city of illegally killing animals and of "gassing young, sick or elderly cats and dogs."
 
Her reporting covers one perspective of the story well but barely indicates any effort to speak to shelter personnel or to inspect the shelter. Why no attempt to be fair?
 
In the series, Ms Fairbank never mentions that the euthanasia methods used in Garland are fully within the guidelines set by the American Veterinary Medical Association. She did say, "The American Veterinary Medical Association and the state do not oppose gassing, but have set limits on its use. For example, the Texas Administrative Code says carbon monoxide cannot be used on animals younger than 4 months, elderly or sick animals because the 'time required to achieve death in these animals may be significantly increased.' Using carbon monoxide on such animals is a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a $2,000 fine for each charge." She charges in post after post that Garland is violating the rules but what evidence does she offer?
 
In a Sept 19 article, Ms Fairbank refers to a sampling of records from 2007 that were provided to the newspaper by anonymous sources. She says these were "shelter records" and she refers to photographs taken of "illegally killed" kittens. (Why would the shelter take photographs of illegally-killed kittens?) She refers to a young dog as another example.
 
According to city personnel, she did ask staff on the afternoon of Sept 17 to investigate a number of incidents. She was told that records were not immediately available — that they were archived — but that her questions could be addressed within a few days. She agreed, telling staff members that she expected the story to run "in a few weeks" and to contact her with the findings. She called the next morning for the results, waiting little more than overnight. Her story was in the paper the following day. There were no other efforts to get the rest of the story even though there were successive articles and blog posts.
 
When those "records" were reviewed, staff was only able to find one instance of improper euthanasia, which was documented in a memo to Council and the city manager: "After reviewing the records from 2007 provided by the media, there does appear to be one instance of an animal younger than four months of age that was euthanized by respiration of carbon monoxide. It was euthanized by a Shelter Attendant who is no longer employed by the City of Garland." Ms Fairbank later acknowledges that single incident but does nothing to correct her prior claims.
 
Never in the articles on carbon monoxide euthanasia does Ms Fairbank mention that she has a conflict of interest: that she has volunteered with various animal rescue groups for 15 years. She does mention it in a blog post in reference to a problem solver question on the Animal Services Advisory board, but never in the newspaper or in any of her blog posts on euthanasia. [Ed.: This slight correction is to be clear that Ms Fairbank never mentioned her rescue efforts in print or her blog posts when reporting on euthanasia. Her statement did appear in her initial response to the Animal Services Board question both in print, Sept 6, and was mirrored in her Sept 7 blog post.]
 
For 15 years Ms Fairbank has been actively trying to rescue animals, a period that would pre-date her start at the Dallas Morning News. In 2005, she donated money to the Metroplex Animal Coalition on behalf of KittiCo for animal victims of Katrina (donation list here ). Her Facebook page lists many friends from rescue groups, many using their pets as their avatar (requires registration to see whole list).
 
While I commend her rescue efforts (we have two cats rescued from a feral litter), it is a conflict of interest for Ms Fairbank to pretend to be reporting on our animal shelter when in fact she is furthering her personal agenda of rescuing animals, hiding behind the Dallas Morning News and using it as her tool to accomplish the same goal she has been working toward for 15 years.
 
Barely two years ago, American Airlines had a pay dispute with its pilots union. Katie Fairbank was the reporter that filed the first story on the dispute with the Dallas Morning News. It took someone at D Magazine to disclose that Ms Fairbank's husband is a pilot and union member at American Airlines and that she had failed to disclose her conflict of interest. That conflict was noticed as far away as the Washington Post (under Media Morsels).
 
On that occasion Managing Editor George Rodrique said, "One of the canons of our ethical code is avoiding even the appearance of a conflict of interest. This week, we blew it." He goes on to say that it was the paper's fault for assigning her the story but he doesn't explain why she didn't say that she couldn't cover it because she had a conflict of interest.
 
Many professionals have potential conflicts of interest. As a Council member, I have had to recuse myself several times to avoid a conflict of interest or the appearance of a conflict. It is fairly common in any city. If we ignore our professional duty, we tarnish our names and our city's name. It is the same probably for all professions. It is certainly true for journalists!
 
What will the Dallas Morning News do to correct the record and explain away the incident this time?