Fresh back from the annual "Pugwash" planning meeting, the Post executives are brimming with ideas and enthusiasm.

Phil Bennett (left), the paper's managing editor, outlined some of their thoughts in a recent email memo to staff. Departing from tradition the spring Pugwash, the Post's annual conclave of editors and thinkers, focused solely on improving the paper's local reporting.

"Local coverage is the largest place where the purpose of our journalism and the readership of our paper converge," Bennett said. "Any serious reflection on local coverage turns outward and inward: outward to the transformation of our region as a center of global power, magnet for migrants and immigrants, source of economic growth and development, laboratory for education, gridlock, race relations, science, the arts; inward to our newsroom culture, habits and possibilities."

As prep each of the paper's AMEs and deputies joined Bennett, Len Downie, and Deputy ME Milton Coleman in doing some real on-the-ground local reporting. "This exercise was meant to ground our discussion in specific observations. The assignments -- from attending the Ballou High School graduation to surveying gated communities in Prince William County and East Diamond Avenue in Gaithersburg -- also made plain that local coverage is a mission shared across the newsroom," Bennett explains. [Frankly we would have loved to have seen Downie reporting on the Fairfax county government.]

The memo explains that local coverage can be challenging because while interesting to readers it's less interesting to the Post's most talented reporters. It also lays out a series of internal challenges to the Post's abilities and talents--from the idea generation "pyramid" to a "false wall" between news and enterprise reporting.

"If The Post's identity is determined by the twin strands of journalism excellence and service to our communities, we're entering (to borrow Joel Garreau's term) a period of radical evolution -- drawing on our depth of talents and experience to enhance what's unique and best about The Post in everything we cover," Bennett said.

As such, the paper is convening a set of working groups on various topics, and looking to open a broad discussion across the staff on how to make the paper as fresh and engaging--and as credible--as possible.

"We would also like to create a new forum for talking about our journalism in the most open, provocative and sustainable way," he said.

Full memo after the jump.

Colleagues,

Pugwash last week departed from tradition. In the first of two sessions this year involving senior editors, we stayed close to home. We stripped down the agenda to encourage discussion instead of presentations. Most importantly, for the first time at Pugwash we took up a single subject: our local coverage.

At a Sunday dinner in Fairfax, Len described progress towards deepening The Post's connection to readers through improvements in design and content, and outlined principals and goals for the next phase of this effort. As Len's away this week, I'm attaching his remarks here.

To prepare for Monday's discussion in Alexandria, each AME and her or his deputy (and Len, Milton and I) did some local reporting. This exercise was meant to ground our discussion in specific observations. The assignments -- from attending the Ballou High School graduation to surveying gated communities in Prince William County and East Diamond Avenue in Gaithersburg -- also made plain that local coverage is a mission shared across the newsroom. More on this later. I've listed the assignments at the end of this message. You can find some video presentations from these visits on the Source at [internal link]

Why a Beltway Pugwash? Why this format? Local coverage is the largest place where the purpose of our journalism and the readership of our paper converge. Any serious reflection on local coverage turns outward and inward: outward to the transformation of our region as a center of global power, magnet for migrants and immigrants, source of economic growth and development, laboratory for education, gridlock, race relations, science, the arts; inward to our newsroom culture, habits and possibilities.

We've talked about adapting newsroom practices to the changing opportunities for journalism all around us. If The Post's identity is determined by the twin strands of journalism excellence and service to our communities, we're entering (to borrow Joel Garreau's term) a period of radical evolution -- drawing on our depth of talents and experience to enhance what's unique and best about The Post in everything we cover.

Many people at The Post have enriched the discussion of readership and journalism during the last months. I've heard from scores of reporters and editors across the newsroom and in our Metro bureaus -- and exchanged emails with National and Foreign correspondents -- about ways to continue to improve local coverage. Len and I have received messages and memos, solicited and unsolicited, that have added original thinking to key questions. These include the truly exceptional diagnoses and proposals that surfaced in the process that
resulted in Bob McCartney's selection as the next AME/Metro. Many of these diverse paths lead to some common views about the nature of the challenges facing us, and how we might to face them.

For our Pugwash discussion, I condensed a selection of the views and questions about local coverage I've heard most often from our colleagues. They include:

Local coverage is what most interests Post readers (in surveys), but it's not often what's most interesting in the Post. We have the largest, most experienced and talented staff involved in local coverage in the paper's history. How do we ensure that reporters and editors are doing their best work? How do we create big and small stories that, together, make original discoveries on the issues most important to readers?

The weight of local coverage is too heavy for one set of hands. It needs all our hands to lift it. The job of creating world-class local journalism extends beyond the Metro staff. Collaboration across staffs is essential. What role does each staff have in addressing local coverage in its many voices? How do we use photography and graphics? How do we expand the impact of stories across the Web?

In an age of innovation, we have too many barriers to invention. In some cases, we need to invert the pyramid of idea generation in the newsroom. We can fall into the habit of expecting editors to divine ideas and reporters to execute them; more often, reporters should create ideas that editors improve and shape on the path to the paper. We should not become a newsroom fed by assignments alone. Are we too hierarchical?

Story matters: Have we built a false wall between news and enterprise? Let's knock it down. Storytelling is what we do, whether by breaking news with accuracy, clarity and context or narrating events across time, place and perspectives. Both want direct, observed reporting and transparent writing to come alive. Their absence (and the physical absence of reporters from the scenes they're described) weakens stories and our ties to people reading them. We should challenge assumptions about what is and isn't a "Post Story."

Credibility begins at home: Local coverage is the place where most readers decide with authority whether The Post seems authentic, fair, required reading. How do we revitalize our approach to strategic subjects: immigration, growth and development, public safety, education, transportation and traffic, spiritual life, culture and entertainment? How do we put our best local journalism before the most readers? What is the role of zoning and the Extras in this equation? What do we give up to get better?

Our conversation last Monday ranged across these questions and raised others. Our reporting assignments hit us with a sense of how community defines so many lives in our diverse area. As Emilio Garcia-Ruiz said (it was not Yogi Berra): "As Washington gets bigger it gets smaller." This rings true across our area. We talked a lot about whether we have the right structure in the newsroom to encourage telling these stories from the inside out.

The Pugwash group will look at concrete proposals for change during our next session in September. We'll evaluate proposals about the Extras, zoning, local content on the web and other critical elements of our local coverage. Bob McCartney will be adding to this list as he takes the leadership of Metro. We will also talk about the paper more broadly. Len outlines much of this agenda in his attached remarks.

It's important in the meantime that we continue to create models of what works. To this end, we're bringing together reporters and editors from across staffs to push our coverage in several strategic areas, starting with immigration and issues of growth and development. I will lead the immigration group and Bill Hamilton will chair the growth group. We will soon add several more groups. These will be modeled on the terrorism meeting among the National, Foreign, Metro, Financial and Investigative staffs that has been a hub of innovation.

We would also like to create a new forum for talking about our journalism in the most open, provocative and sustainable way. We've heard several ideas about how to do this. We'd like to hear yours. We are in a perpetual process of change. Your participation is essential, and welcome.

Phil

Pugwash June/2005 assignments:

Liz Spayd/Mike Abramowitz: Evangel Church, Prince George's County
David Hoffman/Keith Richburg: East Diamond Avenue, Gaithersburg
Jill Dutt/Sandy Sugawara: Immanuel Bible Church, Springfield, VA
Deb Heard/Steve Reiss: night life in Clarendon
Emilio Garcia-Ruiz/Matt Vita: South Riding, VA
Joe Elbert/Keith Jenkins: Shaw
Mike Keegan/Denny Brack: Ballou High School graduation
Shirley Carswell/Claudia Townsend: Regional transportation
Ed Thiede/Vince Bzdek: Langley Park
Jeff Leen/Larry Roberts: Prince George's Sports and Learning Complex
Bob McCartney/Steve Luxenberg: Haymarket, Gainesville area of Prince William County
Bill Hamilton/Bob Barnes: Man Tech, VA defense contractors
Len Downie/Phil Bennett/Keith Harriston: Fairfax County government
Milton Coleman/Don Podesta: Koreatown, Annandale, Va.