Public Affairs Reporting

Journalism 135

Course Description | Grading | Texts & Reading | Course Requirements | Links | Weekly Assignments

Links

This is an annotated list. If you find a good source of information online, please make sure you send the address in to be added to this list. If a link is broken, let me know.

Good California, political coverage & local government
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov
Top site for following the California Legislature, bills and activity. Good links.

http://www.calchannel.com/schedule.htm
This links directly to the schedule of what the California Channel will be televising for the week. Check your channel depending on your cable service. It’s also listed on this site (under carriage).

http://www.dof.ca.gov/
California State budget.

http://www.saccourts.com/
Sacramento County Superior Court, with a tool to track current and civil court cases.http://www.saccourts.com/indexes/

Sacramento Department of Finance, County Clerk-Recorder
http://www.finance.saccounty.net/ccr/
Custodian of public records and recorder of real property documents, registers marriage and other public documents.

http://www.calvoter.org/
California Voter Foundation, a non-profit, non-partisan organization promoting and applying responsible use of technology to improve the democratic process.

http://www.rtumble.com/
A daily snapshot of media coverage of California public policy and politics, with summaries and links to original story. Read this daily.

http://www.fppc.ca.gov/
The Fair Political Practices Commission regulates and enforces campaign financing & lobbying. Oversees financial disclosure of public officials.

www.salon.com
A daily online magazine with strong content, lots of politics.

http://www.calbar.org/
A source for legal information in California.

http://www.guidestar.org/index.html.
Lists all charities 501c(3). A lot of information is available here Also, you get all of the CA state-wide foundations and trusts.

http://www.medbd.ca.gov/
The equivalent of the AMA site, but for California. If you have the doctor’s name, you can look up discipline actions, then call for further information.

Reporting resources & tools
www.powerreporting.com
Thousands of free resources for journalists, annotated and updated daily. Very useful site!

www.profnet.net
Need an expert on deadline? This is a good source.

www.journalism.berkeley.edu/
North Gate, the graduate school of journalism’s web site. Check the Resources & Jobs link.

www.facsnet.org
‘A free site for a responsible press.’

www.newsengine.com
Go to the tools link –– a cost of living calculator, a percent change calculator and other neat tools.

www.spj.org
The Electronic Journalist, by the Society of Professional Journalists

http://www.ibiblio.org/journalism/beat.html
Great links for beat reporters

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http://www.journalistexpress.com/
Register with them to get links provided by beat areas.

http://www.10kwizard.com/
A great way to look up info on publicly-traded companies. Has officers, income, expenses and, most importantly, incidents that could have an effect on revenue—such as lawsuits, mergers and the like.

http://www.ama-assn.org/
Doctor Finder allows you to look up any doctor in the U.S.

http://www.epa.gov/region09/waste/
Far too much information for the paranoid. This lists Superfund sites in Northern California. Check out where you live.

http://www.opensecrets.org/home/index.asp
Politics and money.

http://www.politicaljunkie.com/
More politics and money, but this one allows you to plug in a zip code and find out who in that area has donated and to which campaigns. What’s the campus zip code?

http://adds.awc-kc.noaa.gov
The Aviation Digital Data Service. Check out precise weather, flight patterns, etc.

http://www.martindale.com/
How to locate a lawyer.

http://www.infoplease.com/
This is a good reference site, online dictionary and more.

Other government or federal sites
www.noaa.gov
Complete weather by government, including offshore reports

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http://www.gao.gov/main.html
This site lists all the GAO reports and has a handy "how to use this if you're a reporter" link.

http://www.fedstats.gov/
A great clearinghouse of federal statistics.

Other media sites of interest
www.sfgate.com
A great online San Francisco newspaper. Interactive.

www.drudgereport.com
Don’t admit you look, but check out what’s going on. Good links to lots of commentary.

www.freedomforum.org
Independent site (funded by Gannett) covering media issues.

http://www.mediainfo.com/editorandpublisher/index.jsp
Editor & Publisher online, with daily coverage of the newspaper industry.

www.chicagotribune.com
The Chicago Tribune is a model for interactive online journalism.

slate.msn.com
Slate magazine.

www.cjr.org
Columbia Journalism Review.

www.poynter.org/medianews
Jim Romenesko’s MediaNews, by Poynter Institute for Media Studies.

These links are not guaranteed to be current. If you have a favorite website you use as a journalist (print and online), please send it to me and I will add it to this list.
foxs@csus.edu