Maintaining professional boundaries can be a very difficult task, particularly when working in a professional setting that is small and personal. How do you maintain your distance from people you spend 40+ hours per week with? The short answer is that you can't. You can think you do, but it is nearly impossible unless you literally don't speak all day. Conversation happens, even to the best of us. Night and weekend plans, personal stories and picture-swapping of children and significant others. Any given circumstance may seem isolated until you string them all together and realize, "Wow, these people know a lot about me." It isn't the end of the world. Maintaining professionalism isn't

Kim Mack’s announcement to run for City Council District 2 was met with some fallout related to an incident in 2009 that is still on the minds of many in the Sacramento area – an incident that could come back to haunt her in the race to unseat incumbent City Councilwoman Sandy Sheedy. Mack officially joined the election race in October. Her previous campaign experience included managing a grassroots support effort for the Obama presidential campaign. In 2009 she was involved with the Sacramentans for Accountable Government effort to put a Strong Mayor Initiative on the ballot. In January 2009, emails in support of the strong mayor initiative were sent to people on an email list that orig

About 30 local writers, journalists, students and public relations professionals met at The Sacramento Press office Wednesday evening to attend a media ethics workshop headed by assistant professor of journalism at California State University, Sacramento, Molly Dugan. Dugan hooked her audience by posing hypothetical questions like “If I see a public official strangling a baby, can I write about it?” The answer is yes, but it’s best to seek legal counsel before targeting someone with the means to hire a good attorney. Dugan warned journalists against using anonymous sources whenever possible, encouraged them to keep notes and documents as long as possible for personal protection, and to u

It's not too late to attend the "Journalism Ethics" workshop tonight. It's at our newly remodeled Sacramento Press office, from 6:30-8 p.m. Molly Dugan, an assistant professor of journalism and communication studies at California State University, Sacramento, will teach the workshop. Our second workshop for the month will hopefully transform sports fans into sports writers. Jimmy Spencer, founding editor of PublicCEO.com, will lead the "Sports Writing" workshop Aug. 25 from 6:30-8 p.m. Spencer has a B.A. in journalism from California State University, Sacramento. He has worked for The Sacramento Bee, NBC Sports, and the Sacramento River Cats. Spencer coaches high school basketball in th

Two weeks after taking office in December, Mayor Kevin Johnson launched a ballot reform initiative to expand the executive powers of the Sacramento mayor, suggesting that enhanced executive powers would make city government more efficient and accountable. It would also make him one of the more powerful executives in any California city. Throughout its short, tumultuous life, the so-called "strong mayor initiative" has been praised or criticized by citizen groups as either a democratizing modern reform or a gateway to tyrannical government. Last Friday, the primary group promoting the change, Sacramentans for Accountable Government, presented City Hall with a petition to put the initiativ

While I was cleaning out my apartment over the weekend, I stumbled across a handout from my college days. I found it very relevant to what I'm doing now at The Sacramento Press, so I thought I would share it with our readers. It was a handout on how to avoid plagiarism. Many of you may not take the time to read over these, but we at The Sacramento Press feel very strongly about credibility and transparency. While we are unable to fact-check and copy edit everything that gets published on our site, we still uphold a high level of integrity for our newspaper. For those of you who may not be aware, we offer copy editing for anyone who wants to publish a story on our site. Simply email your

Just under 20 people gathered in a semi circle at the Sacramento Press's office to listen to a Journalism Ethics workshop on Wednesday night. Molly Dugan, assistant professor of journalism and communication studies at Sac State, led the workshop. Participants enjoyed pizza and salad from Hot Italian and mingled with other professionals from various media organizations. Dugan covered the basics of libel, public figures, honesty, accuracy and disclosure when writing articles. She encouraged writers to utilize public records and disclose their connection with the story - whether it be revealing that they have made a donation to the political candidate they are writing about in an article, o

Are you looking for an excuse to come meet the staff of the Sacramento Press? Come join us for our next workshop on Feb. 25th from 6:30-8 p.m. Molly Dugan, an assistant professor of journalism and communication studies at Sac State, will be leading the workshop on Journalism and Ethics. She'll be discussing how ethics come into play when we write and publish articles. We'll be serving food and drinks at our office. Our last workshop had a fantastic turnout, with more than 30 people in attendance. We'll continue to hold more workshops covering a variety of topics. If you have any suggestions for future workshops, please send them to colleen@sacramentopress.com or comment below. We look

Lately, many people who signed up to be on the "Sacramentans for Obama" email lists have received emails inviting them to come to events and sign petitions in favor of Sacramento's "Strong Mayor" petition. Kim Mack, one of the principal organizers of the "Strong Mayor" petition, is also involved with "Sacramentans for Obama." The directors of "Sacramentans for Obama" were apparently unaware of this misuse of their mailing list, and are investigating the matter. If Mack made unauthorized use of the "Sacramentans for Obama" mailing list to promote this Kevin Johnson-backed initiative, what other liberties will the parties pushing the "Strong Mayor" initiative take with personal information g