Standards

The record

Meeting reports, data series and the daily's record items come from documents: minutes, agendas, packets, filings and public datasets, each linked. Numbers, dates and names are used only as they appear in the document. Nothing is characterized, and nothing is written around a gap; a section whose source is down is omitted.

Names in the record

Officials, administrators, presenters and appointees are named as the minutes name them. Honors given in public by a public body, a state championship, a National Merit scholar, a teacher of the year, a commendation, a retirement, are reported with the honoree's name as the minutes give it, adults and students alike, because the body chose to give the honor in public. Residents who speak at public comment are counted, not named. Employees who are the subject of personnel action are not named. Deaths, illnesses and family matters mentioned in the minutes are omitted.

From readers

Births, engagements, weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, honors, scout and student projects, openings, events and obituary links come from the people they concern, through the submission form, and run in the submitter's words under a "From readers" label with the submitter's name. A person reads each item before it runs and may call the number given to confirm it. Nothing runs about a person who has not agreed to it; nothing runs about a minor without a parent; photographs run only when the submitter owns them. A submitter may ask for an item to be removed at any time and it is.

Reported stories

Reporting by contributors, a game, a fire, a profile, an event, carries the contributor's byline and is read by the publisher before it runs. Contributors identify themselves when gathering news, quote people only with their knowledge, and name minors only as their school, team or parents already have in public. Photographs of identifiable people at private events run only with consent. The Ledger pays contributors by the piece and does not run anonymous reporting.

Arrests, accidents and lawsuits

These are public records and the Ledger does not pretend they are not; they are also where a small publication's errors do lasting harm to a named person, so they carry the strictest rules on the site.

• Every such item rests on the primary record itself, the booking record, the charging document, the crash report or agency release, or the filing on the court's docket, and is confirmed against one independent source before it runs. Two news accounts of the same release do not count as two sources.
• The publisher approves each item personally before it runs. None of these items is ever assembled or sent by the automated morning edition; they are held for a session the publisher reads.
• Arrests are reported only for felony charges, only for adults, only from the booking record or charging document, and always as charges, never as facts. No booking photographs. The item names the agency and the date and says what the record says and nothing more.
• Every arrest item carries a standing obligation: the Ledger checks the disposition and reports a dismissal, acquittal, no-bill or expungement with the same prominence as the arrest, and removes the item on request when the charge does not result in a conviction.
• Accidents are reported from the agency's report or release, without names of the dead or injured unless the agency has released them, and never from the scene, social media or a scanner.
• Lawsuits are reported as filings, in the language of the filing, with the case number and court, and the other side's response when it is filed; the Ledger does not weigh the merits. Family, juvenile and probate matters are not reported.
• Victims are not named. Minors are never named in any of these items.

Corrections and removal

Errors are corrected at the top of the item and logged on the corrections page; retractions leave a notice at the item's address. Anyone named in an item may ask for a correction by writing to editor@aledoledger.com, and the publisher answers every request.