Budget deficit triggers worries at convention

SPJ's almost $400,000 budget shortfall was the elephant in the room during the 2023 convention, held Sept. 28-30 this year in Las Vegas.

Outgoing President Claire Regan didn't even mention it during the opening business section of the convention, which led several members (including your Hawaii delegate) to approach her after the meeting to ask questions. Regan said she inherited the deficit and assured the members there was a rainy day fund (about $300k) making the deficit not as serious as it first sounds.

SPJ has hired a new accountant, apparently its third in a year, as well as ordered an audit to find out what happened and set the books straight. In addition, the SPJ Foundation is working on a plan to make the society more solvent, Regan said.

The SPJ board also voted to cancel the 2024 convention, Regan said.

Still, Regan said, she's all for transparency, but she didn't want word to spread beyond the SPJ community for fear of losing even more members and supporters.

Incoming President Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins told the Fort Worth SPJ Pro Chapter shortly after the conference that she had led the charge to cancel the convention, because she believed it would be fiscally irresponsible to have the convention when there isn't the money to pay for it. (https://spjfw.org/?p=2989)

As an aside, there were 530-something attendees at the convention, including presenters, an apparent decrease from previous years. Also, it was noted by this journalist that the exhibit hall was not as robust with exhibitors as in prior conventions, with universities (E.W. Scripps, U.C. Berkeley, UCLA, University of Alabama) and a few of the stalwart media companies (Sinclair, Kiplinger, the Wall Street Journal) representing. It's unknown whether the decrease in exhibitors is related to the economy or to a rules change several years ago allowing SPJ to reject potential exhibitors based on their business practices.

The four candidates who raised the alarm about the budget crisis batted .500 in the election: Emily Bloch won vice president by a 408-291 vote and Wesley Wright won a Director at Large seat with 371 votes. Nicole DeCriscio did not garner a director seat (232 votes) and Michael Koretzky (310 votes) lost to Daniela Ibarra (390 votes) for Secretary/Treasurer. Koretzky was voted Region 3 coordinator instead. Region 11 now has a new coordinator, with Ankita M. Kumar running unopposed.

Amendment 1: Replacing the Delegate System with Referendums, i.e., "One Member, One Vote. Passed 53-42 after a lot of debate.

The other two amendments (changing dates of terms of office and setting participatory standards for SPJ events, did not pass.

See: https://www.spj.org/news.asp?REF=2979