UNC -TV Email Records Raise Questions about Anti-Alcoa effort

Public records provided by UNC-TV show that a video by Eszter Vajda was part of a coordinated campaign by groups opposed to Alcoa Power Generating Inc.'s effort to obtain a new operating license for the Yadkin Project.  Although the records provided by UNC-TV are heavily redacted, the emails uncovered:

* A $3,000 payment by opposing groups to a researcher working with Vajda on the UNC-TV story.  That revelation – breaking what UNC journalism professor Leroy Towns called the cardinal sin of journalism – has raised concerns about the credibility and integrity of the reports and the efforts to discredit Alcoa.

* Vajda was coordinating her actions with political adversaries of Alcoa Power Generating.

* Vajda told those adversaries to by-pass her work email and use her personal email address.

Emails indicate that Vajda and researcher Martin Sansone frequently joined APGI's opposition –including former House Speaker Richard Morgan, political consultant Carter Wrenn, Stanly County banker Roger Dick and Stanly County lobbyist Bruce Thompson – to coordinate their efforts.
                                
Morgan is involved in developing strategy for the NC Water Rights Committee, a group that was created by Thompson to oppose APGI's relicensing effort. Coincidentally, Thompson is a board member at UNC-TV.

Click here to the view a copy of the public records and click on articles below to learn more about this issue:
                                                    
Laura Leslie: Isaac Hunter’s Tavern (August 18, 2010)
Vajda out 
UNC-TV Production Director Shannon Vickery confirmed today that Senior Legislative Correspondent Eszter Vajda “is no longer employed” by the station.  Vickery couldn’t comment further, citing confidentiality reasons. 
Sources at the station say Vajda was the subject of a disciplinary hearing late last week, even before Saturday’s news stories that revealed she’d taken money from former House Co-Speaker Richard Morgan.

John Locke Foundation (August 18, 2010)
Alcoa Documentary “Researcher” Lied to WFAE?
Latest twist in the UNC-TV documentary on Alcoa and its North Carolina operations involves a globe-trotting “researcher” getting $3000 from an anti-Alcoa activist (and former best-bud of Jim Black, Richard Morgan.)
That researcher/aspiring filmmaker, Martin Sansone, yesterday told WFAE that the $3000 from Morgan was needed to help get him back in the country following the volcano eruption in Iceland which shut down air travel from Europe earlier this year.
But UNC radio Laura Leslie notes that the eruption did not happen until after Sansone and Morgan worked out the payment plan.

WFAE Radio (August 17, 2010)
$3,000 Payment Lands UNC-TV, Reporter More Scrutiny
If you're a reporter, you don't accept payment from sources or the people you're covering. It's a basic tenet of journalism ethics. 
But the e-mails that Alcoa received from UNC-TV show that money did change hands. A researcher received $3,000 from former House Speaker Richard Morgan for his work on the series. 
That's significant because Morgan now works for the North Carolina Water Rights Coalition, which is the most vocal opponent of Alcoa's hydropower operation on the Yadkin River.
“It’s further confirmation that the TV report was part of the opposition's effort to seize Alcoa Generation's property,” says Alcoa spokesman Mike Belwood.

The News & Observer (August 14, 2010)
Alcoa foe paid worker on TV story
A researcher who worked on UNC-TV news stories critical of the aluminum company Alcoa took money from a consultant fighting the company's control of dams on the Yadkin River.
Former House Speaker Richard Morgan, who works for the N.C. Water Rights Committee, gave $3,000 to Martin Sansone, a long-time friend of Eszter Vajda, the UNC-TV correspondent who reported stories about Alcoa that aired last month.