Scott Van Voorhis offers some important context about Andrea Estes’ departure from The Boston Globe. In his Contrarian Boston newsletter, Van Voorhis calls her work “compelling and consequential,” and observes that her reporting uncovered a kickback scheme that resulted in a federal prison term for former House Speaker Sal DiMasi and exposed the $300,000-plus salary of Methuen’s now-former police chief.
The current controversy involves two lengthy corrections the Globe published after an Estes-bylined story reported that nine top MBTA managers were working remotely. According to the corrections, the actual number was six, and there were other problems as well. Van Voorhis writes that “to pin the alleged mistakes in the story solely on Estes seems grossly unfair. Where was her editor? And with the prominent play the Globe gave to the story, there surely were other editors involved in at least reviewing the piece.”
Globe editor Nancy Barnes has told her staff that she’s “working to unravel all of this,” adding: “We will hold ourselves accountable for our mistakes because trust is so essential to us as journalists.”
Earlier:
- Globe editor Nancy Barnes tells her staff she’s working to unravel the MBTA fiasco (May 4)
- Andrea Estes has left the Globe following an error-riddled story about the MBTA (May 4)
- An ombudsman could have explained what went wrong with the Globe’s MBTA story (April 28)
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As a former reporter, and a longtime Globe reader who admires the outstanding work of Estes, I still find this entire situation puzzling. Wasn’t this byline shared with another Globe reporter? Van Voorhis is right to ask about the role of editors, as we all know nothing gets printed without multiple sets of eyes upon it. The Globe still employs at least one one writer who actually created false copy, how did he survive his “mistake” yet Estes did not? And there still seems to be some remaining questions around the 3 MBTA employees who say they live in Boston, yet their families reside and attend school in other states at a significant distance. How is this different from Boston employees with residency requirements who live in the suburbs but rent small apartments in Boston to claim residency? Is part-time residency enough when your transit system barely functions?