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Does The Bee favor Clovis West?

If ever there were any doubt about the Fresno Bee's bias in favor of the Clovis West athletic teams, one only needs to look as far as Andy Boogaard's subtitle to the May 22 article covering Clovis High's victory over Clovis East for confirmation. In case you missed it, it reads, "Anything, everything goes in win vs. Eagles." Hello? There were definitely Cougars and Timberwolves present, but certainly no Eagles, who, by the way, were in the process of getting beaten by Stockdale (see the fine print). Gee, the West coach didn't bring home an outright title. I wonder if the pervasive tentacles of the Clovis West Athletic Boosters will demand his head on the chopping block next.

Julie Henderson
Clovis

If only our embarrassing mistake was, in fact, a brilliantly planned plot. But that's not the case; it's simply a mistake made be a headline writer working under extreme deadline pressure who inadvertently wrote the wrong mascot name. Unfortunately, editors who proofed the work didn't catch the mistake and it went to print.

The debate over whether The Bee is biased for Clovis West will certainly continue to rage -- just as debates about perceived Bee bias for many other high schools. We most certainly believe we do our best to spend our resources covering the widest array of high school sports possible, focusing on both the most newsworthy and most compelling stories.

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We in the newspaper business make our living communicating, but when it comes to explaining ourselves, we have long fallen short. So it's no surprise that misconceptions abound about what we do and why we do it. Here, you can ask us why we do what we do and we'll try to answer it.
E-mail asktheeditors@fresnobee.com.

Fresno Bee Editors

Senior Vice President & Executive Editor
Betsy Lumbye
blumbye@fresnobee.com
Betsy manages the newsroom, providing overall direction and tone for its operations. In her spare time she competes as an amateur dressage rider, tackles the New York Times Sunday crossword and reads mysteries -- just not all at the same time.

Managing Editor
Jack Robinson
jrobinson@fresnobee.com
Jack oversees day-to-day operations of the newsroom. He entered journalism at the ripe age of 30, after working as a symphony musician and studying statistics at UC Berkeley.

Assistant Managing Editor for Presentation
Kris Eldred
keldred@fresnobee.com
Kris oversees the Bee's copy desks and the photo, art and features departments. She designed and edited her first newspaper -- for a creative writing class -- in the sixth grade.

Assistant Managing Editor for News
John Rich
jrich@fresnobee.com
John oversees The Bee's local news, sports and business departments. He got ink in his blood -- literally -- as a teenager working on a printing press.

Assistant Managing Editor for Online
Jennifer Ward
jward@fresnobee.com
Jennifer works with all the departments to develop multimedia content and interactive projects for online. She wrote her first computer program in 6th grade -- and still has the original cassette tape it's stored on.

Director of Photography
William Haines
bhaines@fresnobee.com
William supervises a staff of 10 photographers who scour the valley to bring you compelling images. He rides vintage Italian motor scooters that spew smoke and his first published photo was of friend and actor Rob Schneider in high school.

Sports Editor
Matt Lloyd
mlloyd@fresnobee.com
Matt Lloyd has been at The Bee since April 1999. He recently was promoted to Sports Editor in August 2008. He previously was the Assistant Sports Editor. A former sports reporter in the San Francisco Bay Area, he oversees the production of The Bee's daily sports section and the department's special sections.

Executive News Editor
Alison Lucian
alucian@fresnobee.com
Alison oversees The Bee's copy editors from the news desk and the features department. She joined The Bee in 1998 after moving here from the East Coast.

Features Editor
Kathy Mahan
kmahan@fresnobee.com
Kathy manages two editors, 11 reporters and two information aides responsible for arts, entertainment and lifestyle coverage. Reading Rolling Stone Magazine as a teen sparked her interest in journalism.

Business Editor
Mike Nemeth
mnemeth@fresnobee.com
Mike oversees The Bee's business department. He has worked at newspapers more than 20 years and is the third generation of his family to join the industry.

Head Librarian
Nancy Ramirez
nramirez@fresnobee.com
Nancy oversees the daily archival of The Fresno Bee and the weekly publications along with research for the newsroom and the public. She is proud of her two awards for Best of the Bee Outstanding Achievement for Best Behind the Scenes.

Metro Editor
Robert Zizzo
rzizzo@fresnobee.com
Robert manages The Bee's metro/local news department.