A CONVERSATION WITH GREG PEPPERS - The Executive Producer of NPR's Newscast Division.
Conversation from February 2006 with NPR Liaison to Independent Producers, Paul Ingles

Thirty-seven times a day, the NPR newscast division originates a newscast for member stations. Greg Peppers, who's been working with NPR for 20 years, is the division's executive producer. He says they count on independent producers quite a bit for spot news reports from the field.

How important are independent producers and member-station reporters to your division?

It's a huge dependence for us. We're 24/7. We're putting out 37 newscasts a day. Even with all the member stations and our staff reporters, it is going to be impossible to have someone in every location in the States or even in the world. So we depend a lot on stringers and independent producers and freelancers to help us be where we can't be and provide spot coverage for our newscasts.

That would include, especially station-based reporters.

Exactly, the member stations are huge for us. I always think back to Hurricane Katrina and the first few days of it. It was the stations down there that gave NPR a presence on that story. On 9-11, WNYC was big. They were among the first reporters to get down to the scene to help us out. It doesn't have to be a major story. When there's a planned event in a city, we look to our member station reporters or independents to help us out.

And then of course in a lot of those markets, or certainly in smaller markets where public radio stations may not maintain newscasts, you're looking for qualified indy reporters. What kind of journalism background do you require when somebody calls the news desk and says, "Look, I'm a public radio producer and I could do a story for you." Where does that go from there? Do you have to be cautious whether they know writing and reporting?

Yes. What I usually do is an audition by telephone. Or they can ftp or email me a .wav file or send me a CD. I want to see writing samples. I want to hear how they sound on the air before we put them on. I want to get a chance to vet what their skills are to see what background they have on the radio and on public radio.

So if somebody is interested in filing for NPR, they should contact you first (gpeppers@npr.org) to begin that introductory process?

Yes.

And then your evaluation will end up with an invitation that the reporter can call you anytime or what? Might you say "no thank you" if they don't measure up?

It's very rarely a "no, thank you." Especially if we don't have someone in that market. And there are places where we don't have member station newsrooms. So I'm willing, and my senior supervising producer is willing, to work with a promising person. We'll work with them on delivery and writing. Writing is important at NPR. And good use of tape, knowing how to pull a good actuality and some nat sound to build a good wrap to get on the air. So we're willing to work with the indies and member station folks as well.

One thing that happened after I started filing news spots was that I would occasionally get a call from the NPR news desk. They would say that they'd seen something on the wire that I didn't know anything about yet. They would ask if I could do a voicer for them. They said they could send me the wire story. Does that kind of turnaround happen often when you're trying to get a quick report from the field so you're asking a sringer to basically replicate an AP report?

Well the goal is not to have them regurgitate the AP copy.

What we're saying in those cases is "here's some source copy, could you make some calls on this, can you verify and check it out." We have the time to wait until the reporter's been able to do that. If you can't do that, just say so.

If you didn't use a reporter to flesh out the AP wire, your anchor would be comfortable reading the AP as is, right? So can the reporter use some of the information as reported in the AP report in the voicer even if he or she can't verify all of it?

They can use it but I want them to re-write it and turn it into their own work. That's my bottom line.

Can you think of other ways independent producers can contribute to newscasts?

Actualities. We're big on having actualities in our newscasts. If you're at a location where you've done some interviews, that can be helpful. The miners' story comes to mind. The mine accident in West Virginia. It was awhile before we could get AP feeds from the scene and West Virginia Public Radio was huge in helping us. There weren't many independent reporters at that particular story I don't think. But the reporters who were there contacted us and said, "hey I just talked with some of the miners' families, or I just spoke to some officials. Let me get you this tape until I can get back to you to do a wrap-around or a spot." It helps us tell that story back here in Washington by getting that actuality here in house.

Technically we, as reporters, are getting more and more off the phone and more and more onto computers when sending in content. Can you talk about that transition a little bit.

We're trying to get reporters back into their studios to send hi-quality audio back to us through their computers. Some are savvy enough with their laptops that they can ftp it to us that way…

At a coffee shop?

Exactly (laughs)! With Wi-Fi at a Starbucks or wherever. We'd rather NOT have phone. But if it's an emergency and it's a must feed and it's breaking news, we may accept it.

What is the best way to feed an actuality down the phone line?

That's a good question. I've had engineers who've told me that some equipment is good enough that a reporter can just hold the unit up to the phone and get a good sound. I haven't been out in the field in awhile to know how NPR reporters are doing it with the newer minidisk or flash recorders.

My trick is usually to take a decent pair of headphones and then cup the headphone around the phone's mouth piece. We should probably talk about cell phones. I would guess that cell phones are not often suitable for filing unless it's a last resort.

Absolutely. What we might use a cell phone for is to do a Q + A with a reporter on the scene. Then we can chop it up and use parts of it. Or if it's breaking up re-do part of it. But it's very hard to get some cell phones to perform well for 45 or 50 seconds if a reporter is trying to feed a wrap. So it's rare. With breaking news, we'll do a debrief with the reporter - tell us what you what you see, what's happened, can you bring us up to date. And sometimes we'll go live with that. But sometimes we've gotten on the air and the cell phones dropped out.

Let's talk about the question of what is news that the desk would be interested in. How would you define a local or regional news story that suits the national broadcast? Let's talk about emergency situations first. I've had the news desk call me when they've seen a report of an accident with multiple fatalities. I hate to put it in terms of numbers of casualties but when is the NPR news desk, for example, interested in an accident in New Mexico, or Idaho?

It can vary. And a lot of it is a judgment call by the producer on the desk. Obviously, if it's a commercial airline and it crashes in your area, then we'd want coverage of that. Train derailments - not trying to get gruesome here but - you know things that involve a lot of people. The opposite of that though might be a small private plane with a person of note on it that crashes. But for smaller accidents, probably not. Now traffic pileups, where it happens in the winter sometimes or in the fog, even if it doesn't involve casualties it can be news if it causes a major traffic tie up on a major thoroughfare. But there's no hard and fast standard. Like, if it's only three fatalities, don't call in. I'd rather have folks call in and bounce it off us.

Because we might say, "this is on 95-North, a major corridor up the east coast," and we'd want to use it.

What about perusing the local paper. What might a local reporter see in the local paper that would be worthy of the news desk's attention?

Well, I think about the Boston Globe doing stories on the sex-abuse in the local Catholic Church. It became a huge national story after that local reporting because more archdiocese from around the country came out and said, "yeah, we've had our own problems." So when you look at your local paper, you can ask, "where might this be going?" It could be legislation that your local congressional rep is working on in their market that may affect other people on the national level later on. So, don't just think that because it's in your local paper that it wouldn't be of interest to NPR. We don't get a lot of these local papers and we would love to know if you think you see something in your local paper that would be important or interesting.

So as a reporter, I might make that call to talk with the NPR news desk about it. If they say, "that does sound interesting," would they ask me to make a few calls, try to source it myself and get back to them.

Right, and it could happen on a couple of different levels. The reporter or producer who brought it to our attention would start on it. Then we might offer to help on making some of the calls from here. So it could be a collaborative effort with an editor here and a producer or reporter in the field.

What about legislative sessions? During a state session would you be liable to tell a reporter to keep an ear open to maybe the two or three hottest topics being debated in that state?

Sure. That helps us keep our ear to the ground.

As a newscast, you're probably more interested in the final decision or when the laws go into effect whereas the news shows might be more interested in a story on the debate while it's in progress?

Right. It varies sometimes as well depending on the issue. Like the assisted suicide debate that a lot of states are grappling with right now?

Or re-districting?

Exactly. Sure. Or the gay marriage initiatives that are out there. These issues have become big social issues.

And what are current rates for field pieces for newscasts?

There's the "wrap" which is a reporter's copy written around an actuality from a news maker. And a voicer is of course just straight reporter copy. Both should be no more than 45 seconds max. The rate for a domestic wrap is $40 and a domestic voicer $35. Overseas wraps are paid $45, voicers are $40. We pay $20 for any actualities that actually air. We pay the same rate for Q + A's with reporters that we air.