IPA settles dispute with IHSA

April 8th, 2008 at 04:29pm Wally Haas

We’ve commented on this enough. I’ll let the IPA release speak for itself:

SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois High School Association cannot regulate the use of newspaper photos or any other product as a result of a settlement reached Monday with the Illinois Press Association. Nor can the IHSA give preferential access to its own photographers.

            “It’s over. They can’t control how we do business. End of story,” said Dave Bennett, executive director of the IPA, which has battled with the IHSA since last summer. Bennett said the court settlement is a binding agreement that is not subject to political or administrative changes.

            The agreement between the IHSA and the IPA settles a lawsuit filed last November by the IPA. In the lawsuit, the IPA asserted that the IHSA is a state actor and that public high school competitions are thus public events. As such, the IHSA does not have the right to grant exclusivity for photography and does not have the right to control what newspapers do with their own products, Bennett said.

            “I am pleased that the IPA and the IHSA were able to come to an agreement,” said P. Carter Newton, president of the IPA and publisher of The Galena Gazette. “This agreement means that newspapers will continue to cover high school sports as they have for more than a century and, in doing so, provide services that are meaningful to their communities in the coming years. I am also pleased that the staffs of both organizations could work together to reach this settlement.”

            “While this issue began over the secondary use of photographs, the settlement encompasses all platforms that newspapers use to distribute their products,” Bennett said. “Throughout our discussions with the IHSA, we were adamant that newspapers have the right to control their products without regard to whether that newspaper product was delivered on newsprint, on a Web site, as streaming video or any other platform,” Bennett said.

            The dispute heated up last fall when the IHSA filed a countersuit against the IPA and prohibited photographers from having field access during the state high school football championship games. Photographers also were banned from wrestling and cheerleading competitions.

            The IPA then drafted two identical pieces of legislation, which quickly found strong support in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Senate bill passed 47–5 on April 1. The House bill has 23 sponsors. The sponsors of both bills have agreed to not move the legislation in light of the court settlement, Bennett said.

            “We’re very grateful to the legislators who helped move negotiations along and pushed our bills forward,” Bennett said. “In particular, Sen. [James] DeLeo and Rep. [Joe] Lyons, our lead sponsors, worked hard to move our bills.”

            “We had complete confidence in the bills,” Bennett said. “Some of our members would have liked to have passed the legislation. But the settlement agreement really locks down everything we sought.”

            Bennett continued, “This is a victory for press freedom and the independent rights of newspapers to cover public events without restriction from government officials.”

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