Correction

After publication of last week's edition, Cathlamet Council Member Dick Swart contacted The Eagle and requested a retraction, saying he was misquoted in an article about the council's discussion of a proposed ordinance for management of the Cathlamet Fire Department. The sentence read, " If there are errors, it’s the fault of the fire chiefs.”

In an email, Swart wrote: The context at the February 22, 2012 Council meeting was my response to comments in First assistant Fire Chief Duncan Cruickshank’s monthly report about proposed Ordinance 548-12 being full of errors. My point was that Duncan, the Mayor, Chief DeBriae and other fire commanders had spent hours going through several drafts, and that two dozen changes requested by the fire leaders had been researched and incorporated into the February 7, 2012 document being considered by the Council at that meeting. Apart from that rebuttal, I also praised Duncan’s report as one of the best received from the fire department in years. Duncan told me yesterday that he did not hear me say, “If there are errors, it’s the fault of the fire chiefs,” and that such a flip or insensitive comment would be out of character for me. The recording of the meeting does not support that quote. The Mayor and several Council members have told me I did not say that. A couple of neighbors tell me the same thing.

Eagle Publisher Rick Nelson responds:

In my notes, I wrote, "If there are errors, it's the fault of the fire chiefs."

After hearing from Swart, I listened to a recording I had made of the discussion, In it, Swart said, "If there are errors there, they haven't been caught by the fire commanders."

The notes don't directly match what was said, so that qualifies as a misquote.

I've always striven to be as accurate as possible. Taking notes is challenging. One is writing what has been said while one is listening to what is being said, and in this case the wrong words were written. Sometimes one is surprised by what is said, and that interrupts the thought process, and in this case, I was surprised by what Swart was saying.

I sincerely regret not getting the wording correctly.

On another note, the editorial policy of The Eagle has long been one of impartiality and restraint.

Our primary responsibility is to our readers, not to satisfy elected officials.