Crisis Management

Synagro's Shiny New Patina

Synagro protest in DetroitSynagro Technologies is the latest big corporation trying to ditch a scandal-ridden past by re-branding itself. In an August 10, 2011 press release, the company announced it is launching a new website as part of a "rebranding initiative." The press release says the initiative "is a reflection of the enhanced and growing service and solution offerings that have resulted from organic growth and recent acquisitions." Of course, the press release fails to mention the back-to-back scandals that have plagued Synagro since 2008 as well as earlier controversies.

Synagro is in the business of marketing sewage sludge as "compost," or, as the company's new, PR-approved website puts it, "Transforming natural waste challenges into sustainable, planet-friendly solutions." The company is a subsidiary of the Carlyle Group, the largest private equity firm in the world. Carlyle is also a sizeable part of the military-industrial complex with ties to numerous national politicians, including former British Prime Minister John Major, Alice Albright (daughter of former Secretary of State Madelyn Albright), and both George W. and George H.W. Bush.

Can PR Fix This End Run?

Submitted by Anne Landman on

Tiki Barber (Source: AP)Tiki Barber, a former running back for the New York Giants, has hired the 5W Public Relations agency in New York to try and repair his image after he left his wife, who was eight months pregnant with twins, for a former NBC intern. 5W Public Relations is the third PR agency Barber has hired to try and burnish his image.

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Main Source: 
Huffington Post, August 31, 2010
Topics: 
Crisis Management
Public Relations

Reading Between the Lies

Iraq's Ministry of Interior recently released a civilian casualty count for the month of July. Their report accounted for the lost lives of 535 Iraqis, making this past month the most violent since June 2008. This escalation in violence can be attributed in part to a situation which Jeremy Scahill, writer of the ground breaking novel, Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army and correspondent for Democracy Now! explains as an unstable country. Iraq is as "unstable as it has ever been," Scahill says. "They [Iraqis] can't form a government. The vast majority of people don't have consistent access to potable water, to electricity, to gasoline... Iraq is a disaster right now."

Are Oil Companies Greenwashing Gulf Coast Cleanup?

Submitted by Anne Landman on

Sandra Bullock stars in Sandra Bullock, Lenny Kravitz, Harry Shearer and a slew of other celebrities jumped on the bandwagon to star in a public service announcement called "Be the One," to support Restore the Gulf, a campaign to encourage people to sign a petition saying, "I demand

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Main Source: 
Think Progress, July 29, 2010
Topics: 
Crisis Management
Front Groups
Environment

BP "Photoshopped" Gulf Response Pictures

Submitted by Anne Landman on

BP Cockpit photoBP officials have admitted that members of its staff manipulated official images posted on its Gulf of Mexico Response Web site, and promised to stop the practice. The most recent photo, apparently taken from inside a helicopter cockpit, was altered to make it look as though the helicopter was flying.

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Main Source: 
UK Telegraph, July 22, 2010
Topics: 
Crisis Management
Corporations
Ethics
Public Relations

Chez Sludge: How the Sewage Sludge Industry Bedded Alice Waters

Alice WatersThe celebrity chef Alice Waters is probably the world's most famous advocate of growing and eating local, Organic food. In February 2010 her Chez Panisse Foundation chose as its new Executive Director the wealthy "green socialite" and liberal political activist Francesca Vietor. Vietor's hiring created a serious conflict of interest that has married Waters and her Foundation to the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) and its scam of disposing of toxic sewage sludge waste as free "organic Biosolids compost" for gardens.

For the first time, thanks to an ongoing "open records" investigation by the Food Rights Network, the public and the press have easy online access to dozens of internal SFPUC files (SFPUC Sludge Controversy Timeline), documenting the strange tale of Chez Sludge, or how the sewage industry bedded Alice Waters.

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