In the realm of story-seeking, I feel like finding ideas can be the hardest part. Sometimes though, a story can fall in your lap, like it's your job to write it. Such was the case with my story on passports. In my small hometown of Norwich, NY, anything that happens is news. So when a girl I knew was going to be interviewed in Syracuse as part of a press conference with Senator Schumer, I knew I had to be there. The story was a good one-months after applying for her and her fiance's passports so that they could go on their honeymoon-they were still waiting. A call to Senator Schumer's office saved the day; their passports were overnighted to them. I was set to do the story. Unforuntately, so was half of my class, which meant that I couldn't go to the conference. But I still wanted to do the story.
First I interviewed Lindsey Totman, the girl who's story initially caught my interest. She was happy to help, and retold the story of how her honeymoon to Cancun was saved by a call to Senator Schumer's office (click here to listen to Lindsey's story). I then wondered where to go next with the story.
After talking to my professor about the next logical step (find another angle, of course!) I settled on the impact of the post office on passports. Were they swamped with applications? What does "processing your request" really mean?
I called around to different post offices in the area. Everyone directed me to one woman: Maureen Marion, the PR rep for the US Postal Service. She was away on business, but I left a message on her cell phone. I soon recieved a call back from her son. When people say that Syracuse University has a great alumni network, they weren't kidding. As soon as I mentioned where I was from, I could hear exclamation in the background. She was class of '78! She told me that if I called back in the morning she'd give me an interview.
When I called she was very open to talking, and gave me lots of great information. The Post Office is responsible for the beginning process, but the Department of State is actually in charge of issuing the passports. While everything she shared was interesting, the question that I found myself basing my story around came from my hometown friend's plight.
"Do you know why it took so long for her to get her passport, especially when she was able to call Senator Schumer's office and get the passport overnighted to her?"
Maureen Marion said that she had heard of such instances occuring, but only in rare special cases. She recommended getting in your applications as early as possible as the best guarentee to getting the passport on time. I have to say that being a new student, I didn't pick up on the next logical question to ask: whats to stop every single dissatisfied customer from calling Senator Schumer's office to get what they want? This question was actually posed on me by a teacher after the fact; I set about calling the senator's office but did not hear back.
