Thursday, June 4, 2009

Where can I get a dead T-shirt?

We have some repeat flubs and some new flubs in this batch of sentences. See if you can find that flubs that were caught before they made it into The Forum.

1. The School Board is confident they've got their message out.

2. The floodplain would go up three feet at the Wilkin County border.

3. Activities will include face painting, T-shirt dying and a free picnic.

4. Cass County has begun spraying for noxious weeds in road right-of-ways.

5. The school board and school district are considering hiring a Texas-based company.

1. The School Board is confident it got its message out.
School Board is singular. It's one entity. The sentence would be correct if it stated: School Board members are confident they got their message out.

2. The flood plain would go up 3 feet at the Wilkin County border.

3. Activities will include face painting, tie-dyeing and a free picnic.

4. Cass County has begun spraying for noxious weeds in road rights of way.
AP Stylebook states: right of way, rights of way

5. The School Board and School District are considering hiring a Texas-based company.
The following rules also apply to School Boards and School Districts. AP Stylebook states:
governmental bodies Follow these guidelines:
FULL NAME: Capitalize the full proper names of governmental agencies, departments, and offices: The U.S. Department of State, the Georgia Department of Human Resources, the Boston City Council, the Chicago Fire Department.
WITHOUT JURISDICTION: Retain capitalization in referring to a specific body if the dateline or context makes the name of the nation, state, county, city, etc. unnecessary: The Department of State (in a story from Washington), the Department of Human Resources or the state Department of Human Resources (in a story from Georgia), the City Council (in a story from Boston), the Fire Department or the city Fire Department (in a story from Chicago).
Lowercase further condensations of the name: the department, the council, etc.
FLIP-FLOPPED NAMES: Retain capital names for the name of a governmental body if its formal name is flopped to delete the word of: the State Department, the Human Resources Department.
city council Capitalize when part of a proper name: the Boston City Council.
Retain capitalization if the reference is to a specific council but the context does not require the city name:
BOSTON (AP) – The City Council ...
Lowercase in other uses: the council, the Boston and New York city councils, a city council.
Use the proper name if the body is not known as a city council: the Miami City Commission, the City Commission, the commission; the Louisville Board of Aldermen, the Board of Aldermen, the board.
Use city council in a generic sense for plural references: the Boston, Louisville and Miami city councils.