PHONE-BOOK ERRORS DESERVE CORRECTIONS

For decades, the phone book and the dictionary have been useful and necessary tools for newspaper news departments.

The dictionary helps us spell tough words like "hors d'oeuvres" and "maneuver" correctly. And the phone book used to tell us useful things such as how businesses preferred to be identified or when to use an ampersand in a business name or the correct street address for every business in town.

And the phone book also was absolutely invaluable for reporters, carrying every single telephone number in Cape Girardeau, save those who asked to be unlisted.

But users of the Cape Girardeau telephone directory are somewhat on their own this year.

The Southwestern Bell telephone book completely omitted the numbers for Cape Girardeau public schools and several county offices. A representative of McLeod USA, which also publishes telephone directories, came along marketing his new book as having more complete listings. Yes, it's better -- the county offices and most of the schools are there -- but because McLeod gets its listings from Southwestern Bell's, neither of the books is as reliable as phone books once were.

And that's creating some problems.

Some folks have called 911 for routine business with the sheriff's department because the number listed in the Southwestern Bell book is a rollover line that won't make the phone ring.

The direct number for the school district's adult education program, which helps people receive general equivalency diplomas among other things, isn't listed in either book. Uneducated people trying to better themselves need all the help they can get, including quick access to needed telephone numbers.

And take poor Darby Ulery, a residential customer who was assigned the old Crown Shoes number. The former Town Plaza store hasn't been open for more than a year, but its yellow-pages listing is in both phone books. Ulery still receives several calls a day from people looking for certain types of footwear.

Newspaper employees know how devastating it is to make mistakes. Those errors are in print for eternity. That's why everyone in the business is taught how to make every effort to avoid those mistakes. But errors will happen.

When they do, the best course of action is to correct the problem for all to see. And learn how it can be avoided next time.

That's what a lot of Southwestern Bell's customers would like to see happen with the phone books too.