HCA Florida North Florida Hospital has distributed “BOLO” notices for a Mainstreet correspondent around its Gainesville campus, according to several sources who sent photos to Mainstreet. 

“BOLO” stands for “Be on the Lookout,” a term generally used in connection with criminal activity, but these flyers direct hospital staff to contact security if they see Mainstreet correspondent Gary Nelson. If he asks questions, the flyers say, direct him to communications director Lauren Lettelier. 

The flyers feature a photo of Nelson and make no mention of other journalists who have covered the recent disruption of surgical operations at North Florida Hospital. 

Lettelier did not respond to a request for comment about who made the decision to post the notices and why Nelson was singled out.  

One notice provided by an HCA employee also featured a security footage photo of Nelson in the hospital. Nelson said the footage is probably from Feb. 14, when he was visiting a family member who had just had surgery after a three-week delay. 

Nelson said while he was in the hospital visiting, he did walk around and ask questions for a story, but he always identified himself as a journalist to anyone who asked and never left the hospital’s public areas. He said that visit was the only time he was inside the hospital since the start of his reporting, although he has been on hospital grounds several times. 

Nelson, a Mainstreet reader with 49 years of experience as a TV journalist, stepped in as a freelance correspondent last month to report on the ongoing clinical crisis at North Florida Hospital. 

On Feb. 5, Nelson broke the news that Florida’s Agency for Healthcare Administration (AHCA) was investigating the sterile processing department issues that shut down the hospital’s elective surgeries for weeks. AHCA surveyors visited the hospital the next day.  

Nelson followed up with reporting on how the shutdown has affected patients and surgeons and on emails that reveal the problem stretches back at least a year.  

“Mainstreet adheres to the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics, and Mr. Nelson is a seasoned journalist,” Mainstreet Publisher J.C. Derrick said. “No one has brought forward any accusations of unethical behavior or inaccuracy in his reporting. He is simply being the eyes and ears of the community to fill a huge communication gap on an important public health issue.” 

In his years as a reporter, Nelson said he has never seen his photo on a BOLO sign, although he has been tear-gassed, threatened with arrest, asked to leave various places, and had his life threatened. 

“I am struck by the reluctance of HCA, since this issue became known, to be transparent… with the media and the public to whom HCA has an absolute responsibility,” said Nelson, who has won Emmy and Edward R. Murrow awards for his reporting. 

David Cuillier, director of the University of Florida’s Joseph L. Brechner Freedom of Information Project, said he has never seen a BOLO sign for a journalist.  

“I doubt there is any law against posting a flyer about a reporter,” Cuillier wrote in an email. “But the optics are terrible. This is one of the worst examples of excessive information control I think I’ve seen yet.” 

Cuillier’s background includes research on the way public information officers control the flow of information to journalists, a practice that has grown rapidly. 

Mickey Nall, a senior lecturer and professional-in-residence for the public relations department at UF’s College of Journalism and Communications, said the best practice in a crisis is to remind staff to direct questions to the communications director. He said posting a BOLO notice does not achieve the same effect. 

“This organization doesn’t have a PR problem,” Nall said in a phone interview. “They have an operational problem… and part of that is now becoming a PR problem when you, I’m going to call it politicize, or demonize, a member of the working, free, legitimate press. Mr. Nelson is an award-winning journalist. He’s not in this for ‘gotcha’ moments or silliness.”