Each day, newspaper reporters and editors carry out an incredibly difficult job of sorting through an endless supply of ideas, controversies, disagreements and disputes to try to determine what is news and what isn’t.

Most of the time, they get it right. But sometimes, they miss.

Such is the case with the Sun Journal on June 22.

The Maine Workers’ Compensation Board has been working for several years to set a fee schedule for hospitals to pay for medical claims for injured workers.

This complicated issue has been before the board for many years without resolution and led to a complaint by Bath Iron Works, despite years of effort on my part to successfully resolve the issue.

BIW took its case to court, erroneously claiming that my position as both the executive director and chairman of the Workers’ Compensation Board and chairman of the board for Central Maine Healthcare Corp. represented a conflict of interest.

The court rejected BIW’s claim.

Yet what passed as news on June 22 was not the court’s important decision. Instead, the Sun Journal used the most important part of its story in its print edition — the headlines and first paragraphs — to rehash information that was more than a month old and made largely irrelevant by the ruling.

On May 11, I made the decision to remove myself from consideration of the fee schedule issue to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest.

More than a month later, the Sun Journal got around to reporting that fact and pretending it was new information while also giving prominent attention to BIW’s dismissed claims instead of the judge’s validation of the board’s efforts.

The presentation has done a disservice to the newspaper’s readers and to the hard work and accomplishments of the Workers’ Compensation Board.

It was misleading, sensational and inaccurate.

And it took the place of real news that impacts workers and employers across the state.

On June 16, we announced that the board had approved the largest reduction in assessment to employers since 1993, reducing the costs to run Workers’ Compensation by more than $3.4 million. It’s the second year in a row that assessments have been reduced by more than $3 million.

And overall, workers’ compensation rates have dropped 54 percent since 1993, while Maine’s system has become one of the most stable in the country.

While that news doesn’t fit neatly into the category of “government and business fight” story line that appeared on June 22, it more accurately reflects the hard work that is going on in Maine to reduce the cost of doing business and to create and protect jobs.

And it demonstrates the board’s ongoing commitment to reducing the cost of workers’ compensation claims on Maine businesses.

Trying to reduce medical costs is part of our mission.

But it should come as no surprise that those efforts are controversial and have been met with significant resistance, including from BIW which has been involved in our process at every step and has contributed to the delay in reaching an agreement.

Big money is at stake, and the Workers’ Compensation Board must take action that balances the individual desires of some companies with the larger issue of protecting the public interest.

At the end of this process, I am confident that the board will find a reasonable solution that protects employers while also ensuring that injured workers get the care they need.

I hope that when that day comes, we see the good news on the front page of the Sun Journal, but if we don’t, I know that it will be recognized by the businesses and workers who will see their costs go down and their benefits protected.

Paul R. Dionne is executive director of the Maine Workers’ Compensation Board.