The relationship between PR practitioners and the media should always be positive. PR practitioners want the media to report good things on their clients and the media wants to be able to obtain the information whenever they need to.
The media gets their information from PR practitioners, so it is important that the practitioner trusts that media outlet with their clients information.
PR practitioners want their clients to be in the media, and not in a disastrous way. It is also important for them to be on good terms for the client. The client would be unhappy with their representation if their publicist is not keeping a good relationship with the media. It works well if everyone is on good terms with each other.
Carroll Ann Coyle's PR writing blog 