While working on a story on the growth of Vermont's bottled water industry, reporter Mike Ives arranged an interview with a hydrogeologist from the state's Agency of Natural Resources (ANR). But when it came time to conduct the interview, Ives was referred instead to Sabina Haskell, ANR's communications director, who eventually told him, "I won't be able to line up anyone to talk to you." In the meantime, she'd also circulated an internal memo directing ANR employees not to speak with Seven Days unless clearing it with her. "Twice since I've been here," Haskell says as justification, "we've made ourselves readily available and were told that interviews were going to go one way and the story turned out completely differently." The dispute "spilled over to the Vermont Legislature" this week, according to the Rutland Herald. During hearings on two open government bills, the chairwoman of the Senate Government Operations Committee brought up the memo "as an example of how difficult it sometimes is to get agency experts to speak to legislative committees."

Continue ReadingState Agency Stonewalls Seven Days

The Metropolitan Bureau of Investigation (MBI) has dropped its racketeering charges against the Weekly, as well as the misdemeanor and felony charges it filed against three Weekly employees last October for of selling ads to prostitutes, the paper reports. "As it turns out, the MBI brain-trust hit a small hitch -- there's not really anything illegal about that," the Weekly's Jeff Billman writes. The paper has agreed to stop running Adult Services ads, and reimbursed the MBI $10,000 for its investigation.

Continue ReadingAll Charges Against Orlando Weekly Dropped

The last three witnesses took the stand yesterday in the Guardian's predatory pricing trial against SF Weekly and Village Voice Media. Guardian publisher and editor Bruce Brugmann and associate publisher Jean Dibble were brought back to the stand, this time by the Weekly's attorneys; they were followed by Bay Area publisher Bill Johnson, whose papers include AAN members the Palo Alto Weekly and Pacific Sun. The trial takes a day off today, and closing arguments begin Thursday morning. For more details, read the latest from the Weekly and the Bay Guardian.

Continue ReadingClosing Arguments in Bay Guardian/VVM Trial Set for Thursday

Paul Neevel has shot more than 600 portraits over the past 12 years for the Weekly's "Happening People" feature, and now some of the best are on display at the Jacobs Gallery in Eugene. The 68-year-old Neevel "has been taking pictures for the Weekly since 1989, in the days when the alternative newspaper was called What's Happening," the Register-Guard reports. "This has got to be the best job in the world," Neevel says of doing the "Happening People" feature. "I get to visit these interesting people, and they are willing to sit with me and tell me their whole life stories.”

Continue ReadingEugene Weekly Feature Leads to Art Exhibition

The Rake, which was founded in 2002 by Tom Bartel and Kris Henning, announced this week that the March issue will be its last, citing declining print advertising revenue, the Star Tribune reports. The magazine will continue as a web operation, and 15 of its 16 full-time employees will be laid off. "Things have changed radically in the last six years, and I think it's going to get worse long before it gets better," Bartel says. "It's too expensive to produce journalism and then have Google come along and take all your advertising."

Continue ReadingMonthly Mag from City Pages Founders Ceases Print Publication

The predatory pricing trial is winding down and it is now expected that the case will go to the jury either Tuesday or Wednesday (the trial takes a day off today). On Friday, the SF Weekly's expert CPA, Everett P. Harry, continued his testimony and Jeff Mars, Village Voice Media's vice president for financial operations, also took the stand. The Guardian says the Weekly's witnesses "make the Guardian's case," while the Weekly says the Guardian's lawyers were focusing on "imaginary evidence." Meanwhile, Editor & Publisher columnist Mark Fitzgerald checks in on the trial, and on the daily blog dispatches from each side, and finds that "the Guardian and SF Weekly are covering the trial with reports that are gleefully unconcerned about appearing objective, and recall the great newspaper feuds of yesteryear."

Continue ReadingBay Guardian/VVM Trial Will Likely Go to the Jury This Week