Jon Gaskell and Cityview have had a turbulent past: He first edited the paper from 2000 to 2002, then left and started his own alt-weekly, Pointblank, which was admitted to AAN membership in 2003. Cityview was sold to some of Pointblank's investors in April 2005, and the two newspapers merged into one alt-weekly that was still called Cityview, with Gaskell as editor. He tells The Des Moines Register that "there was no drama" in his resignation this time around; his departure was announced in a publisher's note in the current edition of Cityview.
Big Green Umbrella, a company owned by Michael Gartner and Gary Gerlach, has purchased Cityview, a Des Moines, Iowa, alt-weekly and AAN member paper, reports The Des Moines Register. Gartner also owns an interest in Pointblank, another Des Moines alt and AAN member. The two papers will merge and publish as Cityview, with Pointblank founder and editor Jon Gaskell as editor. With the last edition of Pointblank already on news racks, 10 Cityview staffers were laid off Wednesday and will interview for positions with the publication -- though not all of them will be (re)hired.
Jon Gaskell has resigned as editor of Cityview, the Des Moines Register reports. Register columnist Marc Hansen says Gaskell had been in the job 18 months, about the same "spin cycle" as several former editors of the paper owned and published by Connie Wimer. "An anti-establishment paper owned and operated by one of the flowers of the Des Moines establishment. Explain that one," Hansen writes.
