During the height of the Cold War, UCLA and the U.S. Veteran's Administration dumped radioactive waste underneath a field where kids now play and Brentwood residents walk their dogs, CityBeat revealed in articles published May 18 and May 25. Over two dozen citizens met to discuss the issue on June 13, CityBeat reports, and the neighborhood's City Councilman wrote a letter to the Secretary of Veterans Affairs expressing support for a clean-up. In addition, Rep. Henry Waxman tells CityBeat that he is "concerned about the possible environmental hazards" at the site. The V.A. continues to insist the area is safe, but has committed to additional study since the CityBeat articles appeared.
David Butow has photographed some of the most dangerous places on Earth, including war-torn Iraq, where he documented violence and destruction in his award-winning shots for Los Angeles Citybeat. Yet he says it doesn't take him long to readjust to the L.A. mindset. This is the 31st in a "How I Got That Story" series highlighting the AltWeekly Awards' first-place winners.
Los Angeles Times staff writer Scott Martelle describes the fears and hopes for L.A. Weekly's role in the New Times-controlled Village Voice Media. He details the turbulent recent history of alt-weeklies in Los Angeles and speaks to several notable Angelenos. Local pol Jackie Goldberg, "a frequent target of New Times LA columnists" during New Times' previous residency in the city, says: "They were not just a gadfly, they were an assault vehicle." Martelle also speaks to a few current L.A. Weekly staff members, including editor Laurie Ochoa, and addresses speculation that Phoenix New Times editor Rick Barrs will replace her. (Barrs says that he hasn't been asked, but adds that he would "have mixed emotions about it.")
Utne magazine has announced the nominees for its 2004 Independent Press Awards, and Association of Alternative Newsweeklies member papers dominate the "Local/Regional Coverage" category. Austin Chronicle, Chicago Reader, The Stranger, The Texas Observer and Westword all received nominations, as did Los Angeles CityBeat, an upstart alt-weekly that's only been publishing for 16 months. Nominees were chosen from among 2,000 alternative media sources. According to the Utne Web site, selection depended partly upon which publications were "most apt to go missing from the Utne library."
Dallas Observer won two first place awards in the 2003 Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Awards, and The Village Voice and Phoenix New Times each took one. East Bay Express won second place in the General Excellence category for papers with circulations 50,001 to 100,000, and New Times papers were finalists in nine other categories.
