When OC Weekly was launched in 1995, most people figured it wouldn't last: Orange County was (they said) too decentralized, conservative and suburban for an alt-weekly. Even editor/publisher Will Swaim admits he experienced a little anxiety in those early days. Yet here the paper is 10 years later, stronger than ever, making a difference in people's lives, and providing work for its staff that is exciting, fun and rewarding. And Swaim has a few people to thank for that.
Forty-nine employees of the besieged New Orleans paper will each receive an initial gift of $1,000 this week from AAN's Gambit Relief Fund. Although the Fund has already collected over $52,000 in contributions, AAN will continue to seek additional financial assistance for Gambit staffers, with the goal of raising enough money to help them through the next two or three months. New Times and Village Voice employees, whose parent companies have both aggressively promoted a matching-funds program, make up a large percentage of the individual contributions received in the first week since the fund was announced.
In this week's SF Weekly, New Times Media executive editor Michael Lacey (pictured) responds to a recent report in the San Francisco Bay Guardian about merger talks between his company and Village Voice Media. Lacey takes aim at Guardian publisher Bruce Brugmann, calling the report "his latest salvo against New Times" and calling Brugmann himself much worse.
AAN's non-profit foundation on Tuesday deposited $37,865 in tax-deductible contributions it received from members who had pledged donations on Friday and were so anxious to assist displaced Gambit Weekly employees they Fed Ex'ed checks and called in with credit cards. Included in the deposit were ten individual contributions, ranging from $25 to $500, from Village Voice Media and New Times employees participating in their companies' matching-funds program.
AAN announced today that it had established a multi-pronged effort to provide immediate relief to employees of its New Orleans-based member paper who have been displaced by Hurricane Katrina. The centerpiece of the effort is a special fund that the association has established in its Alternative Newsweekly Foundation to accept charitable contributions from members who want to provide immediate assistance to Gambit Weekly employees. Several AAN-member companies have already announced significant contributions to the fund.
Executive editor Tim Redmond says his paper has obtained documents that "include a May 27, 2005, draft of a merger agreement between Village Voice Media and New Times." According to Redmond, "the draft calls for the creation of a new company controlled by a nine-member board," with New Times owning 62 percent of the new venture and controlling five board seats, and VVM retaining the rest. New Times owns 11 AAN papers and VVM owns six.
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