Fresh Loaf

1- AJC Redesign: Your thoughts? (Scott Henry makes a few observations on the new print design of our dear ol’ daily – as do some of our readers. Xanax would be a subscription booster).

2- Rep. John Lewis arrested at Darfur protest in D.C. (When the news reminds you of the real news, you need to work on your attention span – I’ll include myself in that bunch).

3- WSB: Georgia swine flu case confirmed (We’ve officially joined the swine flu pandemic).

4- Clever headline about N. Ga. drug bust elicits giggles (When “cops deal blow to Mexican drug cartels,” has it hit the fan?).

5- William Mize granted stay of execution from Ga. Supreme Court (The former Ku Klux Klan leader had sought the death penalty after being convicted of killing a fellow klansman).

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1. AJC redesign infomercial — OMG (Daily paper’s feel-good promo sounds suspiciously like a pharmaceutical ad.)

2. Three people killed in Athens, Ga., shooting (As of now, a UGA-professor-turned-suspected-triple-murderer is still on the loose.)

3. NORML now has semi-legal status in Georgia (But the party was short-lived.)

4. AJC scooped by local blogger! (Atlanta Unfiltered scores a once-in-a-lifetime nod from the notoriously attribution-stingy daily.)

5. BREAKING: Atlanta Steam relocates, exurban perverts weep (Lingerie-wearing football team runs from Atlanta. Oh my.)

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I think it’s worth taking a moment from laughing at their informercials to note that, without the excellent work of the AJC’s news staff in general, and reporter D.L. Bennett in particular, no one would have noticed DeKalb County’s property tax shenanigans, and DeKalb CEO Burrell Ellis might not have stepped in to clean up the mess.

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The AJC’s brand-new look will be unveiled next Tuesday. But for those who cannot wait, the paper has quietly posted an infomercial video featuring Editor Julia Wallace extolling new features to be found in the redesigned daily and Sunday editions.

Apart from noting that the video employs the same soothing tones you’d expect from an ad for incontinence medication, I will bite my tongue and open the forum for commentary, criticism and random observations.

Please, for the love of Christ, if you watch this video, take the time to post a comment.

Note: We’ve removed a comment from the thread below because it violates our comment policy.

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CB Hackworth, a long-ago CL editor who transitioned into broadcast journalism, has a great semi-new blog, Certain Speculation. But beyond his well-informed observations about Atlanta media, his site boasts a recently-added feature that alone is worth the price of admission: the Jim Wooten Retirement Countdown Clock. And it’s available as a widget!

No longer will you need to keep checking your calendar to see how much longer you’ll be forced to endure GOP press releases thinly disguised as the ramblings of a hack conservative columnist. Now you can just check your Wooten Widget.

But, before you get too excited, remember that old Jim will not be going gently into that good night. He generates far too many web hits for the AJC to cut him loose completely. As Editor Julia Wallace recently revealed, Wooten will continue to write one column a week. With any luck, it’ll be “Thinking Right,” his Larry King-style “weekend free-for-all.”

Pick a topic. Howzabout, um, torture…?

(Image courtesy Certain Speculation)

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If you’ve spent much time on the Interwebs, you’ve likely come across the never-ending debate over the virtues of old-fashioned print journalism vs. blogging. (And if you haven’t, you can do some catching up here, here and most especially, here.)

Yesterday, the local blog Atlanta Unfiltered scored a big coup, posting a story — including the PDF documents — about a new county report indicating that fired DeKalb Police Chief Terrell Bolton “told a subordinate to falsify records to hide two luxury cars that the chief took home for his own use.”

The day before, AU had reported that Bolton “took more than $35,000 in comp days after his supervisor refused to sign off on them,” also according to the investigation, which was overseen by DeKalb Sheriff Tom Brown.

My first reaction was, Damn, I’m glad my beat isn’t DeKalb police or I’d be getting a tongue-lashing from my editor about now for getting the shit scooped out of me by a blogger. In a follow-up story in today’s AJC, the reporter acknowledges that he gained access to the report via Atlanta Unfiltered. Ouch.

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Awash in red ink, the AJC recently cut a third of its news staff

Much like the overall economy, the Fourth Estate seems to be in free-fall. Advertising revenues have dropped 23 percent over the past two years. Newspaper stocks are close to worthless. Big-city papers across the country have slashed staff, cut coverage areas, closed bureaus, quit publishing on certain days and even shut down altogether.

Far from being an exception, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution is among the hardest hit. For reasons that have been the subject of fierce speculation, the AJC has suffered from one of the steepest declines in paid readership among major dailies. And earlier this year, in prefacing the need for cutbacks, its new publisher revealed that the AJC was losing $1 million a week, which placed it in the company of the Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle and other papers perilously close to going belly up.

That’s the background for last week’s sweeping downsizing and reorganization of the AJC newsroom. The paper is in the process of shedding 78 veteran editors, reporters and other journalists through voluntary buyouts — its third such program in three years — and another dozen or so graphic artists, news researchers and customer care employees as a result of a round of post-buyout layoffs. Two weeks ago, more than 40 part-time newsroom employees were told by phone that they no longer had jobs.

In the flush times of a decade ago, the AJC was home to about 500 full-time journalists; when the buyout dust settles, that number will have been pared back to slightly more than 200, most of whom will have heavier workloads and fewer resources than ever before.

Whatever your opinion of the AJC’s virtues, the newspaper going forward can’t escape being a diminished version of its former self. The question is: What kind of news coverage can Atlanta still expect from its daily newspaper?

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1. AJC buyout list official — 74 to leave (In addition to the dozens of veteran reporters who jumped ship, news of Pulitzer-winner Cynthia Tucker’s move to D.C. and food writer John Kessler’s brief departure from food-writing made it a very productive week for us pageview-hoarding wretches at Fresh Loaf.)

2. Atlanta Tea Party with Sean Hannity to feature ’shit sandwiches’ (It’s estimated that 10,000 people attended. Imagine the response had Hannity been offering roast beef!)

3. Bottoms up at Frolicon (That’s a lot of booty.)

4. Anti-tax protestors urged to, um, ride MARTA (Irony sandwich, anyone?)

5. CNN’s Anderson Cooper on why Republicans can’t find their voice (A  recap of last week wouldn’t have been complete without at least one teabagging reference. Phew.)

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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What with all the other news coming out of the AJC today, I’d almost forgotten that Editor Julia Wallace told staffers in a morning memo that the paper would be closing three of its four remaining suburban news bureaus. The Cobb, North Fulton and DeKalb County bureaus — located in rental space in Marietta, Alpharetta and downtown Decatur, respectively — will be shut down come July. Only the mammoth Gwinnett bureau, located in the same AJC-owned building as the newspaper’s press, will be spared it seems.

To local journalists, this is a big sign of changing times. A decade ago, the AJC had bureaus in Cherokee, Fayette and other exurban locales, as well as roving reporters such as Norman Arey in North Georgia and Bill Osinski downstate. As far as I know, Marietta Daily Journal owner Otis Brumby still maintains nearly a dozen offices across metro Atlanta to produce his weekly Neighbor Newspaper chain.

It can be argued, I suppose, that far-flung bureaus have become obsolete in an age of cell phones and laptops. Does that mean the Cobb government reporter will be filing his stories from a Starbucks in Marietta? Or that the paper will no longer cover Cobb government? I guess we’ll find out when Julia issues her follow-up memo tomorrow…

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From AJC.com:

On behalf of Atlanta’s depressives, night owls, actual owls, people whose pupils are dilated because they’ve just had an eye exam, vampires, albinos and Retin-A users, I demand a correction.

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1. AJC plans to cut staff by 30 percent (As we later reported, nearly 90 editorial staffers will be bought out or laid off. That sucks.)

2. Atlanta to New Orleans rail line in danger … because of Alabama? (At least this story has a happy ending.)

3. Atlanta City Council OKs Decatur Belt deal— with a catch (Marietta Street residents protect their neighborhood from destruction, and the newest Beltline plan is a win-win)

4. Examining the Sweet 16: Nova v. Duke is can’t miss basketball (Needless to say, we rooted for the Tar Heels.)

5. Georgia slips in ’safest state’ rankings to no. 39 (The Peach State dropped seven spots, to be exact — the largest plummet in the country. Oops.)

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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After weeks of rumors, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution this morning announced that it plans to cut 30 percent of its full-time newsroom staff. It will be the third and largest round of job cuts  since 2007 to hit metro Atlanta’s largest daily newspaper. Effective April 26, the AJC will also stop distribution to seven outlying counties, reducing its total distribution area to 20 counties in the metro region.

From a staff report:

The AJC’s news staff will drop to about 230 full-time positions, down from about 323 currently. Staff members with five or more years with the company will be offered voluntary buyouts, with layoffs to follow if fewer than about 90 apply, the company said.

Most of the news staff cuts “will be in production and management, allowing us to keep as many news reporters as possible,” AJC and ajc.com editor Julia Wallace said.

The cuts are expected to be completed in May.

The company laid off 48 part-time news staffers Tuesday and announced the full-time cuts Wednesday morning.

In 2006, full-time newsroom staff numbered about 500.

(UPDATE): Rumored counties dropped from distribution: Barrow, Bibb, Clarke, Houston, Monroe, Oconee, Putnam.

More to come.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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1. Atlanta job fair at Georgia World Congress Center (If this post had attracted thousands of visits a few years back, I’d have laughed to myself and said, “What next? Creative Loafing declares Chapter 11 bankruptcy?” Hahahahaha.)

2. Soapbox: Jekyll Island Authority ‘at it again’ (At 239 comments and counting, the Jekyll post is encroaching on Black Mafia Family territory. A JIA v. BMF beef? Scary.)

3. AJC layoffs: this week or next (I’m not going to make a snide remark about the abovementioned job fair. This economy is no place for snide remarks.)

4. Georgia mayor’s Facebook page confuses nation (How easy it is to offend with a can of Schlitz and a pack of Camels!)

5. Sneak peek: Creative Loafing’s website makeover (The euphoria of making our own top-five list is only slightly diminished by the fact that most commenters trashed our makeover. Meanies.)

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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Decatur Metro has a great conversation about my colleague Scott Henry’s news that the Atlanta Journal-Constitution newsroom is bracing for yet another round of job cuts.

Commenters weigh in on what’s to blame for the quickening, whether it’s the Internet, liberal bias, or other factors. (For what it’s worth, Whet Moser, an excellent writer at CL’s sister paper The Chicago Reader, has an excellent piece that nails the various factors at play in journalism.)

One commenter who claims to be an AJC journalist added some firsthand experience to the discussion. This part stood out:

You print lovers need to brace yourself. I think there’s a real possibility that the print version of the AJC may be gone by the end of next year. Yes, I’m serious.

Not good.

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The semi-official motto at Creative Loafing when I started here was, “Once a Loafer always a Loafer!”

No, I never quite swallowed that line either, but I’m willing to invoke it with some pride in reporting that our former news editor, Steve Fennessy, has just been named the next editor of Atlanta magazine, starting April 1. Steve now serves as deputy editor to Rebecca Burns, who will make a lateral move into a newly created position overseeing the magazine’s online initiatives.

Here’s what Deborah Paul, editorial director of Emmis Publications, the magazine’s parent company in Indianapolis, had to say about Steve in an internal memo (which, I should add, was not provided to me by Steve):

Steve has excelled as a writer and editor at Atlanta magazine, where his work has been recognized by Best American Crime Writing and earned him a prestigious Knight-Wallace fellowship. With close to a decade of experience in the Atlanta market (he was an award-winning senior editor at Creative Loafing prior to joining Atlanta), Steve brings a deep knowledge of the city to this role, vital for any city magazine editor. As a seasoned reporter, writer, and editor whose work has taken him from upstate New York to Egypt, he will ensure that Atlanta magazine’s standards for journalistic excellence are maintained.

Awwww. Not to get picky, however, Steve was news editor here and then senior writer, but never quite reached the pinnacle of professional achievement that is the job of CL senior editor.

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On Sunday, the AJC’s brand-new publisher, Doug Franklin, shed a little more light on upcoming changes to the newspaper’s print edition through an article addressed directly to readers. Most of the changes he mentioned were already anticipated, but he provided a few new details.

Here’s what Franklin says to expect:

• In mid-March, the Tuesday-Saturday Business section will merge with an expanded A section. The Sunday section will remain a stand-alone.

• The three Sunday feature sections (Living & Style, Arts & Leisure and Travel) will be combined into one.

• The current TVWeek supplement will be replaced with our own stand-alone, full-color TV section.

OK, I didn’t see the TV supplement coming, although I must admit I can’t be bothered to care. That aside, the other tweaks are fairly conservative first steps toward running a tighter ship. Even so, I’m assuming that a few jobs will be shaved simply by combining sections. With all due respect to the folks who now put together the AJC’s Sunday Living section, that thing’s been in dire need of an update longer than Mickey Rourke’s needed a comeback.

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1. Our complete Oscar predictions, even ‘Documentary Short’ (It undoubtedly was Fresh Loaf’s gusto for “The Conscience of Nhem En’s” that pushed this blog post over the top.)

2. Upcoming AJC cuts to be ’substantial’ (Tragic and unfair, but not really a surprise.)

3. The Televangelist: ‘Lost’ episode 6 (What happened Ben? What happened to Aaron? What happened to Kate’s unconvincing attempt to abide by the law?)

4. Georgia has the Bible Belt blues (The Christian Coaltion relied on teetotaling teenagers to threaten our chance to buy beer on Sundays. Meanies.)

5. Madea Goes to Jail, locks out critics (Tyler Perry is predictably cagey about his newest project.)

(Photo by Ishika Mohan)

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1. AJC is losing $1 million per week (The big question: Can Anne Cox Chambers’ billions save Atlanta’s daily?)

2. Clearing up confusion over Standard murder (Dissecting a robbery gone horribly awry.)

3. Shooting outside East Atlanta’s Graveyard Tavern is eerily familiar (Notice the absence of high-profile violent crime following the shooting death of a would-be robber at the hands of his victim.)

4. Shirley snaps back at cop union head (Crime seems to have everyone — herroner included — on edge.)

5. First Person: Jennifer Graves, wife, mother, swinger (Make love — not armed robberies.)

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Jason Pye at Peach Pundit posts an email from Susan Meyers that says Jim Wooten, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s lone conservative voice and a 30-year veteran at the paper, will retire this summer.

In news that may shock some, be regarded as inevitable to others, Jim Wooten, the voice of principled conservative thought at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, announced to the staff Friday he will retire this summer after three decades at the newspaper.

Wooten, an award-winning journalist, can be thanked for his years of columns and editorials calling on elected officials to spend taxpayer funds as if it were being depleted from their own wallets.

…

As the Associate Editorial Page Editor, it is believed Wooten will continue to post a weekly Thinking Right column as he enjoys life as a Middle Georgia farmer. To read Wooten’s bio please click here.

Who’s gonna take Wooten’s place? DaleC?

UPDATE: Here’s where to go for details if you’re interested in becoming the paper’s new conservative columnist.

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Welcome to the poorhouse.

This past Monday, AJC staffers were informed about the sudden “retirement” of their boss, publisher John Mellott. Perhaps the first question that popped into everyone’s mind was, Who retires at 51?

On Wednesday, during the newspaper’s quarterly staff meeting, employees got to meet the new publisher, one Doug Franklin, who has years of experience as a veteran newspaper executive. (Mellott, by contrast, had previously run another Cox subsidiary, Dent Wizard.)

They were told that the bottom had fallen out of the embattled paper’s revenues sometime around October, which served to confirm the widely held suspicion that Mellott had been pushed out.

Franklin also told the assembled crowd that the AJC is currently losing about $1 million every week.

From what I understand, that little news flash got everybody’s attention.

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Like many locals, I was shocked and, frankly, a little pissed off when I read in the AJC over the weekend that Atlanta police had unexpectedly changed nearly every important detail that had previously been reported about last week’s late-night armed robbery at the Standard and the shooting death of bartender John Henderson.

John Henderson

If Henderson hadn’t been killed “execution-style,” as the initial AJC headline blared, then why say he had been? Was his female co-worker hiding in a cabinet during the shooting, as WSB-TV had reported, or not? Sometimes, in order to trip up or mislead the criminals, the cops don’t tell everything they know about a crime, but it didn’t make sense that the public narrative of the event could have been so far off.

After talking to Lt. Keith Meadows, commander of the Atlanta Police Department homicide unit, I’ve reached the conclusion that the press snafu over the Henderson murder was brought about by a combination of vague, inconclusive information offered by the police and a competitive news environment in which reporters race to make their stories as definitive as possible — often before all the facts are nailed down.

In other words, what we’ve got here is a failure to communicate.

Meadows conceded that detectives were initially mistaken about how Henderson was killed. (Readers should be warned that some of what follows is fairly graphic.)

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Mayor Franklin continues to remind everyone that she has a thin skin. This time, it comes in the form of open letter released minutes ago and addressed to Sgt. Scott Kreher, president of the Atlanta police union, who had publicly scoffed at her proposal to raise taxes to hire more cops.

“Can the mayor be any more full of hot air on that one?” Kreher was quoted as saying in today’s AJC.

Kreher dismissed Franklin’s proposal to add 400 officers to the APD by the end of the year as so much empty political rhetoric. Even if the city had the money, Kreher told the newspaper, the mayor knows it would take longer than that to recruit, train and certify so many new officers.

Here are some excerpts from Shirley’s fairly lengthy reply:

I have your public comments and I faithfully appreciate the frustration you must feel as you advocate for the officers and the International Brotherhood of Police Officers members in recent weeks. In spite of the divisive comments you have made about me I believe we share a common goal, which is a safe city. I think we both recognize the essential role our police officers contribute to achieving this goal.

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Yellow nails? She must be a smoker!

Amount Georgia lawmakers want to raise the price of cigarettes to offset a $2.4 billion deficit: $1

Georgia’s current tax on cigarettes: 39 cents

Nation’s average cigarette tax: $1.19

Estimated revenue the proposed cigarette tax would generate for the state: $350 million

Estimated tax revenue that would be raised if Sunday alcohol sales were allowed: $4.8 million

Number of signatures on an online petition calling for alcohol to be sold in stores on the Sabbath: 52,070

Dollar amount of a proposed “pole tax” that state lawmakers want strip club patrons to pay at the door: $5

Price of admission after 10 p.m. on a regular night at the Cheetah: $10

Minimum estimated revenue that could be generated if casinos were built in Atlanta and along the Georgia coast: $600 million

Sources: AJC, Associated Press, Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, PetitionOnline.com, TheCheetah.com, 11Alive.com

(Photo courtesy of Photos.com)

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My colleague Mara Shalhoup wasn’t the only one who bristled upon reading a recent AJC story about Atlanta’s slumping nightlife scene.

Fulton Commissioner Robb Pitts, never one to shy away from sharing his opinion, also had a strong reaction to the AJC piece. Unlike Mara, who challenged the article’s central thesis, Pitts, in an open e-mail response, chastises the city for allowing a once-vibrant entertainment industry to dwindle – including the adult entertainment industry. Says Robb:

Atlanta has actually lost ground when it comes to adult entertainment, including the former Buckhead Entertainment District. While establishments like the Cheetah, Magic City and the former Gold Club are not for everyone, they are often magnets for convention traffic.

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Clayton County Chairman Eldrin Bell

Clayton County commissioners approved a developer’s request to relocate 311 graves from a historic African-American cemetery next to Jackson-Hartsfield International Airport. On Dec. 16, opponents held a press conference to criticize the decision.

“I’ve seen my daddy dig many graves back there. He hand-dug those graves, so I know where they are.”

— Betty Bowden, who says she has ancestors in the cemetery, in the Dec. 18 Clayton Daily News.

“Some of these developers will put cement over their mama.”

— John Evans of Operation LEAD, an anti-discrimination group, in the Dec. 16 AJC.

“The person who wants to move these graves has met the standards of the state, as well as the board…I have invited the families to monitor [the transfer of the grave sites] as it takes place.”

— Clayton Chairman Eldrin Bell in the Dec. 18 Clayton Daily News.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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