Fresh Loaf

1. Hundreds of fish die in Piedmont Park’s Lake Clara Meer (Turns out it was more like thousands of fish that perished, reportedly from dissolved oxygen. Who knows what Sir Paul thought?)

2. AJC may abandon Marietta Street (Today we learned the paper’s new HQ will be in the action-packed ‘burbs come next June.)

3. Why I want a public option (Andisheh Nouraee clearly states why there needs to be an alternative to private health insurance.)

4. Columnist’s solution to gay sex in parks? Attack dogs. (Marietta Daily Journal resident curmudgeon enlightens us with his wonderful idea of how Marietta City Council should send gays “back to Atlanta where they belong.”)

5. Fulton, Forsyth ban chaining your dog (Beginning Sept. 4, dogs in Fulton County cannot be chained or tethered to a fixed object unless held by an attendant or by the owner.)

(Photo by Thomas Wheatley)

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1. Beltline proposal near Piedmont Park prompts concerns about density (How dense is too dense at 10th and Monroe?)

2. Thoughts on passing of Atlanta LGBT rights leader Allen Thornell (Beloved activist, 38, dies after suffering a stroke.)

3. Letter to editor about Georgia reservoirs hilariously suburban (Second only to CL, the Marietta Daily Journal has some of the best letters to the editor.)

4. Oxendine attacks Obama on behalf of big donors (The Ox has to look out for his base — which, is, of course, big insurance companies.)

5. MARTA service cuts start Aug. 15 (Bus route 23 — which runs along Peachtree, linking Midtown to Buckhead — gets the axe.)

(Photo courtesy Atlanta Beltline Inc.)

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Second only to CL, the Marietta Daily Journal has some of the best letters to the editor. For less than a dollar a day you get some of the most whimsical glimpses into Cobb County life.

Yesterday, MDJ columnist Don McKee reprinted his readers’ thoughts about this whole ‘water wars’ mess. The best comes from my boy “B.E. (Pitt) Pittman.”

I think Atlanta and its metro counties and cities should build regional reservoirs similar to the new Hickory Log Creek Reservoir in Canton. It really ticks me off that a non-elected federal judge in a far off Northern state can dictate our use of Lake Lanier. Gainesville has built a regional lake on Flat Creek in north Hall County. We should build one on Sope Creek, Ward Creek and Sweetwater Creek. Also, we should build some smaller lakes so folks can use the water to water their lawns, wash cars and water golf courses. I have always thought it ridiculous to use treated water to wash cars, water lawns and golf courses. I wish we could get Bob Barr, Newt Gingrich and Zell Miller back in Congress.

After the jump, we examine Mr. Pittman’s opinions, because that is why Jimmy Carter invented the Internet.

(more…)

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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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Last week’s editorial buyout offer at the AJC was structured as something of a gamble for reporters: if enough of them took the deal, there’d be no need for layoffs. Otherwise…

As with any game of chance, you sometimes get unexpected outcomes. In this case, it turns out to be the wholesale departure of the Cobb bureau staff, a result that appears to have taken even the paper’s top brass by surprise.

In one fell swoop, the AJC’s Cobb outpost will lose Bureau Chief Sheila Garland; government reporter Tom Opdyke; business reporter David Pendered; cops reporter Yolanda Rodriguez; general assignment reporter Karen Rosen; enterprise reporter Bill Sanders; photographer Andy Sharp; and education reporter Diane Stepp.

As far as we can tell, the only full-timer left in Cobb is enterprise reporter Jeremy Redmon, who wasn’t eligible to take the buyout because he’s been with the paper only three years.

We’re told editor Julia Wallace has sent out a staff memo asking for volunteers for reassignment to the Cobb office.

The exodus may have something to do with the paper’s decision to discontinue the Extras, the Thursday zoned sections containing news and sports geared to their specific communities. But folks in the DeKalb bureau decided to stay, despite the impending demise of the DeKalb Extra, while the Cobbers bailed.

There was once a time when Cobb was the paper’s Tiffany bureau; many of the paper’s top editors and executives lived in Cobb and they made sure the local staff was top-notch. The newsroom was as big as that of the Marietta Daily Journal, but with more resources at its disposal.

The times are definitely a-changin’ …

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In last Thursday’s Letters section of the Marietta Daily Journal, a fellow by the name of William Owen of the Georgia Monorail Consortium wrote in and espoused the virtues of his organization’s technology — cost-efficient! creates jobs! snazzy! I couldn’t help but wonder why all this talk of newfangled super-slick rail systems sounded so familiar. And then I remembered…

Don’t get snookered, Marietta! Hugely successful cartoon sitcoms are the foretellers of the suburban doom that will befall you!

(Full disclosure: I was raised in Marietta and once worked for one of the MDJ’s weeklies. My folks still live there. I harbor no ill will toward monorails or Mr. Owens and don’t believe him to be the huckster excellently portrayed by the late Phil Hartman in the above video.)

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