Nancee Lyons, a spokesperson for the D.C. Department of Public Works, just returned my call in the matter of the $50 fine Washington City Paper received this week for "failure to separate recycling from other solid waste" at 2390 Champlain St. NW, the location of the paper's newsroom.

The timing seemed curious to some at the newspaper because, just a few weeks earlier, City Paper had published a cover story in which it criticized DPW for failing to crack down on private trash haulers who mix recycling and trash during their rounds.

I asked Lyons if there was any connection—was this meant as some kind of retribution? "Of course not," she said. Usually, she explained, citations are issued after someone makes a complaint and an investigator goes to check it out, not because an investigator is out looking. Lyons did not know if someone had complained about the Dumpster behind 2390 Champlain.

Read More "DPW to City Paper: Recycling Violation Not Retribution" »

Busted?

Washington City Paper has been slapped with a $50 fine from the D.C. Department of Public Works for "failure to separate recycling from other solid waste" at 2390 Champlain St. NW, the address of the paper's newsroom.

Normally, City Paper wouldn't report on this as news. Except there are several curious things about the citation (view a PDF of it here). First, the timing: City Paper recently ran a cover story by Christine MacDonald about how D.C.'s private trash haulers often commingle recycling with solid waste during their pickups and how the city has been lax in cracking down on them. The story hit the streets Nov. 5 12. The date of violation on the citation is Nov. 16.

Read More "DPW Nails City Paper After City Paper Nails DPW" »

Cheap Seats Daily and its inferiority complex ravaged sister publication remain the go-to news organs for coverage of what the Redskins have officially dubbed the Cheerleader Car Wash Sweepstakes.

Yesterday, in this very space, we blew the lid off the latest listener contest for Dan Snyder's sportstalk station, WTEM-AM, in which the Redskins owner promises to send his cheerleading squad over to winners' houses and make them wash cars.

And in this week's analog edition, we blow the lid off Dan Snyder's cheerleader past, from his 2000 rackumentary "Beauty on the Beach," all the way up to his latest scheme, which tells the cheering crew to put down their pom poms and pick up sponges and service his 25-54 male audience.

And, as promised, throughout all this lid-blowing we've run the same photograph of all those sudsy blondes, again and again and again.

That's the shot that got The Great Dan Steinberg so lathered up he rudely barged into the comments section to pooh-pooh our Snyder/T&A expose. TGDS basically accused Cheap Seats Daily of hypocrisy and of being as exploitative as Dan Snyder!

Just because we ran this photo of sudsy blondes!

That hurts.

What kind of message does that contest (and this photo) send to the Little Ladies of Football? Think of the children, Dan and Dan!

(AFTER THE JUMP: Could Snyder's layoffs at Redskins Park have helped this car wash debacle along? Is it Sherm or Sherman? Dan Steinberg reveals Lewis' bingo past? Dan Steinberg conceals reveals his own bingo past? How loaded is the Skins' 2009 schedule with Snyder humiliatees? Yankee Stadium ain't the only ballpark in use this October? Nationals Park gets loaded with readers?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Will Sherm Lewis Fail? Or Will Sherman Lewis Fail?" »

Last year, Central Union Mission attempted to bring its 128-bed homeless shelter to the 3500 block of Georgia Avenue, but was shot down by Ward 1 Council member Jim Graham and a group of residents in a rather shameless case of NIMBYism. "Good news!!! Central Union Mission is not moving to Georgia Avenue in Ward One," Graham wrote on his website after he fought off the shelter.

Now, as the Prince of Petworth has relayed in two recent blog posts, the local ANC 1A will be considering a new proposal on Wednesday night.  The Mission is trying a more moderate tack for the space, which it owns: retail combined with affordable housing.

Read More "Petworth Commenters Mobilize Against “Poor People”" »

Darrow's post yesterday is far from the first photo of a banana on City Desk. In fact, in this blog's relatively short run, we've posted far more banana photos than seems plausible. Here is an archive.

Newsweek delivers an interesting lesson in media economics via a story on Newport Daily News (R.I.). Here's a paper that constructed a huge pay wall for its online content in hopes of stopping its freefall. That's basically what Washington Post reporter Paul Farhi advocated in a recent, controversial piece in American Journalism Review.

The newspaper began charging $345 for an online subscription, and the impact has been stark: Discontinue-my-subscription calls stopped; newsstand sales of the paper surged by 200 copies a day for a paper with a daily circ. of 13,000.

Woohoo, good news for the industry???!!!

But hold on---what do you do if your newspaper has always been free
.

UPDATE 1628:Chicago Reader enters Atalaya Era after Creative Loafing loses its last bid in bankruptcy court (Chicago Reader)

UPDATE 1535: Creative Loafing chain sold to biggest creditor for $5 million (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
UPDATE 1459: Washington City Paper Now Owned by Atalaya Capital (DCist)
Atalaya outbids Eason, assumes control of Creative Loafing (Creative Loafing Tampa)
UPDATE 1332: Hedge Fund Atalaya buys Creative Loafing in equity auction (Tampa Bay Business Journal)

UPDATE 1256: New York equity firm snaps up Tampa's Creative Loafing (Tampa Tribune/TBO.com)

UPDATE 1240:Chicago Reader Has New Owners (Chicago Reader)

UPDATE 1236:Tampa's Creative Loafing chain taken over by hedge fund Atalaya (St. Petersburg Times/tampabay.com)

UPDATE 1229: Atlanta Creative Loafing says Atalaya won.

UPDATE 1223: Chicago Reader calls it for Atalaya.

UPDATE 1218: Unconfirmed Twitter chatter is that Atalaya has won.
Read More "Who Will Own City Paper? We Just Found Out" »

Note that semicolon up there in the title. You see how beautifully I deployed that? I learned punctuation as a copy editor, a job that I took at Spin 14 years ago. There, I first changed like to such as and made bands its rather than theys. I mastered the en dash and the difference between prone and supine.

Prettying up the writing of other journalists, much like answering their phone calls, is a job that isn't making it through the recession at many publications. Here at City Paper, we used to have a receptionist. We also used to have two copy editors. You will no longer find those job titles on our masthead.
Read More "Disappearing Media Jobs: 1) Copy Editor; 2) Receptionist" »

Good morning, City Desk readers, and welcome to a somewhat hungover Fringe Friday! Your intrepid blogger, after much good-natured cajoling, ended up at last night's Fringe kick-off in Chinatown. Boy oh boy, did I have fun! I met Wrath, Gluttony, and Greed from The Sin Show, and according to all the cards I found in my back pocket this morning, I met lots of other friendly people, too! My only regret is the tequila! Trey Graham posted some photos from the launch party (he calls them "Fringe Fotos"--so fun, changing ph's to f's in honor of Fringe!) at the Fringe and Purge blog, which you should all bookmark and check regularly, for the hobbit references, and because a whole bunch of us will be bloggy-bloggy-blogging there nonstop until Fringe ends.

Why the whole world loves/hates the Washington City Paper, Michael Jackson's immortal soul, and some Friday zen, after the jump.

Read More "Our Morning Roundup: Shrimp and White Wine" »

Michael Rupert, spokesperson for the city's Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, confirms receiving five inquiries today about whether his agency can do something about what the Washington City Paper prints.

It's almost as if Washington really paid attention to the summer solstice. This town hops like mad in the springtime---from the Cherry Blossom festival all the way through Pride Weekend, the place is mayhem. Street closings, marathons, road races, everything---don't even bother driving near the downtown/federal core on a weekend. You're just going to get stuck in traffic.

Read More "Weekend in Review: City Emptying Out!" »

A short time ago, Washington City Paper called the L.A. Coroner's Office for confirmation on the rumors concerning the King of Pop's alleged death. 

When Washington City Paper asked for confirmation, we were put on hold. 

We are still on hold. 

While we wait, we revel in the memory of having watched (already) Al Sharpton's press conference, Michael Eric Dyson's faux scholarly take (seriously, this guy is a vampire), and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann interview an Access Hollywood "reporter."

Shit, we're no longer on hold.

Read More "WCP Confirms Michael Jackson’s Death" »

Never thought I'd be scolded by a Huffington Post official for linking. But I was!

Here's a chronology that explains how this HuffPo reprimand came about:

Read More "HuffPo Scolds Washington City Paper for Linking" »

In which Erik gives prop to former CP reporter Jessica Gould, scolds the Examiner for "buying the tort reformers' angle," refuses to read Baltimore Gay Life, and dings the auto section of the Washington Hispanic for overstepping its advertorial bounds.

PLUS: A stirring bonus segment in which Erik lobs a BIG ONE at CP's own glass house. No way are you touching that remote!

Stop me if you already read this at DCist, but Reality Blurred's Andy Dehnart reports that

Bravo is spinning off yet another series from its Real Housewives franchise: The Real Housewives of D.C., which will be the fifth in the series....

The series will be produced by [D.C.'s] Half Yard Productions, which produced Discovery’s American Loggers. Different production companies produce the different spin-offs, perhaps to keep them fresh.

This is absolutely fantastic. Would it be too much of a stretch for Half Yard to recruit Maureen Dowd?

Washington City Paper's twitter account (@WCP) is leading the hunt on this one. Twitter your guesses as to which neighborhoods are most likely to produce Half Yard's "real housewives" and tag your tweets #realhousewivesdc. Guess correctly and there may be some swag in it for you.