October 16, 2002

talkback...

Proposition 49

The Bay Guardian's discussion of Proposition 49 contained some information that is inaccurate ["Endorsements," 10/2/02].

It is not true that the money to expand after-school programs will "come out of existing school funding" or take "crucial money away from the classrooms." The initiative specifically calls for the funding to come through growth in state revenue not guaranteed for education purposes. This is one of the many reasons why the California Teachers Association has endorsed the initiative. The initiative was written so that education funding protected under Proposition 98 would remain untouched. The initiative goes into effect only when state revenues are at least $1.5 billion higher than they have ever been, protecting existing programs and their natural growth.

Also, in no way will after-school programs currently supported by the state lose money. In fact, these are the first programs to receive funding after the initiative kicks in.

Michael Funk Director Sunset Neighborhood Beacon Center San Francisco

Yes, Yes, Yes on B

I was delighted to see your Yes on B endorsement, though I had hoped you would say YES, YES, YES for the housing bond. We really need to make a push to pass Proposition B for four reasons.

1. We all know S.F. rents and home prices are too high and that the answer to these high costs is to increase the supply of housing by creating or preserving more homes and housing units.

2. The bond is under attack by those who brought us the live-work lofts. They say the nonprofit housers stopped the lofts so "It's pay back time," and they are going to kill Prop. B.

3. The first anti-Prop. B hit piece has arrived, and it is slick and misleading. It doesn't count any of the units we have done at Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp. because they are not new construction. It needs to be noted however that our single-room-occupancy units are about $300 a month while the market rate (even on lovely Sixth Street) is $600 to $800!

4. Prop. B needs 67 percent to win and thus needs a big push and to be talked up by everyone.

Brother Kelly Cullen Executive director Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp.

AAN's revenue figures

An article in last week's paper ("Bad Times") mischaracterized certain data relating to various alternative weeklies as "revenue figures recently released by the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies." First, the data were AAN membership-dues categories, not "revenue figures." In AAN, dues rates are assessed based on prior year revenue (e.g., papers under $1 million in revenue pay $500, papers between $1-$2 million pay $750, etc.); the figures cited in the article were revenue ranges that were used to calculate certain papers' FY02 dues rates. Second, the information was not "released"; it was included in a notebook of material provided last month to our board of directors. Third, the revenue ranges were not from "the past year," as the article states. The dues invoices they referenced were based on calendar year 2000 figures. Finally, publishers often hand the dues invoice to their accounting department without looking at it closely, so in many cases the data is even older than that. Bottom line: Anyone who read the story and has an interest in facts will be well advised to disregard these "revenue figures," which have a particularly tenuous relationship to reality.

Richard Karpel Executive director Association of Alternative Newsweeklies Washington, D.C.

Executive editor Tim Redmond responds: The figures at issue listed members of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies by revenue categories (under $2 million, between $2 million and $3 million, between $3 million and $4 million, between $4 million and $6 million, between $6 million and $8 million, and over $8 million). The document provides a useful comparison of how New Times papers are doing in markets where they have competition (badly) compared to markets where they have a monopoly.

It may well be, as Karpel suggests, that the figures are old (although the document is labeled "AAN member papers categorized by FY02 annual revenue"). But it's unlikely that they are so inaccurate as to skew the comparison – New Times Los Angeles, for example, is listed with revenue between $3 million and $4 million, and it seems unlikely that the real figure is twice that high, which it would have to be to put New Times Los Angeles in the same league as its more established competitor, the LA Weekly. So the figures do, even figuring for some inaccuracy, make clear that New Times papers only prosper when they have a monopoly in their market.

The document was distributed to the board of AAN (of which I am a member), and Karpel told me on the phone that the document was not confidential.

For the record