Category Archives: Hearne_Christopher
Today: What Not to Where While KU Takes Elite Eight Tube Ride
The premise, both simple and lame…
Typical newspaper pablum for the masses. Masterminded by the Lawrence Journal World, which took it upon itself to hatch an activity guide for folks who could care less about choking down KU‘s 10 day march to its stunning loss to VCU in the NCAA tournament.
Think of it as, clues for the clueless...
Hearne: The Rise & Fall of the KC Pitch, Part Deux
The current state of Kansas City "alt weekly" the Pitch?
It’s painfully obvious to pretty much anyone who’s been watching that print publications are fighting a losing battle. A battle for their lives. Which isn’t to say that the Kansas City Star, for example, is going to just blow away. At some point in time the stronger pubs will downsize themselves into a long-term model that affords profitability.
Oh, it won’t be pretty. Just as it hasn’t at 18th and Grand these past three years. It will get there though, and if the economy rights itself, they may even begin adding bodies. However in the long run, it’s just too costly to print and distribute hundreds of thousands of newspapers each day, and fewer and fewer people – younger people – have an appetite to hold a physical paper in their hands.
The problem, as most of you probably know, is nobody’s come close to figuring out how to make anywhere near the profits online that they’ve been making in print.
So those in the print pub biz, it’s beyond scary.
Today: Wanted, Dead or Alive; Proof as to The Whereabouts of Jerry Mazer
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In the spirit of O.J.’s search for the real killer, I bring you my search for an actual dead body…
We’re talking about notorious Plaza panhandler Jerry Mazer, of course. He of the, "Can I get a down payment on a cheeseburger?" fame. The dude who in 1994 knocked the Plaza and City of Kansas City on their butts and got an ordinance banning bumming on the Plaza overturned. Not only that, the city had to cough up some cash for Mazer’s trouble to settle the case.
Mazer’s travels to San Fran and beyond and his subsequent run-ins with the Gestapo-like Plaza Patrol went on for years as he continued his pursuit of the American Dream along Kansas City’s Appian Way outside Barnes & Noble.
Until, several sources say, sometime late last summer or early fall.
That’s when Mazer, 56, allegedly tipped his toes toward the sky and said goodbye
Today: Why News Radio KMBZ’s Move to FM May Not Work, Part One
Simulcasting news radio 980 KMBZ AM on the FM dial makes perfect sense – or does it…
While the station remains a cash cow for Entercom, its flagging ratings were bound to catch up with its pocketbook. So by bringing in more listeners grazing on the FM band – not the AM – KMBZ hopes to keep the cash coming in and perhaps charge a bit of a premium for a more upscale (and hopefully larger) FM enhanced audience.
Just how poorly has KMBZ fared of late?
In the just released February radio ratings it placed 14th in the market in adults 25 to 54 with a 3.5 share of listeners. And in its prime demo of adults 35 to 64 it came in 14th also.
Hearne: Will News/Talk Station 980 KMBZ’s Talent Measure Up On The FM Dial?
The $64 million question: Will younger, trendier listeners flock to news/talk radio 980 KMBZ after it goes FM?
That’s a tough one.
At this point, nobody really knows. After all, the main thrust of frequency modulation (FM) is the high quality the signal imparts to music. I mean, how mellifluous can Rush Limbaugh get? And it’s not like Mike Shanin’s going to forget he’s not in the shower and break into song in the middle of dissing Obama or fantasizing about Sarah Palin. I mean, he is getting up there some, but…
Which brings us to the age issue…
For KMBZ to take its game to the next level, it needs to attract younger listeners when it begins to simulcast on KUDL 98.1’s FM signal. You know, people who don’t subscribe to the Kansas City Star.
Today: Entercom To Blow Up Historic KUDL FM, Changes Format on 99.7…Again
This just in….
Entercom radio told advertisers today that it’s blowing up up one of Kansas City’s most legendary radio stations, KUDL 98.1 FM. The soft rock station is more-or-less being folded into a new station and format called The Point on sister signal 99.7 FM. Until today 99.7 was the home of Gen X Radio, which debuted just last year.
In a telephone conference call, Point program director Mark Edwards described the new format as being designed to serve Kansas City women between the ages of 25 and 49.
Hearne: Will Nick Wright or 980 KMBZ Commandeer KUDL FM’s Signal?
What’s to become of one of Kansas City most esteemed local radio signals, KUDL-FM?
Parent company Entercom told key advertisers today it would announce the signal’s fate tomorrow. KUDL currently plays soft rock, targeted to women at 98.1 on the FM dial. However at noon today Entercom did away with its Gen X radio format at 99.7, changing it to The Point, playing "Today’s Best Music" and targeting women between the ages of 25 and 49.
There’s more…
Hearne: Police to KU Fans & Bars, Read Our Lips; No Open Containers
It’s that time of year again…
You can almost taste the jubilation. KU’s forging ahead in the NCAAs and the prospect of dancing in the streets is smack in the minds of Jayhawk faithful. To that end, a bartender at La Parrilla in downtown Lawrence told me the city and/or police enacted an ordinance or policy allowing bars and restaurants to let customers buy booze and take it to the streets.
Whenever KU‘s basketball team makes it into the Sweet 16 or Elite 8.Other customers added assurances that this was the case. It started in 2008 when KU won the national title.
Kinda makes sense, right?
Hearne: Sly James Victory Dance To Go Down at Negro Leagues Tonight
With all due respect for the political prognosticator known as Jimmy C….
The losers I talk to are forecasting a victory for Sly James in today’s KC mayoral contest. Not for Mike Burke, as my well-heeled colleague Jim Fitzpatrick (Fitz choked out a cool five grand to Burke) wishfully predicted earlier today.
The reason: For starters, the weather.
Today’s pleasing climes will turn out voters in parts of town and of an age that will likely countermand the waspy white, older voters to whom meaningless support of over-the-hill former mayors counts for something.
In other words, it will bring out younger, hipper voters, to whom staid endorsements from the old guard are more likely to be seen as a reason to vote against rather than for Mike Burke.
That’s what I’m hearing anyway…
Today: Has Claire McCaskill Used Up Her Nine Lives?
When it comes to dodging bullets, few have done it better than Claire McCaskill…
Long ago the Missouri senator’s political colleagues bestowed upon her the nickname "Blonde Ambition." And through the years McCaskill’s used her uncanny skills at charming members of the local media to navigate past any number of potentially career killing missteps.
Let’s look at McCaskill’s latest hot mess and review some of the ones she’s skittered past in the past.
Hearne: The Story Behind Sporting Kansas City’s Bid to Book Concerts
Star sports scribe Sam Mellinger was on the right track…almost
Mellinger was high in pegging Sporting Kansas City’s stadium naming rights to Lance Armstrong’s cancer charity LIVESTRONG at a value of $2 million a year. SKC honcho Robb Heineman suggested only $1 million, possibly up to $2 million for the rights.
That said, Mellinger’s larger point being that "Livestrong’s “payment” — if you can call it that — was Armstrong’s "access to big-name performers who could help fill the stadium for high-dollar concerts," Mellinger writes. "Armstrong is close with Justin Timberlake, for instance. He shares a house in France with Bono. Jimmy Buffett rode in the pace car during one of Armstrong’s Tour de France races."
So will SKC be able to draw top drawer talent to its new outdoor soccer stadium despite competition from the myriad indoor and outdoor area concert venues, like the nearby, similarly-sized Sandstone?
Tonight: End of an Era; Jim Nutter Sr. Loses Mayor’s Race for First Time
This just in from a political observer who declined to be identified…
"This is the first time Jim Nutter Sr.’s lost a Kansas City mayoral election since H. Roe Bartle was in office," says the source. "Until tonight, he’s won every mayor’s race since H. Roe Bartle – that’s your story."
In an interview earlier this week Nutter confirmed he was backing Mike Burke over eventual winner Sly James. Nutter noted that this was the fourth mayor’s race pitting a black candidate against a white one.
Nutter had backed the winners in the first three; Dick Berkley over Bruce Watkins, Emanuel Cleaver over Bob Lewellen and – to Nutter’s everlasting chagrine – current KC mayor Mark Funkhouser over Alvin Brooks.
This was to be Nutter’s fourth victory in the mayoral races of black versus white. Just one problem..
Today: Life After KC Confidential, The Tony Botello Story
What’s next for former KC Confidential hit man Tony Botello now that he’s parted ways with KCC?
Plenty. But first a few words about the year and a half-long journalistic honeymoon that ended two weeks ago. Early on in the brief two year history of KCC I met with Tony with the idea of writing a story for a local print publication measuring his six year odyssey to the top of the local blogosphere.
It was a story largely untold – until somewhat weakly two weeks back in the Pitch. One that warranted telling.
We met for coffee at Broadway Cafe in Westport and four hours later I departed with way more news and information about Tony than Pitch editor Joe Tone was able to amass two years later.
Just one problem…
The story was never written, I hired Tony instead.
Hearne: Riding With The King; Jim Nutter & The 2011 Elections
Some people call him
king maker…
I look at him as a nice, older gentleman with a penchant for politics. Some people live for the Chiefs or KU basketball. Others collect stamps. My take on Jim Nutter is that politics is his game. And that’s the way he plays it, like a game. Naturally people who play games generally like to win.
But Nutter’s intentions are largely benign in my opinion. He values things like honesty and right versus wrong. Oh, he’s’s thrown his fair share of rabbit punches, but he’s several levels above the sleezy local political operatives we know all too well.
So I ask Nutter who he’s for?
Hearne: The Rise & Fall of the KC Pitch, Part 1
First Pennylane, now the Pitch…
It’s been a rough year for aging, local pop culture icons. First the closing of Streetside Records (successor to Pennylane) and then the continuing long, slow demise and sale of KC’s first true alternative paper. For those inclined to take notice of such things, my ties to both the Pitch and the music store extend well beyond my 16 year run as a columnist at the Star .
The affiliation with the two began in the mid 1980s when, after trying in vain to buy an ad in the Pitch for a concert I was promoting, I pitched the owner to let me take over its advertising and promotion. And to a lesser extent contribute to its editorial content. There wasn’t a whole lot to the Pitch in those days, LeRoi‘s music reviews, Joe Bob’s Drive-In movies, record store staff contributuions, and every once in a while someone like Jack Cashill would step in and take a swing.
The Pitch was little more than a device Pennylane’s owner used to pocket co-op ad dollars from small music labels.
Today: How a Washington Post Reporter & Star Editor Purposely Dodged Correction Bullet
One of the comments on yesterday’s story about Plaza panhandler Jerry Mazer’s demise referred to my having blown him up…
As in that my writing about Mazer’s travails over the years elevated his profile and status in KC.
I won’t argue that, other than to note Mazer had already blown himself up.
By knocking Kansas City on its butt and getting a discriminatory, Plaza-backed, panhandler-ban booted off the books. Mazer was front page news before I laid a glove on him.
Back to Mazer’s victory.
Washington Post reporter Tom Jackman – then at the Star – screwed up and misspelled Mazer’s first name in a major news story.
Today: Muted Local Media Trades Ad Bucks For Integrity, Views Royals Glass As Half Full
Does anytbody around these parts have the stones to take on David Glass?
Sure doesn’t look that way. With the Kansas City Royals locked into a neverending nosedive, you’d think the town’s top providers of news and sports would be all over the team’s owner to shape up or ship out. But funny thing, everybody’s too busy harvesting the team’s ad dollars to belly up to the tell-it-like-it-is bar.
Everybody who’s anybody, anyway.
Major media with the clout – but not the will – to begin the drum beat. of disatisfaction. The lack of that leadership at 18th and Grand, for example, renders the town largely voiceless and helps insure KC’s status quo as Mudville, USA. A state that will continue for years or until owner David Glass’s death or a financial reversal forcing him to sell the team.
Enter lifelong baseball and Royals fan Andy Lewellen.…
Hearne: Panhandler Jerry Mazer Off to Cheeseburger Heaven
Stop the complete presses…
Who said bad news comes in threes? Try four. To that lineup in the sky of recently departed local icons – DiPardo, Grigsby and Murphy – add the name, Jerry Mazer.
According to sources, Mazer, Kansas City’s most mercenary mendicant, is no more.
Loved, hated, arrested, bullied, spat on, feared, banned – but most of all – recognized and well known. Who among the habitues of downtown KC, Westport or the Plaza doesn’t recognize Mazer’s signature line, "Can I get a downpayment on a cheeseburger?"
The irascible Mazer was a fixture in Kansas City pop culture for the better part of the past five decades. In the mid 1990s Kansas City was forced to make a cash settlement with Mazer and agreed to repeal its anti-begging ordinance.
"Really, I hadn’t heard anything, I’m sad," says Tivoli Theater owner Jerry Harrington. "I mean, he wasn’t a friend of mine but he was a Kansas City character – there was nobody like Jerry. No matter how irritated he made me, I always laughed"
Today: Truck Wars; Basement Dryers Duke It Out In Court Over The Color Yellow
Don’t look now but there’s a foundation civil war brewing in the Cowtown…
One one side, stands a gentleman named Otto Fleck, the owner of a company called Dry Basement. On the other looks to be made up of about anybody else who wants to use the words "dry" and "basement" and/or the color yellow in their foundation repair biz.
Which brings us to a front page story last week in the Star that ran under the headline "Foundation repair companies scrap in court over trucks’ color."
Fleck’s Dry Basement sued Raytown-based competitor Pro Foundation Technology claiming it iinfringed on Dry Basement’s trademark color yellow by fielding a pair of used Penske rental trucks already painted yellow. And because for seven years Dry Basement has had a "fleet" of distinctive, yellow trucks.
Kinda like those bright red trucks Roger the Plumber drives…
Today: No Sale, Lew’s ‘Zack Grienke Land’ Alive & Well Despite Pitcher’s Departure
The days (and nights) of Zach Greinke packing The K are mostly behind him…
So, in all likeihood, are the ones of his pitching starts packing popular Waldo watreing hole Lew’s Grill & Bar. Raising the question of what will become of the Facebook blasts Lew’s has been sending out the past two years for everything from a Greinke game gatherings to Beer Pong tourneys.
And the answer is nothing – Zack Geinke Land is going nowhere.
Fast…
