Monday, September 21, 2009

Thinking Things Over...OOPS!



With all the excitement leading up to last week's primary (not to mention the duties of running the election - and the upcoming recount), I didn't get a chance to follow up on a minor issue.

You see, when Team Picard ran a full page ad in the Register on September 9th, I did a little investigation. A full page ad, run on a weekday, costs $12,818.80, which the Register requires paid in advance. Now, insofar as Team Picard had no indication of ever having this money, it was only natural to wonder who their "angel" was.

I was also told by Register personnel that they wouldn't consider running a political ad after Sunday.

Then, lo and behold! The day before the primary, another full page ad - almost identical to the first appears in the Register:


Now, the only difference between this ad and that on Sept. 9th is the disclaimer on the bottom: while the first ad was "Approved by Team Picard", with no indication of who paid for it, this latest was not only "Approved", it was also "Paid For" by Team Picard.

So, maybe this second ad - which ran at a time I was told no political ad would run - was a "freebie" due to an error by the Register, right?

Wrong.

My sources have told me that the Register made no error on the first ad; and in any case would never swallow the 13 large of ad revenue without a really, REALLY good reason.

So now we have the question of TWO ads, totalling $25,637.60. Wonder how Al Stiewing (Team Picard's Treasurer) will square this on the next SEEC report!

Musta had a HELLUVA fundraiser, guys, right? Uh, guys????

UPDATE: Rumor has it that Team Picard claims it got a "sale" price for the first ad of $999.99...but on 9/14 the "sale" was off, so they had to pay $1,000.00. Heck of a sale, huh? Also, given that the local rag charges around $1,200 for a full page ad, can anyone really believe a bankrupt company like the Register would get approval for (let alone seriously consider) such fire-sale pricing?

2 comments:

jimd said...

"Rumor has it that Team Picard claims it got a "sale" price for the first ad of $999.99...but on 9/14 the "sale" was off, so they had to pay $1,000.00. Heck of a sale, huh? Also, given that the local rag charges around $1,200 for a full page ad"

So which is it $1200 or $12,000 for a full page ad ?

West Haven Bob said...

The "local rag" is the West Haven Voice, a weekly tabloid.