Riordan group nears debut of new weekly.

Setting their sights on a summer debut, a group financed by former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan is preparing a prototype of a new weekly newspaper, The Los Angeles Examiner.

The prototype, which staff members said should be complete next week, will be a 50-page tabloid that will be shopped around to prospective advertisers and investors.

"The business is being worked on, but at this point we're planning on launching in June," said Ken Layne, a member of the Examiner's editorial staff and co-founder of the LAExaminer.com Web site.

Layne said the Examiner would be a politically oriented, L.A.-centric paper aimed at affluent readers. The goal is to have commentary from well-known political writers and Hollywood insiders.

Contributors to the prototype include comedian Billy Crystal, producer Lynda Obst and former New Times Los Angeles columnist Jill Stewart, said Tim DeRoche, a former Riordan aide who is heading up the project.

"I want to see every mover and shaker in the city read it," Riordan said. "Everybody who loves L.A. like I do should like reading a paper that respects their city."

The paper, which will be free, remains a work in progress, but DeRoche volunteered that gossip and nuptials columns were possible features. He also said Riordan plans to pen a column from time to time.

Advertisers being targeted include higher-end restaurants, hotels and retailers. The Examiner will not accept sex ads that are typical of free weeklies, and will limit its circulation to wealthier neighborhoods.

DeRoche said the paper would be available at boxes around town and possibly at fancier supermarkets. Another idea: mailing the publication to prospective readers in certain ZIP codes. "What we're trying to do is go for a more upscale advertiser than your typical alternative paper," DeRoche said.

Weekly a better choice

The paper's debut would mark the revival of a venerable L.A. publishing name.

William Randolph Hearst founded the original Los Angeles Examiner in 1903 and by the 1950s, it was one of the nation's largest afternoon dailies. In 1961, Hearst merged the Examiner with the evening Herald-Express, creating the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, ceding the morning market to the L.A. Times.

The Herald-Examiner was crippled by a strike from 1967 to 1973; management fought the union and ultimately settled, but it lost scores of readers and advertisers during the battle. The Herald-Examiner was shut down in 1989.

Riordan's group is in the process of registering the Examiner name for the new paper.

Reports of Riordan's interest in starting a paper first surfaced in April 2002, just after Bill Simon defeated him for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. Riordan said he was mulling a daily or five-day-a-week paper for a June 2002 launch.

Media experts felt those plans were overly ambitious and likely to fail. But with a weekly, which is far cheaper to produce than a daily, Riordan's chances are considered better, even in an uncertain advertising climate.

"A daily is pretty much impossible," said John Morton, president of Morton Research Inc., a media consulting firm in Silver Spring, Md. "With a weekly the operating costs are less. Moreover, you can orient it toward a particular niche, and it can have a particular theme."

In its infancy, the paper likely will attract curious readers. Also, given his hefty Rolodex and troupe of well-heeled friends, Riordan shouldn't have trouble drumming up advertisers for the first few issues.

"There is a certain amount of goodwill businesses want to engender, so when somebody says 'I'm selling ads for Dick Riordan's new newspaper,' most people will say 'I'll take a few,'" said David Cole, editor and publisher of NewsInc a newsletter on the newspaper business. "The issue is selling six months, selling a year."

Riordan, a multi-millionaire, has funded the project thus far. "I really haven't gone to anybody," he said. "There is an old saying that you don't try to sell from an empty cart. Nobody has turned me down and nobody has said yes because I haven't gone to them yet."

DeRoche would not say how much had been spent so far, nor how big the staff will be. "Mayor Riordan has reviewed a draft of the prototype, which he is very happy with, and he has helped us solicit. contributions from some name folks," he said.

Morton estimated the annual cost of running a free weekly at less than $10 million, but he noted that costs could be kept down if the paper's circulation is tightly controlled.

Moving ahead

The five-person Examiner staff is currently completing the prototype and drafting a business plan. The incorporation process has been initiated, DeRoche said, although the paper's holding company does not yet have a name. Certain particulars, such as official titles for Riordan and the editorial staff, have yet to he worked out. "What my eventual title will be depends on everyone else's title," Layne said.

It is not clear what will happen to the LAExaminer.com Web site, which Layne founded with Matt Welch, also a member of The Examiner's editorial staff. "Most likely we will continue LAExaminer.com for what it is," Layne said.

The site features links to select stories in local media accompanied by often biting commentary, which will continue in the Examiner.

"In the pantheon of L.A. media, there isn't much in terms of unique voice, so it will be exciting, but it will take an amalgam of readers and advertising to make this thing go," Cole said. "In business you have to ask yourself why you have no competitors. Is it because you're so far out ahead of the group or because it's a bad idea?"