Is panic setting in on Locust Street? The circulation slide at The Des Moines Register is deepening. For the six months ending March 27, the newspaper sold 138,604 copies a day to subscribers and at newsstands. That was down 2.1 percent from a year earlier and 3.5 percent from two years earlier. The Sunday Register also is in a free fall. The 232,739 copies for home-delivery, mail and single-copy sales was down 2.07 percent from the 237,668 of a year before and down 3.3 from the 240,731 of two years earlier. Fewer than four out of 10 households in the metro area - what the Register defines as its "newspaper designated market" - buy a daily Register. That area includes all of Polk, Dallas, Story and Warren counties and pieces of Boone and Clarke counties. For the latest six-month period, 84,997 households in that area got a daily Register either at their door (or driveway or roof), in their mailbox, or at a store or vending machine. A year ago, that figure was 85,824. At the same time, the number of occupied households in the market grew to 221,484 from 216,287 - meaning the all-important (to advertisers) measurement of market penetration dropped to 38.3 percent from 39.6 percent. (Two years ago, it was 40.8 percent.) The newspaper doesn't break out circulation figures for Polk County in its report filed with the industry's Audit Bureau of Circulations, but a good guess would be that now fewer than one in three Polk households actually buy a daily Register. Even when the newspaper throws in all of the industry's gimmicks - those discounted sales to hotels and employees and college students - circulation is still down. Daily, that figure has dropped to 150,907 from 155,898 a year ago - a drop of 3.2 percent in just one year. On Sunday, that figure dropped to 239,368 from 246,245 a year before - a drop of 2.8 percent. Again, that drop comes while the market as a whole is growing. There is one bright spot, though: The company now sells one Sunday paper each week to airlines, a copy that is "available for passengers." No such sales were listed for the previous two years.
Also down at the daily, some old-timers in the newsroom are getting a little peeved that the powers that be at its Web site Juice are allowing the young writers there to place their bylines above press releases. An example pointed out to us last week had Datebook regular Joe Lawler taking a release by The Garden nightclub and claiming it was his own without any further reporting. "But at least we called out Newsweek about how we 'properly do things' here in the Midwest," this individual told us.

With an election changing the form of government in Cedar Rapids on the horizon, current Cedar Rapids Mayor Paul Pate is throwing his name around for another potential statewide bid. Pate, who was once a respected state senator turned unimpressive secretary of state before running for governor and getting his teeth kicked in, is said to be testing the waters for another run at secretary of state. Why? Well, it seems that Pate has pissed off former Iowa Speaker of the House and current Cedar Rapids Economic Development Leader Ron Corbett, who is gunning for Pate due to his perceived ineptness as mayor. Corbett is leading the charge to change CR government where as Pate wants to keep it status quo.

Speaking of the secretary of state position, word on the street has it that its current title holder, Chet Culver, is giving some serious consideration to trying to stay put after the dismal KCCI polling numbers showed that he is likely beatable in a race for the Democratic bid for governor by both Iowa Economic Development head Mike Blouin and Sen. Mike Gronstal, who insiders say can wrestle labor away from Culver and is gaining momentum. Polk County Auditor Michael Mauro is running already, Culver or not.

As for Mauro, he has been working with the Des Moines School Board to reduce the number of polling places in Des Moines on school board election day. He wants to save $40,000. He has met resistance from some minority groups who claim some neighborhoods are being consolidated more than others. African-American community leaders also are complaining that incumbent school board members have had a say in which precincts should close when they have a vested interest. Up for re-election this year: Margaret Borgen, Jim Patch and Som Baccam.

Also, the Des Moines School Board will have solid support for their elementary school closings from community leaders, understanding that this board is making up for lots of lost time under previous boards. The parents going to the schools that will be closed will be the only ones who disagree. "Look for the Register to cover only that half," a school official told us.

Des Moines City Council members are choosing up sides on how to find a new city manager: hire a consultant, at a pretty hefty price, and look nationwide, or take a hard look first, without a consultant, at a handful of Iowa managers known to be very good. The pro-Iowa argument: An Iowa manager already knows how the property-tax system works, knows who's who, knows all the bad stuff as well as all the good stuff and can hit the ground running. The pro-Iowa crowd probably will find the needed four votes - Mahaffey, Brooks, Coleman and a player to be named later. One guy who knows a lot about who's good around the state says the three best are Jeff Pomerantz of West Des Moines, Steve Schainker of Ames and Mike Van Milligen of Dubuque (Rick Clark's name has yet to surface). However, Pomerantz just signed a new contract with a hefty raise, and Schainker has spent nearly all his career in Ames and doesn't seem likely to leave. That leaves Van Milligen, a onetime cop whom his worldwide peers named outstanding manager of the year a while back. They cited his "innovative ideas, enthusiasm and endless optimism." His wife, Nancy, runs the Dubuque foundation - she's the Johnny Danos of Dubuque - which might make it tougher to uproot him from the job he has held since 1993. But it's a safe bet all three managers will get telephone calls pretty quickly.

Meanwhile, a few council members are complaining that current Des Moines City Manager Eric Anderson, who is destined for Tacoma, Wash., is "less than enthusiastic for Des Moines and his performance has dropped quite a bit - unless your last name is Hensley." This individual also told us that Anderson will take a dip in pay when he leaves, and that his poor annual performance review (leaked first by Cityview) is a "significant reason he's taking off."

A handful of Republicans are saying that Sen. Stewart Iverson is not going to run again. Iverson, who has a fancy new Ankeny townhouse, is also said to be looking at running for Jeff Lamberti's spot when he runs for Congress and pining for a federal job, as well, so what he ends up doing is anyone's guess. "A year into Bush's second term you'd think he'd get a sniff, but he hasn't," a top state source said. "It's kind of sad."

And finally, look for The East Village to get a serious boost with two new restaurants in the near future. The Continental, a small plates cafŽ with more than 40 wines, 40 beers and a full liquor selection should open very soon, while the 3,000 square-foot Rio Tapas will open later on in the year. CV

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