It's the only "porn" Attorney General Mark Shurtleff allows in the office. It gives former Salt Lake City Councilwoman Deeda Seed heartburn. And federal Judge David Winder calls it an example of why America needs the First Amendment.
Love it or hate it, the irreverent Salt Lake City Weekly has managed to amuse and irritate Utahns for a decade. A 10th-anniversary edition came out last week.
"It's unprecedented," says John Saltas, 48, the alternative newspaper's Hawaiian-shirt-wearing publisher.
Saltas said the paper provides a voice to Utah's many communities — political, cultural or ethnic — that haven't had a decent forum.
In filling that role, he said the paper has been the target of much name-calling, including the lazy catch-all "liberal." "When that happens, it merely validates just how important it is to continue telling those stories," he said.
Although most metropolitan areas, even conservative bastions like California's Orange County, have successful non-mainstream papers, no one gave Saltas' edgy upstart a chance in staid Salt Lake City.
"It just shows there's an audience for our type of publication," said Richard Karpel, executive director of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, based in Washington, D.C. "There comes a point where all the work you put into it starts to pay off. I think (Saltas) has hit that sweet spot in the last couple of years."
While papers such as the Event and the Salt Lake Observer failed (for various reasons), City Weekly found an audience. The tabloid-style publication claims an unpaid distribution of 60,000 and 1,800 distribution points.
And like readers of those supermarket checkstand rags, some pick it up on the sly.
"There are people who sneak us and read it in the office," says managing editor Christopher Smart.
City Weekly has taken on anyone and everything over the years. It delves into subjects that titillate and infuriate. It also contains racy ads, especially in the personals section, where escort services and adult chat lines dominate the pages.
"It's much more raffish than the other papers dare to be," said Milton Hollstein, a longtime University of Utah journalism professor and media critic.
Hollstein, a regular City Weekly reader, said he used to criticize the paper for being too lurid but says it has toned down. Overall, though, he doesn't find much to dislike about it.
"If it didn't exist, there'd be a need for something else like it," he said.
Saltas, a U. grad, started the newspaper out of his basement in 1984 as the monthly Private Eye, with private clubs as his bread-and-butter advertisers. Because Utah law prohibited liquor advertising at the time, he could only distribute it to club members via mail.
Bi-weekly publication began when alcohol laws changed in 1988 and distribution expanded. Four years later, the Private Eye became a weekly.
Because he grew tired of being confused with a private detective agency, Saltas changed the name in 1997. City Weekly now has 28 full-time employees and 40 to 50 distribution drivers and freelance writers.
Nary an institution has escaped the paper's biting prose, including government, the Deseret News, the Salt Lake Tribune and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, not to mention scads of politicians.
"John doesn't like me to use the word anti-establishment, but I think that is our role," said Smart, a former Tribune reporter.
Saltas likes to think of the paper as an equal-opportunity basher, though he says his aim isn't to take anyone down. The great-great-grandson of a Mormon polygamist, Saltas said he's bugged that people label the paper anti-Mormon.
"Look around here," he says in his cluttered downtown office. "Does this look like a battleship to you? I don't think so."
But former Salt Lake County District Attorney Neal Gunnarson, for one, felt an August 1997 issue torpedoed him.
City Weekly carried a story critical of his decision not to prosecute then-Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Corradini in the so-called "Giftgate" controversy. A front-cover cartoon depicted Gunnarson as a firefighter rescuing a scantily clad Corradini from a burning City Hall.
An angry Gunnarson dumped a rack of papers into a trash bin near his Sandy home because he found the cover offensive.
Conservative political activist Gayle Ruzicka is often a target of City Weekly's scorn. It once ran a computer-generated photo of her as a barmaid, a lampooning she understands goes with being in the public eye.
"I can't complain a lot. At least they made sure I had clothes on," she said, adding that she thinks an altered photo of Shurtleff as Hugh Hefner and state porn czar Paula Houston as a Playboy bunny went too far.
Ruzicka has more of an issue with the editorial content.
"When they tell the truth, and who knows when that is, it's an alternative way to get their message out. The problem is, news doesn't mean a lot to them. It's an opinion paper," she said.
Smart said the newspaper doesn't attempt to hide its biases, nor does it claim to be even-handed. "We ought to be fair," he said, "but we certainly don't profess to be objective."
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