Type | Alternative weekly |
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Format | Tabloid |
Owner(s) | Copperfield Publishing, Inc. |
Publisher | John Saltas |
Founded | 1984 (as Private Eye) |
Language | English |
Headquarters | 248 South Main St. Salt Lake City, Utah 84101 US |
Circulation | 55,000 |
Website | www |
Salt Lake City Weekly (usually shortened to City Weekly) is a free alternative weekly tabloid-paged newspaper published in Salt Lake City, Utah. It began as Private Eye. City Weekly is published and dated for every Thursday by Copperfield Publishing Inc. of which John Saltas is majority owner and president.
John Saltas founded what would become Salt Lake City Weekly in June 1984. He called his monthly publication Private Eye because it contained news and promotions for bars and dance clubs, which due to Utah State liquor laws were all private clubs. Saltas originally mailed the Private Eye as a newsletter to private club members. State law forbade private clubs from advertising at the time, so Saltas' newsletter was the only way for clubs to provide promotional information.
In 1988 Private Eye became a bi-weekly newspaper although it was available mostly in clubs. Distribution of the paper broadened as new liquor rule interpretations at the Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (DABC) allowed mainstream media to carry club advertisements as long as they weren't "soliciting" members. Private Eye thus ended its mailed period and was available for free in public distribution outlets for the first time. In 1989, Private Eye was admitted to the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies (AAN), the organization's 40th member.
In 1992 Private Eye Weekly emerged as a weekly tabloid-style alternative paper with distribution outlets in Salt Lake City, Ogden, Park City and Utah County. Saltas hired his first editor, then-KSL-TV journalist Tom Walsh, a veteran writer with experience from the alternative Phoenix New Times, who took a significant salary cut because of his enthusiasm for the new paper.
Early contributors to Private Eye included Ben Fulton (who served as editor-in-chief until spring 2007), Christopher Smart (currently a reporter for The Salt Lake Tribune), Mary Dickson, Katharine Biele, Lynn Packer, and notable Utah defense attorney Ron Yengich.