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LAVoice.org has competition for its series keeping tabs on the web presence of the five top candidates for mayor. In the Downtown News, Jon Regardie submits their websites to expert analysis and rates them from best to worst. Not surprisingly, the site that Bob Hertzberg's campaign staff updates every day gets the highest grade, though only a B+. "I don't know if it creates the passion we'd like to see, but it's a nice piece of interactivity," one of the evaluators says. Next comes Richard Alarcon (B-), Bernard Parks (C-), Antonio Villaraigosa (D+) and finally Jim Hahn, whose site is still under construction and receives an F- for effort.
Also in the Downtown News: Jay Berman lets out the secret that the Ben Myerson Candy Co. sells "irregulars"—fine candy with cosmetic blemishes—cheap by the bag out of a nondescript outlet at 928 Towne Avenue in the Fashion District.
Nothing outside the building suggests that fine candies are being sold inside. Customers, in fact, have to enter through an unmarked loading dock door, often making their way past trucks and forklifts.
The paper's Kathryn Maese also notes the fading away of another Los Angeles cultural tradition. For more than 50 years, people wanting the freshest Christmas trees would buy them just off the train (or truck) at wholesale lots around Seventh and Alameda streets. But the lots have been mostly developed on, the paper says. The last wholesaler, United Melon Distributors, was forced to move this year to Chinatown when the MTA snatched up its land for a parking lot.