The long-dormant newspaper war between the St. Petersburg Times and Tampa Tribune is getting hot again. Over at Front Page Florida, former Trib editor Joe Registrato reports on a "skirmish" in a downtown Tampa park, between the tbt* folks handing out freebies (hired models, once source tells us, we're tracking that down) and a wave of Tribune circulators with free papers and donut coupons.
Meanwhile, I opened my morning Times to find a byline from Ben Montgomery, formerly the Trib's hotshot GA reporter and best narrative writer. Snatching up the best at the Tribune is a time-honored Times tradition (see: Troxler, Howard; Scherberger, Tom; Wilborn, Paul) but this is the first time in a long time I can recall them doing it.
This article appears in Mar 8-14, 2006.