Dayton Daily News Editor in Chief, Jana Collier, made me an offer I couldn’t refuse: get paid to investigate local political backroom deals. Starting today, I’ll be the new editor for the special investigative MetroGov desk. Collier said it was becoming obvious that most of her reporters were depending on Esrati.com for leads on stories, going back years. “If you can’t beat’em, join’em” was the philosophical reason David Esrati agreed to the multi-year contract. “Although I was beating them on the stories, I couldn’t dedicate the time it takes to fully expose the graft, corruption and nepotism that I’ve been exposing since 2005 on Esrati.com” said Esrati, 50, who is also a candidate for Dayton City Commission.
Details are still being worked out on what to do about his Commission race.
Since no journalist has ever also worked for the people he’s investigating, although, Publisher Julia Wallace has blazed new journalistic trails by sitting on the Dayton Development Coalition board, Esrati may have to drop out of his commission race. Luckily, since the Dayton City Commission petitions provide for a nominating committee, he is going to accept applications from potential candidates to run in his place. So far, only William Pace has expressed interest. Other possible candidates are the dozen or so candidates who were denied an opportunity on the ballot due to the Board of Elections finding faulty with more than half the candidates petitions.
In other breaking news the UAW CAP Council has endorsed the Montgomery County Democratic Party candidates, Joey Williams and Jeff Mims. Esrati knew he was in trouble when he talked about the nepotism in local government, and one of the council told him that Esrati knew his daughter who worked in the Board of Elections.
Esrati is not shutting down his ad agency The Next Wave. As part of the negotiated deal, since he won’t have to spend the time on the campaign or unpaid time writing his popular blog, he will still be able to put in the same amount of hours he does now- and do both.
I thought April Fools jokes were supposed to be funny? No? Wouldn’t be surprised if you got a real job. Didn’t “the Next Wave” recently lose some business?
@Drew- The Next Wave lost some clients when some of my staff started their own thing. But, we’re busier than ever- and doing some great work.
People on Facebook seem to think this is funny. Sorry, you don’t have a sense of humor.
Why do a couple postings show more comments in the little indicator box than there really are ? This one, shows (2) comments but when I view them, there’s only (1) (before I added THIS comment). Same with William Pace story about you testifying in court. It says there’s (2) comments but I only see (1).
Truth of the matter, I would like for you to run for the City Commission, in that you could or try to clean up the mess that they (the Commission) allowed the City to get in. Is the DDN offering you a job so you can’t run for Commissioner, or can you do both?
Hall, the bubble shows count of comments and trackbacks. You probably don’t look at the trackbacks- they are links to sites, or other articles that link to this article.
Congratulations, David. The DDN is lucky to have you. Good luck! If you ever need a first-rate proof reader, let me know?
So IS this an April Fool’s joke or not?!?! We really badly need someone to investigate what the city is doing in charging customers in the poorer areas of town $500 in presumably “estimated readings” on their water bill after the new, electronic meters have been installed……and actually coming in an cutting off the water on the weekends, thus setting these hapless folks up for another $100 charge to get it reconnected. Many live on under $1,000 a month and this is being done to so many here in my neighborhood that I cannot help but think this is a corrupt practice someone thought up to make scads of money on the back of the poor……….
To all- “Tagged as: April Fools Joke“
Some people fell for it. Congratulations. The secret to a good April fools joke is that it’s almost believable. Better luck next year.
You should all know that the Dayton Daily news has no interest in reporting on the real stories in this community. As of late, it seems as if they’ve been writing one story after another to prop up the power structure. The front page article that says all the “economic development” incentives are creating jobs, that local companies bought so many First Four tickets that they had to “give away” to make this work- really?
There is no interest in changing the status quo in Dayton by the powers that be, any more than there is interest by the Federal Government to regulate big banks, finance, insurance or the real estate industries- (or as Greg Hunter used to call them FIRE). It’s easier to blame Al Qaeda, North Korea, Drugs and people on welfare for the problems in our society.
On the Brilliant of Bozo I clicked on the wrong link, in reality I meant Brilliant, as you would have to be a Bozo not to know that our Power Leaders are the Bozo’s.
Aw, you got me.
Oh wow, there for a minute I thought you’d gone over to the dark side…