LA Weekly Publisher Beth Sestanovich told the staff this morning that the Justice Department gave the okay for New Times to acquire Village Voice Media, and with it her paper and the OC Weekly. Things will move quickly now.

From: Beth Sestanovich
Date: Mon, 28 Nov 2005 09:40:51 -0800
To: LA Everyone
Subject: FW: Announcement

Everyone,

I am pleased to inform you that the Department Justice has approved our merger with New Times. We expect to close in about a month or so. The work on integrating the two companies will accelerate, but we will still be functioning as separate entities until the closing.

David

The message she forwarded is presumably from David Schneiderman, the head of Village Voice Media.