Dan Murphy is the editor of the “Yonkers Rising”, s low circulation local newspaper in Yonkers that is owned by the Nick Sprayregen Estate.
The Nick Sprayregen Estate are partners in RXR’s Sawyer Place (formerly Larkin Plaza) luxury development and other major downtown taxpayer funded real estate projects.
The death spiral of the “Yonkers Rising” was only accelerated when the Sprayregen family closed the newspapers’ tiny downtown office and told Dan Murphy to cover Yonkers from his Putnam County home.
Previously, the joke in Yonkers was that the “Yonkers Rising” was printed in the basement of city hall and Mayor Mike Spano did all of the editing, since the newspaper had a reputation of kissing the rear ends of elected officials.
Now Dan Murphy basically sits in Mahopac, New York and tries to cover Yonkers by following Facebook posts and getting emails from a rapidly dwindling older crowd in Yonkers that actually reads the free bird cage liner at the Raceway diner.
Recently, Dan Murphy has gotten local Yonkers elevator serviceman Frank Sportano to fund a WordPress blog, that basically re-posts the articles from the Nick Sprayregen Estate’s newspaper, in an effort to sell Google Adsense Banner ads.
“Yonkers Rising” Editor Dan Murphy has told Frank Sportano that the WordPress blog is his “insurance policy” to keep him in the Yonkers news game if the Sprayregen family decides to finally pull the plug on the low circulation broadsheet.
It is unclear if the Sprayregen family knows of or approved their articles being recycled in this WordPress blog that lists Frank Sportano and not them as the publishers.