The Philadelphia Inquirer recently reported that federal prosecutors have subpoenaed records from the Reading Terminal Market Corporation, which is landlord to some 76 merchants. Since summer, the market's merchants have been battling management, which wants to hike the rent of some vendors, toss out others and compel everyone to report annual income [Loose Canon, "Terminal Politics," Nov. 3, 2005].

The Reading Terminal Market Corporation is a nonprofit created by City Council, but controlled by the mayor. Ricardo Dunston, selected by Street to chair the corporation, also manages retail franchises at the airport. Dunston's company reportedly gave $100,000 to the mayor's re-election.

Dunston has not been named in the federal investigation of City Hall corruption at the airport. Still, Dunston comes to Reading Market with considerable baggage. On FBI wiretaps Dunston is reportedly heard asking Ron White, known as the "Juice Man," for partial ownership of an airport bar. Dunston apparently never received his wish from White, now deceased.

What the Inquirer failed to report until recently is that the U.S. Attorney's office isn't the only one looking through the market's ledgers. In early fall the merchants struck back at Dunston by hiring an accounting firm to conduct a "forensic audit."

To date, neither Dunston nor the Market Corporation have been accused of any legal wrongdoing. The federal subpoenas, described as "very preliminary," are for now reportedly focused on contracts that are long-standing, some of which predate the current board's service.

Still, Dunston's attempt to wrest control from the merchants ought to be stopped before he converts the Reading Terminal Market into just another food court.

Dunston has refused numerous requests for an interview. He's hired former Rendell spokesman, Kevin Feeley, to run interference from the press. The strategy, till now, has worked: Until the feds stepped in, neither daily newspaper nor any other news source reported on the Merchant Association's own probe of management's books. Feeley says Dunston will open his books to the merchants and will cooperate fully with the feds.

That's still not good enough. Dunston should quit hiding behind the shuck and jive of his PR flak. Philadelphians deserve some straight talk from the man himself. Or an explanation from his boss.

From the other side of the phone, I can hear Marty Goldensohn salivating. Goldensohn is hankering to revolutionize radio news in Philly in some of the ways he's hit upon while reporting on Iraq.

Goldensohn's latest project, War News Radio, is a weekly half-hour show run by a handful of Swarthmore College undergraduates. It uses the Internet to bring back tales from a place where many fear to tread—which is most of Iraq. Through long-distance audio interviews, students are finding stories that, as Goldensohn puts it, "rediscover the real voices of real people." Produced on a shoestring, the news service is garnering attaboys by the score after a recent article in The New Yorker. The show is available locally only through the Internet (www.warnewsradio.org).

Violent places are always tough to report from, and information is usually limited to official statements. Without a deeper context, news from a war front sounds like one horror after another.

Reporting from Philly's inner city has the same problems. So I asked Goldensohn if students and ordinary citizens could report cheaply—and deeply—from embattled urban centers in Philly.

Sure, he said: "What's really missing in Philadelphia—that many smaller places have—is community radio. A network that connects people and communities."

In neighborhoods where public places are dangerous, homegrown radio offers what healthy neighborhoods, like Center City, take for granted: safe, common spaces for constructive community dialogue. It is a news service that teaches people to report on themselves.

So what's making Goldensohn's mouth water are classrooms full of computers inside the new, $13.5 million Honickman Learning Center near Temple University. It's a perfect facility and location to launch community audio in Philly. So I asked Honickman's executive director, Cindy Ferguson, if she'd be willing to listen to Goldensohn. She said to bring 'em on in.

Who knows? There could soon be some real news told by real people from the front at home.