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Saturday, January 30, 1999 By Dennis Roddy, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Until it was yanked from the computers at America Online yesterday, an acerbic little site on the World Wide Web called "Grant Street 1999" dispensed zesty tidbits about local politicians and sowed confusion for a few.
For instance, Dennis Casey, Larry Dunn's campaign manager, has been heard high and low protesting his innocence.
"Everybody thinks it's me," Casey said. "I didn't do it. I didn't write it. Judge Melvin's a friend of mine. She's mad at me. She thinks it's me."
A day earlier, Grant Street 1999 had accused Joan Orie Melvin, a judge on the state Superior Court, of meddling with the Ridge administration to get someone appointed to the Allegheny County bench, an accusation Melvin flatly denied.
Yesterday, the judge's brother, attorney Jack Orie, who has made a personal mission of unmasking the author behind "Grant Street 1999," called to report that AOL had pulled the site.
"I expect to know who's behind it in two or three weeks," Orie said. "I'll get him in the long run. Joan has to be above the fray, but I live for this stuff."
So does the guy behind Grant Street 1999.
I know this because I spent an evening sharing beer and conspiracy theories and trying to find out a little about the guy who has sent an already gossipy street into full buzz.
I am sworn not to reveal his name, but can report this much: He is not Dennis Casey. Nor is he a Larry Dunn apparatchik.
What he is is a faceless guy deep in the bowels of the old political system who, after years of silently witnessing intrigues worthy of old Byzantium, decided to let 'er rip.
"I just got fed up," he said. "There's no vendetta against anyone. Just against the system as it is now."
His almost invisible position in the Grant Street machinery puts him at the crossroads of gossip. So far he's unloaded on Judge Melvin, Cathy Baker Knoll, Commissioners Mike Dawida and Bob Cranmer, would-be county executive Jim Roddey, assorted city councilmen and former state Rep. Ivan Itkin.
Grant Street regulars have responded by sending along tips on who to roast next.
"I check everything out," he said. "Everything I publish is true. It may be controversial, but it's true."
As evidence of his standards, he's no fan of his fellow anonymous Web page publisher, the Blue Knight, whose page he considers vulgar and badly researched.
"It's terrible. Absolutely terrible. He's being completely unfair," he said.
Of late, judicial candidates are getting in touch. Some hope he'll dump on opponents. Others hope he won't dump on them.
"One or two I won't be hitting have written to me and I wrote back saying, 'I don't plan to hit you. You're more than qualified. Enjoy the ride,' " he said.
"Grant Street" doesn't think much of the local papers, including this one, a tradition as American as apple pie. But in an era when anyone will soon be a publisher, he gets to act on his fantasy.
"I had no computer experience whatever," he said. A week after he made up his mind to do it, he was online and dishing the dirt.
Lack of journalism experience was no impediment in an age when everybody gets a crack at being one.
All he has to do is find a new site - he says he'll be back online in a few days - and a nickname for next year.
"How about Grant Street Double-O?" he asked.
Sounds good, kid. Enjoy the ride.
Dennis Roddy's e-mail is droddy@post-gazette.com.
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