Lining Up Votes for Crown

Dissident shareholder Ed Schmidt claims he has 153,078 revocable proxies ready to vote at Crown Bancorp’s Aug. 1 annual meeting. That’s about 24% of Crown’s outstanding shares.

Schmidt disclosed the number Thursday during a deposition for Crown’s lawsuit against him, charging that he has illegally obtained the proxies.

His proxies don’t include the shares held by former Crown Chairman Dustin Rose, former President James Klingensmith, founding directors Richard Maitland and Fred Swenson or former director Bill Campbell. Also not included is La Jolla real estate investor Michael Saywitz, who is trying for a seat on Crown’s board, and Canadian investor Milton Sorokin, who is reportedly backing Saywitz and Schmidt.

Another Business Newspaper?

American City Business Journals, the Kansas City, Mo.-based firm that publishes 14 weekly business publications, took out a help wanted ad in Sunday’s San Diego Union looking for editors and reporters.

But that should not imply that the chain is looking to open in San Diego, where Scripps Howard’s San Diego Business Journal has published since 1980.

“It doesn’t mean we are, and it doesn’t mean we aren’t,” said Carolyn Ashford, vice president of operations. The chain is merely looking to fill openings, she said. “We have no plans today to open (in San Diego) in the next few weeks.”

P.R. Firm’s Strategy: Pulling Back

Not long ago, rumors abounded in the public relations industry that Burson Marsteller, the large New York-based PR firm with offices in Los Angeles and Orange County, would open a San Diego operation.

Not so, according to Tim Conner, executive vice president and western regional manager.

In fact, the firm is consolidating, cutting back its Irvine operations and melding much of its Orange County work into L.A.

Conner calls it “implementing a Southern California strategy--we’re going to serve the whole marketplace out of Los Angeles.”

Theater’s Space Program Scrubbed

Reuben H. Fleet Space Center officials had to do some fast shuffling last week. Wednesday’s lecture on the development of the Centaur rocket as the space shuttle’s upper stage by a General Dynamics executive had to be scrubbed because the Centaur program has been canceled.

The talk was replaced by a NASA consultant discussing the “Ultimate Industrialization of the Solar System.”