"That was six weeks ago," he said, adding that he continues to receive the paper, though sporadically.
McDonald said the number of complaints is minor considering that 271,000 copies are distributed daily. "We have put infrastructure in place [to deal with the distribution problems]," he said. "It has shown a dramatic improvement in the number of complaints. The phone calls have gone down in number."
McDonald said the paper has begun sending in auditors behind the delivery staff to make sure papers are not delivered to homes that don't want them.
Clarity chief executive Ryan McKibben and McDonald said neither the advertising nor distribution issues had anything to do with the switch in publishers.
"It was my choice completely. It happened a couple of months ago. I promised to help them with the launch and help them through the transition," said McDonald, who was publisher of the local Journal newspapers for several months before Anschutz bought them. "We've taken a failing franchise and sold it to a viable owner. It was not easy, but it was worthwhile."
Moloney, 54, was introduced to the newsroom staff yesterday afternoon in the Examiner's Alexandria offices, said Jim Monaghan, a spokesman for Anschutz.
Moloney was most recently chief operating officer of Vertis North America, a Baltimore advertising agency that specializes in newspaper inserts. Before that, Moloney spent six years as executive vice president for sales and marketing at Treasure Chest Advertising. From 1973 to 1994, he worked for Knight Ridder papers in Philadelphia and Miami.
"He's a very smart guy. A very marketing-oriented guy. He knows a lot about newspapers and advertising," said Mary E. Junck, chairman, president and chief executive of Lee Enterprises Inc., a publishing company where Moloney is a board member.
"If I had more money than I knew what to do with and I was determined to start a daily newspaper, I wouldn't do it in Washington [because of the established papers]. But if I was going to do it in Washington, I would do it exactly the way [the Examiner] has and go after high-income readers," said veteran newspaper analyst John Morton.
