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• State reports give academic snapshots of local schools

• Downtown Lodi included in latest state cleanup order

• Wall Street firm helped lead Lodi's suit, attorneys say

• 18 law firms apply to represent Lodi in pollution case

• Galt woman sentenced to 11 years in prison for drunken driving, vehicular manslaughter

• 'Sopranos' find a home in Lodi -- New Jersey, that is

• Regional Roundup

• Lockeford residents want to bring Mayberry-style 'constable' to town

• County health care to suffer because of budget crisis

• Logbook

November 2nd, 2009

• Deputies name suspect in fatal Acampo shooting

November 7th, 2009

• Lodi High graduate was at Fort Hood

• Lining up for flu shots in Lodi

• Tour packs buses as birdwatchers admire Sandhill cranes

• City of Lodi staff looking into possibility of limiting number of taco trucks

• Daytime thieves targeting Lodi homes

• Lodi High School rally featured on 'Good Day Sacramento'

• Out of control

• Homicide suspect Anthony Hubbard arraigned

• Regional Roundup

• New Lodi Memorial rule to combat spread of H1N1: Visitors must be older than 16

November 6th, 2009

• Short sales make up nearly half of Lodi market

• Regional Roundup

• Lodi man accused of smuggling drugs, weapons for inmates at state prison

• 'I-5 Strangler' sentenced to 6 terms of life

• Jury convicts Acampo man of torture, assault of his girlfriend

• Young girl is 200,000th person to assemble AIDS, HIV care kit

• Woman in wheelchair struck by car

November 5th, 2009

• A lower Lodi Lake

• Streetside scarecrows

• San Joaquin County considers moratorium on new Williamson Act contracts

• Speakers address Lodi Unified School District budget shortfalls, plea to keep programs

• Armed robbers still targeting Lodi shops

• Regional Roundup

• California voters have final say over $11 billion water bond

• Weekend bus service to continue until Lodi City Council makes decision

• Paul Tebbel shines spotlight on sandhill cranes

• Your complete guide to Sandhill Crane Festival

• David Diskin is first to give an invocation under new city of Lodi policy

• Man wanted in Acampo homicide gives up to San Joaquin County Sheriff's detectives

November 4th, 2009

• Candle fire

• Rep. Jerry McNerney sets telephone town hall for Thursday

• Jason Behrmann is unanimously named Galt's city manager

• Regional Roundup

• Galt City Council argues over ordinance hiring residents

• San Joaquin County sues state over prison hospital planned for Stockton

• Big win for Allen Baroni in reclamation election

• California sends Democratic loyalist John Garamendi to Congress

• Bicycling father raising awareness of teen suicide

• Lodi City Council weighs raising fares to restore some bus service

November 3rd, 2009

• 500 attend service for Kyle Coumas

• Correction

• Galt considers ordinance that would require city contractors to hire locally

• Regional Roundup

• Have you seen a missing guide dog puppy in Lodi?

• Galt man dies after weekend Highway 12 crash

• Jason Behrmann is top candidate for Galt city manager

• Deputies name suspect in fatal Acampo shooting

• Clarification

November 2nd, 2009

• Downtown Lodi trick or treat

• Public Meetings

• Correction

• Kyle Coumas funeral today

• 27-year-old man shot to death Saturday night in front of Acampo home

• Regional Roundup

• Group investigates reports of haunting

• Sandhill Cranes Festival comes to Lodi next weekend

• Lamborghini lovers gather for show, fine wine, luncheon in Woodbridge

• Lodi's 'Biggest Loser' Christy Richesin runs 5K Halloween race

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'Sopranos' find a home in Lodi -- New Jersey, that is

There are some shady characters cavorting in Lodi these days.

Guys named Tony and Silvio and Paulie Walnuts -- all silk suits, designer shoes and pinkie rings -- working out deals at the local gentlemen's club. Made guys paying tribute to the Don. Young soldiers working to move up in the Family. Everybody hoping they're not the next to be whacked.

Not the Lodi you know and love? That's because it's not -- on a number of levels. This Lodi is nestled among other working-class suburbs in northern New Jersey, just south of Interstate 80, and is a 20-minute commute to New York City.

Lodi, N.J. is a frequent backdrop for the critically acclaimed HBO series "The Sopranos," which kicked off its fifth season Sunday night. The series, which chronicles mob boss Tony Soprano's life with both his family and "the Family," has used several locations in the city since shooting began in 1999.

By shooting, we mean film, of course.

"I literally grew up in most of these locations," said Bob Kozlarek, who lives one town over in Elmwood Park. Kozlarek is one of many New Jersey residents who make sport of pointing out familiar backdrops that pop up during the show, which is filmed mostly in the Garden State.

Kozlarek's Web site, The Sopranos On Location, includes news and photos from filming locations across northern New Jersey. A meat market in Elizabeth. A sporting goods store in Paramus. A Jersey City furniture store. Familiar places seem to pop up all the time in the mob show's fictional world, he said.

Especially in Lodi, which features one of the show's most frequently filmed locations -- Satin Dolls, a gentlemen's club on Route 17 that's better known to "Sopranos" fans as the Bada Bing! strip club. On television, the Bada Bing! is a club where Tony and the boys are known to relax after a hard day at the office. In real life, however, Satin Dolls has become a destination for tourists and others who want a piece of the show, said Nick D'Urso, director of operations for the club.

"We're probably the most popular in the country," D'Urso said. "Everybody knows in this area. If you say Satin Dolls, they'll say the Bada Bing!"

Satin Dolls has even become a tour bus destination for camera-wielding tourists, said Sue Sadik, who operates another Sopranos Web site from her Clifton home (www.sopranosuessightings.com). "Soprano Sue" said people will step off the bus and pose for pictures in front, inside and even behind the building, where a character named Tracee once met an unfortunate demise.

"They can't wait to get their picture taken behind the Bada Bing! by the dumpster," Sadik said. "We have guardrails that are famous."

Satin Dolls isn't the only location the series has filmed in Lodi. Local restaurants like Lodi Pizza have become popular settings, as have supermarkets, a car wash and a party supplies store, said local historian and longtime Lodi resident Arthur Maglionico.

"We see them all over the place," Maglionico said. "They're at Lodi Pizza or somewhere on Main Street or at the clubs on Route 17. But they're not really using Lodi's name. They just shoot certain scenes here."

Workers on the set of "The Sopranos" turn Satin Dolls gentlemen's club in Lodi, N.J., into Bada Bing!, a strip club featured on the show, in this undated photo. Lodi is the backdrop for many scenes in the popular mob series. (Courtesy Photo/Bob Kozlarek)

In fact, just as this Lodi will forever be wedged between the words "stuck" and "again" thanks to Creedence Clearwater Revival, some people in Lodi, N.J. hope the Sopranos connection doesn't take attention from the rest of the city. It's a blue collar town in Bergen County with a population of 24,000, where Yankees fans barely outnumber Mets supporters and parents are always working to give their kids a better life, said Anthony Taormina, director of the Lodi Memorial Library.

"The Bada Bing! is really on the edge of town," Taormina said. "That is not typical Lodi."

Lodi became a city in 1894 after splitting from a larger township with the same name, Taormina said. Stories vary about how the name Lodi was chosen: Some say it's named after a small cart bridge in Italy, others that it was a region where Napoleon rested his troops after one of his campaigns and still others that it was named after the actual site of a Napoleonic battle in 1796.

Taormina and Maglionico both agree that the original township's residents initially wanted to name the city Lafayette after the Revolutionary War general, but chose Lodi after he declined the offer in the early 19th century.

At the turn of the 20th century, Lodi was home to United Piece Dyeworks, one of the largest textile mills in the world, Maglionico said. It also had the American Theater, where one of the area's first talking pictures was screened in the late 1920s, he said.

"It was a big deal," he said. "People came from all over."

And now they converge again, this time for the small screen. Sadik said scenes for episodes of the show's fifth season have already been filmed in Lodi, so the Bada Bing!, Lodi Pizza and other locations will be beamed to homes across America in the coming months.

In California's Lodi, where people cheer for the baseball Giants instead of the football team and the biggest industries are agriculture and winemaking, people will be watching. Kozlarek said he's aware of that, but the East Coast version will always be No. 1 in his heart.

"I knew there was a Lodi in California," he said, "but when we think of Lodi, we think of New Jersey."