Act now to Support LOCAL LIVE Santa Cruz Community Programming on KUSP fm Radio!

July 29, 2008 at 11:18 pm · Filed under KUSP Business, KUSP Programs, RadioEngage

The KUSP Board of Directors approved several significant changes to our station’s schedule and programming strategy at their board meeting last night. These are the first large-scale changes to KUSP’s schedule in about five and a half years. Most changes will go into effect on September 1.

The most significant change adds more news and information programming in the middle of the day Monday through Friday, where right now we run a mix of different kinds of music programs. This will put news, talk and information on the air weekdays from early in the morning through the end of the afternoon commute.

Classical music will continue on the schedule weekday evenings and jazz will follow later at night, as happens now, but these programs will extend across the whole week, from Monday through Friday (rather than Friday being different from the other weekdays). We will also begin featuring our On-Site live and recorded concert performances (music festivals, local symphonies and chamber music groups, and so on) on Friday nights, instead of late Sunday morning.

The news, talk and entertainment shows that air on weekend mornings will extend a little longer into the day, and be followed on both Saturday and Sunday afternoon by music with kind of a global flavor (we’re still working with our program hosts to plan out exactly what that will sound like; we have three different kinds of “world music” programs on Sunday afternoon now, and a Celtic music show on Saturday afternoon, so this may not be that big of a change).

Saturday nights will have more of an upbeat kind of rhythm musically, and Sunday night will continue much as it is now, with interview and cultural programs in the early evening, followed by jazz.

KUSP will broadcast all of NPR’s news magazines (like Morning Edition and All Things Considered) seven days a week, so you’ll never be too far from an update on world events from what I think is clearly the best broadcast news organization in the U.S.

The part of the decision that provoked the most discussion and controversy involved very late night programming (after midnight), which is now a decidedly eclectic mix of music and talk (and some dead air when we have no volunteer program hosts). In the end the board determined that we need to re-evaluate how we use this air time, hoping that we can evolve it into a more effective laboratory for creative radio programming (something that we were also exploring for web-only content at kusp.org).

The changes emerge from many months of discussions with listeners and seven full-scale surveys about public radio listening in the Monterey Bay area. We learned a lot about how people use public radio, and what they wish could be different. Listeners reinforced the message that they value both news and music on their public radio stations, but attach more importance to the news and information that we provide. There’s more of a preference by listeners for news in the daytime, for music in the evenings, and a mix of news, talk and entertainment to start the day off on the weekend - and we think this updated schedule will fit those preferences.

The schedule retooling on our main over-the-air stream won’t mean the end for all time of the kinds of programs that are coming off the schedule right now. We plan to offer more content than before on kusp.org, produced by more people in our community. This is a critical part of our RadioEngage on-line project, which I’ve written about before - opening up the pipeline for creative kinds of radio so that we’re no longer constrained by the kinds of conventions that have grown up over the nearly sixty years since KPFA pioneered this kind of broadcasting (as in, you have to be willing to come in at 3 AM to get air time for something radically different).

We’re also continuing to pursue multiple over-the-air streams of programming, and will in particular explore whether we can develop a full-time stream of music that would generally parallel what we’ve been playing on “The Open Road,” the weekday music show that debuted in 2003 and wraps around our “Live at Lunch” in-studio music segment. There’s several different ways that second stream could get out to our listeners (including Internet streams and HD Radio digital broadcasts), and we’ll be evaluating all of them.

More generally, we’ve vowed to do careful and extensive listening to listeners about their specific kinds of music preferences. We discovered in the last year and a half of work that it’s easier to reach general conclusions about public radio listener preferences in news and information than it is about music. But music is very important to us - it’s always been a vital part of KUSP - and we want to make our music programming as relevant and important to you as it can be.

For a while today the Santa Cruz Sentinel was reporting on their web site that KUSP was dropping all local music programming; this was not true, and was apparently pulled off their site later in the day. Sentinel reporter Shanna McCord interviewed me this afternoon, along with two other members of our board of directors, and we’re told a story will run in the Wednesday 7/30 edition.

In a few days we’ll have worked out more details of our new over-the-air schedule and we’ll share them with you and the local news media as soon as we have them.

Please take the opportunity to share your thoughts about our changes with me as they get underway!

I support Local Live Santa Cruz Community Programming on KUSP Central Coast Public Radio. I am Susan Goldstein, President of the Board of Directors at KUSP. We have been working for the last 2 years to understand our current and potential listeners and come up with a schedule that will build our audience and community support.


KUSP has a broadcast area from San Luis Obispo County, through Monterey, San Benito, and Santa Cruz Counties with a potential audience of close to a million listeners. Some of our programming is changing so that we can provide a public service to more of the people in all of our community.


First and foremost, KUSP will continue to provide locally hosted music in many genres: Jazz, Classical, World, and late night eclectic. Many of the programmers that you and I love will still be on the air, and folks who are losing a time slot will be encouraged to submit proposals for new shows.


On the news and information front, KUSP is infusing all satellite shows with locally produced content, bringing back a local voice to public radio and creating a new, noncommercial source for news and information. The general retreat of press resources in the area combined with our recent efforts around the fire this summer prove that there is a need for this kind of service and we're responding to it.


We will continue to provide locally hosted, in-depth interview programs and we will air a new Call In show in collaboration with KALW in San Francisco. This show will address our local issues, but will also get us into the whole San Francisco Bay.


We will continue our productions of regional music festival shows.


We are taking a leadership position in our development of on-line, on-demand programming, so that you can hear our local programs when it is convenient for you. Our website is going through a complete face-lift to provide an interactive relationship with our local/ regional/ national/ international listeners.


All media is changing and we are taking a pro-active position to make sure we continue and expand our public service. Please continue to give KUSP your attention and support. I believe you will be pleasantly surprised by what's the same—and what's new—at KUSP.

Specifically, we know for sure that:


*Robert Pollie will host a weekly interview program
*Rick Kleffel will host a weekly interview program
*Deanna Zachary will be part of a new group of volunteers producing news stories about local issues
*J.D. Hillard will lead the new group of volunteers producing news stories about local issues, and oversee at least six different weekly local public affairs and talk shows
*Brett Taylor has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Louise Salazar has been offered a music program
*Bruce Larsen has been offered a music program
*Johnny Simmons and Rob Mullen, who are paid employees, have declined to host music programs to make more time available to volunteers
*Charlie Lange has been offered a music program
*Christian Deeny has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Gary Shapiro has agreed to continue his weekly interview program
*Bobby Bishop has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Susan Freeman has agreed to develop new on-line programs for kids and families that will be available to listeners on-demand (something we could never do with Castle Cottage)
*Cindy Odom has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Seth Kolski has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Jeff Grubb has agreed to continue to host a music program
*Gypsy Flores has agreed to continue to host a music program

And we're scheduling new late-night programming that we hope will enable many of the other programmers listed, and others that haven't been mentioned, to continue producing the programs they love at KUSP.

The ad-hoc committee met with Terry Thursday night (8/21) to hear his responses
to our proposal and get more information about what is happening with
the schedule change. We want to reiterate that we are only speaking for
the Ad Hoc Committee and do not presume to speak for the entire
foundation. Our goal as a group is to advocate for MORE local voices &
programs on the KUSP schedule, nothing more.
Basically, Terry is conditionally in support of two out of the three proposals.
1. RETURN A DAILY LOCAL, LIVE TALK SHOW TO THE AIRWAVES (The
suggested time window was amended in the meeting from "between 10 and
3pm" to "Between 10 and 7pm" after discussing other optimal times for
such an effort.
Discussion began with reflection over why TOTB had lost audience.
Conclusion was that inconsistent format and hosts over different days
with lack of single focus was the main problem with the program. Most
agreed on the ideal concept of one host. Terry indicated he thought a
better time for such a show might be evenings, and the group concurred.
Discussion ensued about how to get some kind of daily show back on the
air. Terry says he is supportive of the idea if it's done well.

*2. WEEKEND PROGRAMMING
*The group proposed a number of ideas for the Fri-Sun schedule, all of
which were ultimately rejected by Terry. These ideas included.

*A: LEAVE FRIDAY NIGHT PROGRAMMING AS IS. The group unanimously said
they did not feel Classical music was right for Friday nights, that
people are starting their weekend, and a more celebratory music (such as
what was there) is more typical of stations around the country and
better serves our listeners. This move would also be a good faith move
for programmers & listeners alike and show that the management can
respond to negative public & foundation feedback in a positive way and
actually be collaborative. Suggestions were made where proposed program
"KUSP On Site" could be moved. We suggested moving "KUSP On Site" to
other weekday classical shows and promoting them strongly as specials.
Terry said one of his main objections to the move was the potential
damage to relationships with a couple music partners that could happen
because they already published the times for the broadcasts in their
schedules. This was acknowledged to be a stumbling block, but perhaps
not impossible to overcome. Publishing a correction sheet to go in
printed programs was one suggestion to get around this issue. Terry
also offered that he was not in favor of moving "KUSP On Site", he might
consider alternatives like stripping concerts across the weeknight
shows. He also was not in favor of returning Classical to Sunday
mornings as show was not doing well there.

*B: NO BROADCAST OF ALL THINGS CONSIDERED ON SATURDAY & SUNDAY AFTERNOONS AND
NO REPLAY OF CANNED NPR/PRI PROGRAMS
*By eliminating this hour of news programming AND not replaying
programs such as "WAIT WAIT" & "CAR TALK" & "THIS AMERICAN LIFE" on the
weekends, KUSP could once again retain some of it's local programmers &
programs that are sacrificed in this new schedule. The committee felt
that concessions to programmers & existing listeners who feel sold out
by the programming change is much more important than "consistency." It
also would retain the financial support those programs already enjoy. Terry cited consistency with weekday schedule as the reason for ATC to remain where it is..
A discussion ensued about the reasons to replay NPR
offerings numerous times in the programming schedule with Terry offering
that it builds loyalty to the show to have it on twice, as well as pledges to that program may increase.
*3. RETURN MIDNIGHT- 3AM TO LOCAL MUSIC SHOWS
*Terry's reaction: No to 12-3, yes to 12-2am, local live music hosts.
Current lineup o.k. for now.. Station will entertain proposals long
term for other show ideas/hosts.
*SUGGESTIONS FROM AD HOC COMMITTEE
A. Creation of a PROGRAMMING COMMITTEE* that can evaluate existing
programs & future proposals in a collaborative way by including
volunteers from the music and news/ spoken word programs.
*B. Make all disenfranchised programmers lifetime members so they retain
their voting rights within the foundation.
*KUSP is one of the few democratically run stations in the nation. To
lose voting rights at KUSP with this proposed programming change allows
a small group of people to dictate what KUSP's misson and programming
will be.
*C. Foundation wide vote on the program change to see where we as a
group stand on it's viability.

Respectfully,
Charlie Lange