CapRadio cuts 12% staff and cancels shows

[Michael Rivers Kramer]

Clearly, though, those 75 community leaders feel it's enough of a possibility to mention a KQED takeover scenario in the early part of their letter.



I don't think I've ever seen them get more than a 0.2 or 0.3 in the Sacramento PPMs.



Which is why they'd probably just hire an independent contractor who lives in the area. It works for CapRadio in Stockton.

I highly doubt that an entity with a budget of 21 million dollars would go under, especially under the ownership of a state university.

It would be outlandish for KQED to buy CapRadio into a repeater of KQED. I cannot think of any top 30 urban area where the NPR station is a satellite of an out of Market signal. West Palm Beach comes to mind which is one of the few top 50 markets where they rebroadcast a larger market NPR. But then again, Miami and Palm Beach is actually one “Metro Satistical Area” in two DMAs and radio market, albeit a narrow and long metro.

Bay Area media generally ignores Sacramento local traffic and news. When KQEI first started, they would have separate weather and traffic reports in drive times. I remember living in the Bay Area and hearing local friends complain they didn’t like hearing Sacramento traffic being included when they broke the separation during pledges.

Over time, KQEI devolved into a pure satellite after KQED’s misguided ambitions in Sacramento failed to materialize.

After living in both places for years, it is clear that they while Sacramento is getting more sophisticated, it’s in now way anything like the Bay Area culturally.

 

[michael hagerty]

I highly doubt that an entity with a budget of 21 million dollars would go under, especially under the ownership of a state university.

Sac State Reveals CapRadio Could Be Penniless By January - Radio Ink

Sacramento State University has announced that Capital Public Radio is expected to run out of financial resources by January 2024.

radioink.com

As I mentioned in an earlier post, that can keeps getting kicked down the road---the last estimate I heard was May, and I've been gone two and a half months, so hopefully, there's some progress.

A lot is still unknown, though---and a clear picture of the financial status of CapRadio is dependent on the forensic audit, which, according to the Sacramento Business Journal, is expected to be released this month (April).

It would be outlandish for KQED to buy CapRadio into a repeater of KQED. I cannot think of any top 30 urban area where the NPR station is a satellite of an out of Market signal.

We're barely there---Nielsen's new rankings show Sac slipping from #28 to #29.

West Palm Beach comes to mind which is one of the few top 50 markets where they rebroadcast a larger market NPR. But then again, Miami and Palm Beach is actually one “Metro Satistical Area” in two DMAs and radio market, albeit a narrow and long metro.

Bay Area media generally ignores Sacramento local traffic and news. When KQEI first started, they would have separate weather and traffic reports in drive times. I remember living in the Bay Area and hearing local friends complain they didn’t like hearing Sacramento traffic being included when they broke the separation during pledges.

If this were to happen (and again, BIG if), 'QED would probably make some gesture toward Sac in terms of traffic and weather. It's fairly easy to set something like that up. Until a few weeks before I retired, we ran separate funding credits in certain hours in Sac, Stockton and Tahoe. You can do that with traffic and weather, too.

As it is now, CapRadio doesn't do traffic at all, and weather is an ad-lib mention by hosts, not a scheduled event on the clock.

After living in both places for years, it is clear that they while Sacramento is getting more sophisticated, it’s in now way anything like the Bay Area culturally.

KQED and CapRadio are currently duplicating programming (BBC World Service and Morning Edition) from 11:00 p.m. to 9:00 a.m. and from 4:30-7:30 p.m. weekdays (minus local newscasts on both stations and traffic on KQED).

KQED has "Forum" from 9:00-11:00 a.m. while CapRadio runs "Here & Now" in that timeslot.

KQED airs "Here & Now" from 11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m., while CapRadio runs "1A" (not carried by KQED) from 11:00-12:00 noon and its live local talk show "Insight" from noon to 1:00 p.m.

KQED splits "All Things Considered", airing an hour from 1:00-2:00 p.m., followed by "The World" (which CapRadio dropped in Januar) from 2:00-3:00, "PBS NewsHour" (not carried by CapRadio) from 3:00-4:00 and "Marketplace" from 4:00-4:30, before returning to "All Things Considered" from 4:30-6:30.

CapRadio carries the BBC Newshour from 1:00-2:00, "Marketplace" from 2:00-2:30, and then an uninterrupted four hours of "All Things Considered from 2:30-6:30.

Both KQED and CapRadio run "Marketplace" again at 6:30.

KQED airs "Fresh Air" at 7, while CapRadio replays "Insight".

CapRadio airs "Fresh Air" at 8, and BBC Newsday from 9-11, while KQED replays "Forum" from 8-10 and has a rotating schedule of one-hour shows ("On Shifting Ground", "City Arts & Lectures", "Kelly Corrigan Wonders", "Commonwealth Club", "Tech Nation") from 10-11.


The vast majority of what airs is on both stations, and for 13 hours of the broadcast day, it's virtually a simulcast.

 

[TheBigA]

The vast majority of what airs is on both stations, and for 13 hours of the broadcast day, it's virtually a simulcast.

The problem with this is I don't see how management by a PBS TV station would change that in any way. Based on my time at co-owned radio-TV operations, usually radio ends up getting short shrift.

 

[Michael Rivers Kramer]

but there’s no market outside of even the top 40 or 50 outside of Palm Beach simulcasting a larger market’s public station. It really would be bad for Sacramento. It’s still too big and independent of the Bay Area. Sure they could just carry the shows and block out the Bay Area traffic but Sacramento deserves better.

And market rank slipping to 29 from 28 isn’t much as markets 27-31 are in a virtual tie. It’s still a market of 2,000,000 plus.

An NPR station in Sacramento without local programming would put it below places like, Fresno Honolulu and Spokane.

If Cap Radio managed to get a 21 million dollar budget, it’s still hard to fathom an out of market simulcast takeover.

Sure anything is possible. Sadly, I know about the local inferiority complex in Sacto. I found it annoying when I lived there.

 

[michael hagerty]

The problem with this is I don't see how management by a PBS TV station would change that in any way. Based on my time at co-owned radio-TV operations, usually radio ends up getting short shrift.

You’ve mentioned that before and I agree.

But this is less about a perfect situation and more about a tolerable one. CapRadio is in seven, and possibly eight figures of debt.

Absent that huge hole, CapRadio’s donor cash flow was always pretty good. KVIE is well-run, and there would be synergies in merging the fundraising.

If all KVIE is doing is buying licenses and equipment, there’s sufficient operating capital to run a radio station. That low bar is in doubt under the current situation.

 

[TheBigA]

If all KVIE is doing is buying licenses and equipment, there’s sufficient operating capital to run a radio station. That low bar is in doubt under the current situation.

They really don't have to BUY anything. Seems to me what's needed is credible management. Just do a management deal.

 

[michael hagerty]

but there’s no market outside of even the top 40 or 50 outside of Palm Beach simulcasting a larger market’s public station. It really would be bad for Sacramento. It’s still too big and independent of the Bay Area. Sure they could just carry the shows and block out the Bay Area traffic but Sacramento deserves better.

And market rank slipping to 29 from 28 isn’t much as markets 27-31 are in a virtual tie. It’s still a market of 2,000,000 plus.

An NPR station in Sacramento without local programming would put it below places like, Fresno Honolulu and Spokane.

If Cap Radio managed to get a 21 million dollar budget, it’s still hard to fathom an out of market simulcast takeover.

Sure anything is possible.

Michael, the fact that 75 community leaders are concerned enough to include that scenario is an indicator of how bad the situation at CapRadio is.

The previous interim GM, Tom Karlo, has been quoted as saying that if Sac State hadn’t taken over operations, the station wouldn’t have laid off 12% of staff last summer, it would have laid off 100% and gone dark.

We’ll know more this month when the forensic audit comes out.

 

[Michael Rivers Kramer]

Michael, the fact that 75 community leaders are concerned enough to include that scenario is an indicator of how bad the situation at CapRadio is.

The previous interim GM, Tom Karlo, has been quoted as saying that if Sac State hadn’t taken over operations, the station wouldn’t have laid off 12% of staff last summer, it would have laid off 100% and gone dark.

We’ll know more this month when the forensic audit comes out.

Understood! That report will be telling. It’s amazing how blind people were to the mismanagement.

 

[michael hagerty]

They really don't have to BUY anything. Seems to me what's needed is credible management. Just do a management deal.

Who wants to manage a station with seven (maybe eight) figures of debt?

Again, if you haven’t, read the audit I posted the link to a couple of days ago. And while you do that, understand that info is incomplete, nearly a year old and about to be supplanted by a forensic audit that most are expecting to reveal even larger land mines.

 

[TheBigA]

Who wants to manage a station with seven (maybe eight) figures of debt?

Conversely, who wants to BUY a station with all that debt? So leave the debt and the license with the college.

 

[Weiserguy]

It seems like the big problem is the lease obligations on the two downtown buildings. Is CapRadio a separate NFP corporation? Or is it an integrated subsidiary of Sacramento State University? If the latter, CSUS is indisputably on the hook. But if someone had the foresight to incorporate the CapRadio operations and the radio stations into their own corporation, and the lease obligations overwhelm the corporations assets and reserves, then they are technically bankrupt. And they should be eligible to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which could allow them to reject those leases and get off the hook. Sell off all the furniture and equipment that can't be treated as sunk costs and used to modernize the on-campus operations. Exit the leases, lick their wounds and move on. (I am presuming that, in the absence of the leases, they would at least be cash flow neutral, and probably even cash positive.)

 

[Weiserguy]

If this were to happen (and again, BIG if), 'QED would probably make some gesture toward Sac in terms of traffic and weather. It's fairly easy to set something like that up. Until a few weeks before I retired, we ran separate funding credits in certain hours in Sac, Stockton and Tahoe. You can do that with traffic and weather, too.

As it is now, CapRadio doesn't do traffic at all, and weather is an ad-lib mention by hosts, not a scheduled event on the clock.

My understanding is that KQED can, and sometimes does, record separate traffic and weather inserts for KQEI/Sacto in AM Drive, occasionally at other times of the day.

KQED and CapRadio are currently duplicating programming (BBC World Service and Morning Edition) from 11:00 p.m. to 9:00 a.m. and from 4:30-7:30 p.m. weekdays (minus local newscasts on both stations and traffic on KQED).

Not exactly. KQED runs a repeat of the 10 pm hour ("City Arts", "On Shifting Ground", "Commonwealth Club", etc.) in the 1 AM hour. CapRadio stays with the Beeb until ME launches at 2 AM. Plus there's all the local inserts. On KQED they're obviously SFBA-centric. At CapRadio, unfortunately, a fair amount of the local inserts have turned into the same old canned promos and donation solicitations, day-after-day, night-after-night, since the CapRadio crisis hit.

Not having Donna Abedoni at the board in AM Drive doesn't help either.

KQED has "Forum" from 9:00-11:00 a.m. while CapRadio runs "Here & Now" in that timeslot.

KQED airs "Here & Now" from 11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m., while CapRadio runs "1A" (not carried by KQED) from 11:00-12:00 noon and its live local talk show "Insight" from noon to 1:00 p.m.

KQED had been running "1-A", picked up right after Joshua Johnson left KQED to take over from Diane Rehm at WAMU. After he'd left to go to MSNBC, that program became the red-headed stepchild and was eventually removed from the schedule (where it already was airing just before midnight).

KQED splits "All Things Considered", airing an hour from 1:00-2:00 p.m., followed by "The World" (which CapRadio dropped in Januar) from 2:00-3:00, "PBS NewsHour" (not carried by CapRadio) from 3:00-4:00 and "Marketplace" from 4:00-4:30, before returning to "All Things Considered" from 4:30-6:30.

CapRadio carries the BBC Newshour from 1:00-2:00, "Marketplace" from 2:00-2:30, and then an uninterrupted four hours of "All Things Considered from 2:30-6:30.

Both KQED and CapRadio run "Marketplace" again at 6:30.

KQED airs "Fresh Air" at 7, while CapRadio replays "Insight".

CapRadio airs "Fresh Air" at 8, and BBC Newsday from 9-11, while KQED replays "Forum" from 8-10 and has a rotating schedule of one-hour shows ("On Shifting Ground", "City Arts & Lectures", "Kelly Corrigan Wonders", "Commonwealth Club", "Tech Nation") from 10-11.


The vast majority of what airs is on both stations, and for 13 hours of the broadcast day, it's virtually a simulcast.

It's more like 11-1/2 hours on weekdays, but otherwise you're spot-on.

 

[michael hagerty]

Conversely, who wants to BUY a station with all that debt? So leave the debt and the license with the college.

The proposal is that KVIE buy the licenses (and likely all the new equipment), but not the debt. The station can then operate on a normal budget, Sac State gets some money to offset the cash it has spent digging CapRadio out, and that’s that.

 

[michael hagerty]

It seems like the big problem is the lease obligations on the two downtown buildings. Is CapRadio a separate NFP corporation? Or is it an integrated subsidiary of Sacramento State University? If the latter, CSUS is indisputably on the hook. But if someone had the foresight to incorporate the CapRadio operations and the radio stations into their own corporation, and the lease obligations overwhelm the corporations assets and reserves, then they are technically bankrupt. And they should be eligible to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which could allow them to reject those leases and get off the hook. Sell off all the furniture and equipment that can't be treated as sunk costs and used to modernize the on-campus operations. Exit the leases, lick their wounds and move on. (I am presuming that, in the absence of the leases, they would at least be cash flow neutral, and probably even cash positive.)

It’s an auxiliary. They are on the hook. Bankruptcy is not an option.

 

[michael hagerty]

Not having Donna Abedoni at the board in AM Drive doesn't help either.

Donna Apidone retired prior to the problems becoming known. Her successor, Chris Campbell, got caught in the downsizing that eliminated separate hosts and news anchors and Steve Milne, who’s been there nearly 30 years and hosted Morning Edition before Donna, had his anchor role expanded to include hosting.

 

[Weiserguy]

Donna Apidone retired prior to the problems becoming known. Her successor, Chris Campbell, got caught in the downsizing that eliminated separate hosts and news anchors and Steve Milne, who’s been there nearly 30 years and hosted Morning Edition before Donna, had his anchor role expanded to include hosting.

Apologies for mis-hearing and misspelling Donna's surname. (My hearing is sub-optimal these days.) I knew she'd retired, and I wasn't trying to claim any malevolence, that her "disappearance" was the result of the downsizing. My point was only that Mr. Milne now has to juggle two roles while he's on air, and both roles can't benefit from being combined. The same could be said for Devon Yamanake (sp?) too, after your own retirement. Not her fault, it just is what it is.

Now, if both of these anchors/hosts are doing as good a job, or a better one, than having the host/board-op and newscaster roles split apart in their respective shifts, then that's a different discussion. (I don't detect that's the case; my impression is they're making lemonade from the lemons they've been dealt.)

 

[michael hagerty]

Apologies for mis-hearing and misspelling Donna's surname. (My hearing is sub-optimal these days.) I knew she'd retired, and I wasn't trying to claim any malevolence, that her "disappearance" was the result of the downsizing. My point was only that Mr. Milne now has to juggle two roles while he's on air, and both roles can't benefit from being combined. The same could be said for Devon Yamanake (sp?) too, after your own retirement. Not her fault, it just is what it is.

Because I know you won’t take offense, I‘ll correct that name too—-Devin Yamanaka.

And just for the record, Devin and Steve had their roles expanded at the same time—-four months before my retirement.

Chris and I were told at the same time, the day after the layoffs, just before my vacation, that the station would no longer have separate news anchors.

I was offered the opportunity to move to a new role as lead story reporter and fill-in host for both Steve and Devin as well as formally designated fill-in host for Insight (I’d been the only sub on Insight for a year or two, but this made it official).

I said yes and had a great time doing a variety of things rather than 90-second newscasts every 28 minutes.

My wife and I had been discussing retirement for two years—-more than a year before any signs of financial issues at CapRadio. Probably the biggest motivator in our timing was the grandkids being 2,500 miles away at Christmas, and three weeks in France telling me I wanted more travel and more time. We made the decision during the holidays.

Now, if both of these anchors/hosts are doing as good a job, or a better one, than having the host/board-op and newscaster roles split apart in their respective shifts, then that's a different discussion. (I don't detect that's the case; my impression is they're making lemonade from the lemons they've been dealt.)

There are a lot of very good, very talented people making lemonade in that building.

 

[Y2kTheNewOldies]

CapRadio Contests Its Endowment Board Giving Away Tower - Radio Ink

Sacramento State is battling the station's endowment board over the board's gift of a transmission tower used by CapRadio to KVIE-TV.

radioink.com

Here is more from CapRadio and their transmission tower. This comes as there are talks that Sacramento's PBS affiliate could take over Cap Radio if approved.

The fight over Sacramento’s Capital Public Radio is turning bitter as owner Sacramento State is battling the station’s endowment board over the board’s gift of a transmission tower used by CapRadio to KVIE-TV, who the board now wants to run CapRadio.

CapRadio are contesting the KXJZ broadcast tower donation, claiming that financial statements and a lease agreement confirm the tower is owned by CapRadio, not the endowment board, and sits on permanently restricted property.


Contrarily, endowment board president Dan Brunner maintains that the endowment has owned the property and tower since 2013, handling all related expenses including property taxes and audit fees. Brunner disclosed that recent discussions about the tower between Sac State officials and the endowment were followed by an appraisal valuing the property at $2.7 million.

 

[michael hagerty]

CapRadio's own reporting on the tower issue, including a segment on Insight with Vicki Gonzales.

CapRadio and financial backer at odds over who owns broadcast tower

After a financial backer of CapRadio donated one of its broadcasting towers to KVIE following calls for a merger between the two public media stations, management of the Sacramento NPR member station argues they ‘definitively’ own the tower.

www.capradio.org

 

[PTBoardOp93]

A new report from tomorrow's print edition of the Sacramento Bee will cover an audit of CapRadio's expenditure: https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article287937050.html

The forensic report flagged more than $774,000 in spending — including at least $460,800 linked to an individual “without corresponding evidence of expense reports and/or receipts.” That person had at least some influence over the station’s finances, according to the review.

Additionally, the audit includes allegations of self-dealing between CapRadio and members of its board.