National EAS tests

[b-turner]

The greed you speak of shows your lack of understanding of radio in markets like Minot. There is not much money with only 40,000 people. With 9 stations dividing the advertising pie, I can tell you $40,000 or $50,000 a month is doing quite well and I bet some of the AMs are running only a few thousand a month. Quite frankly, if each station was to stand alone, I bet half of them would be bankrupt in that market. When you look at a staff including sales people, management, bookkeeping and traffic, manning a station 24/7 never was feasible which is why when stations were required to be run with a warm body in the building, they signed off at 10pm or midnight. The point is, even if there was an EAS activation at that point in time, nobody would have been at the station because nobody was on the air 24/7. At least with FCC sanctioned computer driven programming, the EAS would be able to be activated. At the station I manage, ours fires off with nobody in the building and my automation will repeat it at the intervals we set for warnings. Then again, when the warning is never sent via the EAS, it never makes it on the air, which seems to be the case for the Minot situation.

A quick check of the census, there is $1,005,742,000 in Retail Sales. Assuming a very healthy market, radio might get $4 in advertising for every $1,000 in retail sales. We'll round to $4,023,000 in radio dollars divided by 9 commercial stations or about $447,000 per station. This means the average station brings in about $1,228 a day in revenue. If you've run a business of any kind, you know that's not much to work with. That's about $37,250 a month.

Quite frankly, back in the 1970s or early 1980s when cable wasn't after ad dollars, when the radio dial still had blank spots and when stations had to have full staffing, the share in market like Minot might only be split three ways instead of today's 9. They needed more dollars then to run a station, adjusting for inflation, but there was more on the table then. Quite frankly, we in radio get a bit ticked when people say we're only after as much profit as we can grab. The truth is, those of us running stations are really bent toward doing all we can for our markets. Naturally we don't like our budgets being squeezed time and time again and we've figured out how to squeeze blood from a turnip. Radio really isn't a cash cow unless maybe you own stock and force us to make you a few dollars, should you own that stock. I think we'd love to be live 24/7 if we could but markets won't pay for it and shareholders won't permit it. We're simply stuck trying to do all we can with what we have to work with. Greed is not in our vocabulary but cheapskates is, at least within the walls of such stations. We can also understand that since radio is not what it was you feel abandoned but radio is still kicking and we haven't ordered our tombstones.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

You don't have to be in the radio station to activate EAS. Radio is not in charge of EAS. Emergency officials are in charge. Radio is merely the pipe through which the information travels. That's how the law was written. This is not about radio greed. This is about the people who are supposed to be responsible not knowing what to do. It's also about a train that should not have been carrying dangerous chemicals without an escort. They tried to sneak through late at night without anyone knowing. This was a much bigger problem than staffing a radio station.

I didn't say someone at the STATION had to be there to activate it, I said that nobody was there to activate it because there was no warning of the train coming through to begin with. I know how the EAS system works, I understand perfectly who activates it, and that's the problem. The media, if THEY had actually been on the job at the time, would have had a better opportunity to inform the public than the EAS could have, and nobody was THERE, either.

This is exactly the problem I said it was.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

The greed you speak of shows your lack of understanding of radio in markets like Minot.

On the contrary, it shows my perfect understanding. We're not talking about greed in just one station or just one market or even ALL stations or markets. We're talking about a culture among the major owners that has literally bankrupted the industry at a time when it should have done nothing but grow profits at exponential factors. We could be talking about very healthy properties that could have staff at least during most hours of the day, but instead we're talking about how nobody was there to sound the alarm when an emergency happened -- which is truly and hilariously ironic, given that the industry up until that point had been attempting to sell itself on emergency preparedness and communications ever since Katrina broke the levies.

(And by the way, I'm not here because I'm a radio fan, I'm here because radio was my career for many years. I know what the situation is.)

 

[davideduardo]

On the contrary, it shows my perfect understanding. We're not talking about greed in just one station or just one market or even ALL stations or markets. We're talking about a culture among the major owners that has literally bankrupted the industry at a time when it should have done nothing but grow profits at exponential factors.

The OTA radio industry was in flat growth mode since the "dot bomb" of 1999, and was then hit by the double whammy of recession and the rapid growth of mobile devices and the consequent surge of radio streams from Pandora et. al.

In smaller markets, add in the significant damage to local accounts that used radio in the recession and the growing dominance of the big box stores that often do not buy local radio.

There is no reason to expect growth in OTA radio. Radio companies know this, but have as yet to create significant competition for the Pandora-like streamers that have limited or no ads. Radio does not care what the platform is, but it can't move into the Pandora space as Pandora does not yet have a truly viable business model that includes little things like a profit.

We could be talking about very healthy properties that could have staff at least during most hours of the day, but instead we're talking about how nobody was there to sound the alarm when an emergency happened

I already posted that in the pre-consolidation model that market had no stations on the air at the time of the disaster. Automation has made increased schedules possible, and the EAS system makes emergency alerts perfectly doable. Even if the stations were to have had someone present, they would not have broadcast an alert in anywhere near as timely a fashion as the EAS as most stations have a verification policy for called in "news" to avoid dangerous situations caused by pranksters and evil-doers.

-- which is truly and hilariously ironic, given that the industry up until that point had been attempting to sell itself on emergency preparedness and communications ever since Katrina broke the levies.

That's news to me, and I've broadcast everything from a half-dozen major hurricanes to a major earthquake or two. Of course, neither of those events triggers an EAS alert so that sort of thing is irrelevant to the purpose of the EAS.

(And by the way, I'm not here because I'm a radio fan, I'm here because radio was my career for many years. I know what the situation is.)

No, you have an opinion on what the situation is. Others here believe your opinions are ill-founded.

 

[davideduardo]

I didn't say someone at the STATION had to be there to activate it, I said that nobody was there to activate it because there was no warning of the train coming through to begin with. I know how the EAS system works, I understand perfectly who activates it, and that's the problem. The media, if THEY had actually been on the job at the time, would have had a better opportunity to inform the public than the EAS could have, and nobody was THERE, either.

Do you really expect a market like Minot where the largest station bills under $45,000 a month is going to have a news person around in overnights? I know of nearly all news stations in a top 15 market that have no news people after 7 PM and those are stations that bill more than the entire Minot market does.

In fact, your average McDonald's has gross sales several times higher than those of Minot's billing leader.

If you counted the stations with news staff in-house at the time of the Minot derailment in the entire US, I doubt you would get into the triple digits.

Actually, there were all kinds of people authorized to call an EAS alert, but none had done the required training or they simply did not think about what they were supposed to know. Since essentially nobody else in the city even knew about the spill, the residents depended on their own officials for protection and they were let down by them. The EAS system was working. It's the fastest way to get an alert on the air, but the people who "own" the EAS did not act.

In any case, in Minot, ND, how many people do you think were awake at 2 AM listening to the radio? That is why emergency alerts need to be sent via multiple kinds of media.

 

[davideduardo]

A quick check of the census, there is $1,005,742,000 in Retail Sales. Assuming a very healthy market, radio might get $4 in advertising for every $1,000 in retail sales. We'll round to $4,023,000 in radio dollars divided by 9 commercial stations or about $447,000 per station. This means the average station brings in about $1,228 a day in revenue. If you've run a business of any kind, you know that's not much to work with. That's about $37,250 a month.

The commercial stations in Ward County appear to have total billing of around $2 million. The average is less than $225 k per station.

The leading station, and agribusiness AM, takes a quarter of the revenue. The next three stations take another 60%.

It's not surprising most are automated most of the time. It's just not reasonable to expect multiple stations to have staff at 2 AM in a market where there is so little revenue.

Let's figure that a minimally qualified "live" person in Minot in overnights might make $18 k a year. Times 9 stations, that is around $190 a year if you include FICA and any benefits. Or about 10% of the total market revenue. No way.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

No, you have an opinion on what the situation is. Others here believe your opinions are ill-founded.

My "opinion" is made up of facts, and those others are wrong.

 

[davideduardo]

My "opinion" is made up of facts, and those others are wrong.

What facts?

You have said things like (and I paraphrase) "radio should be increasing its billings" and "Minot was not handled well because there was nobody at the station" and that "EAS does not work".

The facts are: The economy, changes in retail advertising and new media have affected radio severely. No small market station can staff 24/7 and nearly no stations have overnight news staffs. EAS works admirably in protecting people in situations such as child abductions, tornados, flash floods, wildfires and the like.

Another fact: nothing works perfectly 100% of the time.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

Once again, David, you prove that you'll take my words, "paraphrase" them to twist them out of context, and attempt to prove a point that is half what I'm actually saying and half something completely different.

 

[Kelly A]

Okay then, how about summarizing your statements based on some facts for once.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

Okay then, how about summarizing your statements based on some facts for once.

I've done so more than once, in this forum and many others, and the continued denial from industry patriots who refuse to see reality even as it unfolds right in front of them doesn't discount it. In fact, it proves my point all the more.

 

[TheBigA]

I didn't say someone at the STATION had to be there to activate it, I said that nobody was there to activate it because there was no warning of the train coming through to begin with.

But numerous investigations, including one by NYU sociologist Eric Klinenberg in his book "Fighting For Air," discovered that in fact there WAS someone in the station at the time. And the police contacted the station's newsman, Don May, at home, and he drove to the station "through the toxic plume in the dead of night." So there were two people in the station, and once May got there, they began round the clock warnings. In fact, the local TV stations had signed off the air at midnight.

The problem on the radio side isn't staffing. The problem was having staff on hand that is trained to handle an emergency. The reason for that problem is simple: The FCC eliminated the 3rd Class Radiotelephone Operator's Permit requirement. Why? Because of the FCC's budget cuts. They couldn't handle the training, testing, and licensing of the growing number of people who applied. So they eliminated the requirement. It's easy to blame radio, but radio isn't the only part of the equation with budget cuts. The federal government has been cutting the FCC's budget for over 30 years.

There's a lot of blame to go around. But the statement that "nobody was there to activate it" is wrong. Read Klinenberg's book. It's not at all complimentary of Clear Channel, but it has first person interviews with people who were there that night.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

Oh, believe me, I in no way excuse the feds, either. Between consolidation and cuts at the FCC, they're just as much to blame for this farce. Staffing isn't the entire problem, but it is part of it, and that's because of years of greed and mismanagement throughout the industry and the lack of regulation that allowed that greed to flourish. It's all interconnected.

Thanks for the tip, I'll definitely check the book out.

 

[Kelly A]

I've done so more than once, in this forum and many others, and the continued denial from industry patriots who refuse to see reality even as it unfolds right in front of them doesn't discount it. In fact, it proves my point all the more.

All I've seen is your slant/opinions, probably based on some sort of bitterness toward the business, but no facts or statistics to back it up.

 

[b-turner]

Wow, some posters amaze me. We have facts on market revenue and some of us actually manage radio stations like me. But it seems that I don't know radio at all. The funny thing, some posters claim facts but fail to even mention those facts. What are those so called facts? Why is it what facts we have shared are wrong?

Here's what baffles me: explain how a person in the 9 stations in the overnight makes the officials enact the EAS system. Explain how you have the money to be live Midnight to 6. Explain why having a warm body in the studio is different than an automation system that can record and repeat the EAS audio message on a designated cycle. Explain how a warm body makes an EAS fire off when in the automatic mode and how this somehow gives the warm body the information not included in the EAS message.

Actually this reminds me of an event. I was riding the board during a flooding event. I'm at a daytime only AM. All I have as a resource is the national Weather Service. I try to get information by listening to the all news station but they're not covering it, playing a baseball game instead. I was at the station getting the EAS activations saying there was a Flash Flood Warning. The only real detail was 'main thoroughfares are flooding' and 'this is an ongoing event'. There was no useful information to give motorists in this metro who were on their way home. At sunset I managed to get home (we were a daytime only, remember). Nobody on radio is talking flooding. When I'm home, all the TV channels with news departments have people all over town. I see video of submerged cars all over the city. People stranded and hanging out in any business that will let them in. Yes, the TV stations with news departments were running commercial free with ongoing live reports. It got worse. 911 went down. Hospitals evacuated patients. It was nothing like Katrina, but really more like a miniature Katrina. This was tropical storm Alison and Houston is the place...Google it. My point is I was a warm body in the studio, helpless because nobody was giving details or useful information. Yes, the EAS was firing off but when the National Weather Service just doesn't give lots of detail it is pretty useless. If they had said major freeways were blocked by high water or this is a life threatening situation, maybe that could have prevented some from venturing out for home. So, my point is a warm body didn't help. The listener of radio heard the words they had heard hundreds of times and had no reason to think this time was any different than those past hundreds of flash flood warnings.

Later I'll share the budget for a station I managed to give you some additional facts. I have an appointment in about 30 minutes.

 

[TheBigA]

Staffing isn't the entire problem, but it is part of it, and that's because of years of greed and mismanagement throughout the industry and the lack of regulation that allowed that greed to flourish. It's all interconnected.

All this hand-wringing about greed ignores the fact that it's the American way. Radio was invented to make money. If you read the writings of Marconi, he wasn't interested in public service. He was interested in making money. Same with the launch of KDKA at Westinghouse or NBC at RCA. It was all about money. Remember that NBC had two networks, and was forced by the government to sell one. This happened in 1943. And the cost-cutting in radio goes back to replacing live bands with recorded music, and replacing radio drama with DJ shows. Sorry, but greed in broadcasting is not a recent event, and has been going on since it was invented. The only solution is government-owned media. And given the drive for tax cutting in this government, there'd be cost cutting there too, as evidenced by the recent layoffs at VOA.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

All I've seen is your slant/opinions, probably based on some sort of bitterness toward the business, but no facts or statistics to back it up.

Well, then, you've only been reading what you want to read.

 

[TheBigA]

Explain why having a warm body in the studio is different than an automation system that can record and repeat the EAS audio message on a designated cycle. Explain how a warm body makes an EAS fire off when in the automatic mode and how this somehow gives the warm body the information not included in the EAS message.

That's a good question, and if you read the law, it doesn't require local radio staffing. The EAS system was designed to operate without any local radio staffing, and the law allows for that. All the law requires is that the EAS alerts are logged, and the logging can be done by the automation system. The Congress didn't intend to put the responsibility for warning the public in the hands of an overnight DJ. That role was given to emergency personnel, paid for by taxpayers. The problem is when THOSE people aren't properly trained, and when other procedures aren't followed. Then the final link in the chain fails, and radio gets blamed. But it's not radio's responsibility. That is the key thing.

And it goes back to the OP, where Congress is discussing more testing. That is the ONLY way to ensure the system works. Whether or not the system is effective is irrelevant. If the emergency officials aren't trained and experienced, the warnings won't go out, regardless if the platform is OTA broadcasting or cell phones.

 

[JoshTheRadioDude]

The only solution is government-owned media.

Greed is fine when it's regulated into serving the public. That used to be the case. Now... not so much. The intentional deregulation of the industry and cuts to its regulatory agency? That's the problem.

 

[TheBigA]

Greed is fine when it's regulated into serving the public. That used to be the case.

But my point is that it really never was the case. You can't regulate a profit-making company into losing money. The end result is AMTRAK. Nobody wants that.

If you look at the last 40 years of regulatory history, none of it was about public service. And as long as the voters want less government and lower taxes, this will not change. THAT is the problem. Greedy voters.