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WRVO Names John Hurlbutt's Replacement

This is a compelling story. Congratulations and best wishes to all. However, the last paragraph takes off a bit of the bloom off the rose.

"Vigeant also catches us up on the fact that former WRVO producer Kelly Olsen exited the station early last month to pursue other interests. Due to budget constraints, the station has opted not to fill the position at this time."

This does not portend good things; difficult times for public and commercial broadcasters, to be sure.
 
Color me thrilled for Jason.

He made the fastest transition ever from intern to employee at WSYR. We hired him for the difficult part-time overnights position within the first week or so of his internship from Cayuga Community College because it was pretty clear he could handle it. It was a quick trip for him from part-time to full-time, too.

Jason had a whole other life before deciding radio -- not broadcasting, radio -- was where he wanted to be.

He's a creative editor, excellent air talent, good writer and great guy. He learns fast.

I'm so glad WRVO is replacing one pro with another.

And, to element9's comment: while I have no inside knowledge, I think WRVO's in a far better position than commercial radio because it is funded by a foundation and by passionate listeners (like me, for instance). I have absolutely no doubt that if WRVO went on the air and said they needed to raise an extra (say) $30K to keep a position, their listener base would dig down and come up with the cash. I can never see that happening in commercial radio.

There's also far less pressure on the costs side of the equation in public radio. I doubt there's a mortgage to pay off. Rent, perhaps. Bills and payroll, certainly. But the real problem in commercial radio is not that stations are losing money. It's that the profits are not extreme enough to pay returns above and beyond the bills to the investors who thought they'd have unloaded these "assets" by now and are sourly demanding extreme cost cuts in order to make the high profit numbers work again.

If there's any stability at all in radio, it's on the public side, particularly the university-owned side. The cuts on the public side have been very mild, by comparison, even the cuts at NPR.
 
Big shoes to fill. Do you realize John's been on the air there since the mid 70s? He gave me my first professional job in radio (but I don't hold it against him-ha!). He's done Morning Edition (with a couple years off here and there) since 1979. Jim Campagna once hosted ME on WRVO (1981-82 or so). I'll miss hearing John on the air.
 
If there's any stability at all in radio, it's on the public side, particularly the university-owned side. The cuts on the public side have been very mild, by comparison, even the cuts at NPR.
Click to expand...

What you say is true, but that's also partly because of the natural "lag time" that colleges tend to experience the economy through. For example, a lot of colleges are waiting with baited breath to see how big their fall class sizes are, and how much financial aid they'll need...and they won't know either "for sure" until late August or even early September in a lot of cases. At more than $50k a pop for tuition, room and board, it doesn't take many students not coming to your school, or coming and needing a lot of aid, to really foul up your balancesheet.

I fully expect that by the fall we'll hear of a few more college-owned NPR outlets being cut off fiscally, or even sold off entirely like Miami University did in Ohio. Fortunately for WRVO, though, it's damn near impossible for SUNY to sell a station license thanks to the politics in Albany. And I think they're mostly self-sufficient financially anyways.

Speaking of WRVO jobs, this morning I heard them advertising for a job opening to be their Morning Edition producer.
 
SUNY enrollment rarely suffers during a recession. SUNY is a much cheaper alternative to private schools for state residents, so enrollment is more likely to go up than down when money gets tight, especially for the first two years of school when most of the courses aren't specific to a major anyway. Ask any parent facing tuition bills.
 
...and I'm hoping SUNY doesn't get radically more expensive -- it's already plenty costly. (My son's at SUNY Oswego.)

The comment about lag time for schools is on the mark. It's possible SUNY will see declining enrollment if both tuition hikes continue and financial aid continues to be cut back. SUNY's the lower cost alternative, but at $15,000+ a year, it ain't cheap.

But I don't think SUNY will suffer as much as the private schools do, because, as Rox indicated, if you're gonna send the kid to college (and you have to, these days), SUNY's the cheapest option possible.

Even if there's a reduction in tuition, WRVO's secret weapon remains its extremely loyal listener base. I know I'd pitch in in a crisis, and I imagine many others would, too.

That's the prime difference between public and commercial radio -- each cultivated a community of fans. But public radio knows exactly who its fans are and how to reach them. Giving a damn about the audience is probably the best insurance against economic mood swings, yes?

In that regard, commercial radio has learned nothing. It remains a medium for advertisers first. And, as we're learning, advertisers have no loyalty to a given medium when times turn tough.
 
I could be mistaken, but most state schools' budgets are heavily subsidized by the state, and that budget is being slashed by Albany as we speak. So enrollment is less of a factor in terms of overall fiscal health. But, I want to point out again: WRVO is, AFAIK, fairly fiscally self-sufficient. So even if SUNY Oswego has its budget slashed, the trickle-down effect onto WRVO wouldn't hurt too badly.

That said, apparently WSKG-TV is having an ugly fundraiser at the moment. Current had an article about it.
 
I'd be more likely to donate again if they said, "Send us your cash AND Big Bird gets it between the eyes."

But that's just me....
 
These last 2 posts remind me of a sketch from the show "Robot Chicken."

Even though WRVO obviously gets support from the state by virtue of the fact that SUNY holds the broadcast license, it's very likely that listener support is a much bigger part of the budget than state funding.

Heck, look at WAMC, based in Albany. They just held a pledge drive a week or two ago. They usually go until they hit their goal. I think the press release I saw said they were estimating it would take 5+ days, but they had it done in less than 3. And they're not affiliated with a school at all. Of course, being based in a larger city and having dozens of stations and translators reaching as far as Utica, Beacon and parts of Vermont helps reach more potential donors... but still. Just goes to show public radio can still be successful in a down economy.

And as much as it may be morbid to take advantage of a situation, but the fact that NPR had some recent layoffs at the network level may be spurring people to increase their pledges to stations. It's a simple fact - no listener support = no programming = no station.

Hopefully stations and the network are smart enough (and have the ability) to save anything above their budget, to keep things going if and when there's a time when donations fall back down. In the case of stations owned by a college or a government, it's unfortunate IF (and I stress if, because I don't know for sure) the budget regulations require all money be spent by the end of each year. It's foolish to spend money on things you don't necessarily need, just for the sake of bookkeeping, when that money could very well help save jobs further down the road, if only it were saved.
 
Interesting point about the cutbacks spurring donations. You might be right. It shows there's a high level of engagement among listeners -- they take public radio seriously.

And just as interesting is the general public reaction to cutbacks on the commercial level. CC had to cut some folks and the public reaction was.....

<crickets>

Then again, what were listeners supposed to do? There does not seem to be the emotional attachment to commercial radio these days that there is to public radio, and it almost seems to have been done on purpose. The commercial radio public has been conditioned to expect format changes, for example, and while some folks call or send e-mails to complain, the general public reaction is....

<crickets>

No local programs on WHEN anymore? <crickets>

Midday host let go at (insert station here) in favor of voice tracking or nothing at all? <crickets>

One of the last places of passion among listeners in commercial radio would be Galuski, Reith, Ted & Amy and Gomez & Dave. But they seem to be the exceptions that proves the rule. (And 3 of the 4 air at the exact same time.)

Commercial radio has sanded down all of the rough points of attachment to consumers. They've traded Velcro for Teflon by voice tracking, limiting jock exposures to just a few seconds, perfect homogenization of playlists, etc. So what will consumers say at some point in the not-too-distant future when there's not a format change, but perhaps a complete shutdown of a local station? Maybe....

<crickets>?
 
Well said, Dave. And well written, too. I especially like the <crickets> tag.
 
This is my first time on the Syracuse/Utica board so please allow me to offer belated congratulations to Jason on his appointment at WRVO.

When the job was first posted last year I spoke with Chris and actually entertained the idea of getting back into public radio by applying for the position. But then considering that it used to take me over an hour's drive, one way, just to see my daughter when she attended SUNY Oswego, and that the price of gasoline at the time was over $4.00 a gallon, not to mention the wonderful snow belt on Route 104 during the winter months, I decided the best thing was to stay where I am.

I noticed with great interest comments about public broadcasting and proposed cuts in the state budget. Former colleagues at WXXI informed me that the station stands to lose half of its state funding. And even though WXXI's recent radio fundraiser exceeded its goal, the station is still a long way from making up the loss of over $800,000 in state aid.

We've all read, I'm sure, articles about job cutbacks. And even with a more stable and perhaps loyal audience than commercial radio, many public radio stations face an uncertain future.

It is my feeling that this recession is going to last a very long time, especially since New York state depends so much on Wall Street, and people are avoiding Wall Street like the plague.

With that in mind, my fear is that some pub-radio stations will be forced to layoff personnel just to make ends meet. Hopefully my doom-and-gloom prediction proves to be incorrect. But I doubt it.
 
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