Richard Wagoner made this comment in the
Daily Breeze which completely knocked the wind out of me for a moment. If I was a regular Breeze reader instead of some guy on Mike Stark's mailing list I would've responded in the paper.
"I have said this many times in the past -- I don't think a university should be allowed to hold a license to a station that is not run by and for students as much as possible. I don't care about the format: if students aren't a primary part, the station should lose its license."
If we don't have schools running our public radio stations, then whom? I only know of one public station in the L.A./Long Beach metro area that is not operated by a college or university and that is Pacifica Foundation's KPFK.
KPFK is a strongly left-wing station with a mission of political change. Although they may still have a smattering of entertainment programs, that is not what they are about.
If public radio stations won't exist without heavy student involvement, woe to South Californians who want to hear popular music on shows like KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic and unbiased news from top flight reporters and talk show hosts like those at KPCC.
In my youth, radio in So Cal was mostly mediocre, with some stations rising above that level with high quality programs. Radio in the 1990's through to today is burdened with too many commercials, sexual talk that makes KPFK's airing of Carlin's "Seven Words you can't say..." in the '70's seem tame, foreign-language programming, and news and talk stations that are nothing more than right-wing propaganda machines. The focus is on profits first, last, and in the middle.
So what are we training college students for? They need to leave the ethics they learn in college at the door for many of the jobs available in commercial radio. Without talented professionals hosting local public radio shows, there won't be any jobs to fill in that area.
Let's not view KSUL through green glasses, Toto, because it wasn't a shining Emerald City but quite a mixed bag. It was a fun station with some very good shows but some of us hit the airwaves long before we were ready. There were many cringe-inducing moments on the air.
Even the students I worked with at the OC High School of the Arts had to pass an audition before getting up on the stage and college students should do the same, even in a "lab" environment. In both the Radio/TV and Journalism departments, once the students had passed their lower division classes they often went right on the air.
Elements of the KSUL model could make for a fine public radio station. But KSUL as it was in 1981 was not that station.
