October 20, 2008

Job Cuts at Entercom

• MAINE
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• CLASSIFIEDS
• FROM THE ARCHIVES

*Wall Street's lack of confidence in radio stocks hit home in eastern MASSACHUSETTS in a big way late last week, as Boston became one of the Entercom markets to weather big job cuts as the broadcaster's stock continued to fall. A year ago, ETM traded for more than $18 a share; it closed Friday at $1.40, matching other radio groups such as Citadel and Westwood One in their financial agonies.

In addition to some company-wide austerity measures, including pay freezes and a halt on company contributions to employees' 401(k) plans, Entercom cut staff at its stations around the country.

In Boston, the most visible cut was in mid-mornings at troubled talker WRKO (680), where Reese Hopkins had joined the station last December as its lone African-American host, drawing some rare critical praise for the station amidst its struggles with high-priced morning man Tom Finneran and afternoon star Howie Carr, whose attempt to flee to competitor WTKK was thwarted amidst some contentious lawsuits a year ago.

That didn't make Hopkins any less expendable, though - and now he's out the door, his local shift replaced by a live clearance for Laura Ingraham, whose syndicated offering had been heard in late nights on WTKK.

Also out at the Boston Entercom cluster: WRKO executive producer Andy Strecker and WAAF morning show producer Dave DiGando, along with at least nine others behind the scenes.

*When the Red Sox faced off against the Rays Saturday night for Game 6 of the ALCS, the game was missing from TV screens across Sox Nation thanks to a technical disaster at TBS headquarters in Atlanta.

No, it wasn't a crazed Braves fan seeking revenge - as best we can tell from what TBS is saying publicly, it was a fluky set of circumstances involving a massive power surge that fried not one, but two routers and made it impossible for TBS (or several other Turner networks) to switch any external feeds out of the building.

Granted, if it had been up to us, we'd have bumped Headline News off the air and switched the whole mess from CNN's New York control room, or given ESPN emergency clearance to put the international feed that it was producing on its domestic network until the TBS broadcast could be restored...but in any event, it gave the WRKO broadcast team a chance to reconnect with a Boston audience suddenly deprived of a video feed.

And in the end...well, if destiny calls for the Series to be played by a team playing in a large, dank parking garage with ugly carpeting where a field is supposed to be, then so it goes. (But, Tito, did you really have to leave Lester in that long? Really?)

*Clear Channel has a new market manager for its Worcester stations, WTAG/WSRS: Sean Davey adds those responsibilities to his existing duties 45 minutes to the west at Clear Channel's Springfield cluster (WHYN/WHYN-FM/WPKX). He replaces Mike Schaus, who exits the Worcester cluster.

Across town, Sully is out as morning sidekick on WXLO (104.5 Fitchburg).

Nassau's WCRB (99.5 Lowell) is losing its general manager, as Paul Kelley joins Saga Communications as VP/market manager for its cluster in Norfolk, Virginia.

Longtime NERW readers may recall that one of this column's frequent topics in its early years was the woeful state of reporting in the Boston Globe about the radio industry. That changed a few years back, when Clea Simon took over the paper's "Radio Tracks" column. Sadly, the ongoing cutbacks at the Globe have taken their toll on its radio coverage, and this past week's column (which focused on our good friend Donna Halper, and also mentioned a certain Tower Site Calendar) marks the end of a good run for Simon - and, after one farewell column next week, of regular radio coverage in what was once New England's newspaper of record.

The Globe's impending redesign also means the end of the weekly TV listings book, which appeared in yesterday's Sunday Globe for the last time.

And it's not just Morrissey Boulevard facing cuts: in Chicago, Robert Feder, whose Sun-Times column was probably the best local newspaper column about broadcasting still being published, took a buyout offer and offered up his last column last week.

Here at NERW, we're a little saddened to have outlasted these and other fine columns (Dean Johnson in the Boston Herald and Mark McGuire in the Albany Times Union come immediately to mind), and all the more committed to being here each and every week as we approach our 15th anniversary next year.

*NEW YORK's only NFL team, the Buffalo Bills, won their matchup with the San Diego Chargers Sunday afternoon, but not without some headaches for anyone who wasn't watching from the chilly confines of Ralph Wilson Stadium.

A stray helium balloon apparently floated into a high-voltage line next to the stadium just before game time, knocking out power to the stadium itself and to the broadcast trucks parked outside - and that meant that CBS viewers missed big chunks of the game action until power could be restored and the broadcast back to New York could get back on line.

Of course, many viewers in the Buffalo market weren't seeing the game, anyway, as the carriage dispute between LIN's CBS affiliate WIVB (Channel 4) and Time Warner Cable drags on. It's reportedly costing WIVB in the form of significant drops in ratings and ad revenue - and while Time Warner says it's not recording higher disconnect numbers than usual, we're hearing that Dish and DirecTV installers have been very busy in the last few weeks.

While some Time Warner customers in Niagara County had access to the game broadcast (such as it was) on Toronto's CFTO, the CTV affiliate was blacked out on cable in other parts of the market where it doesn't meet the FCC's "significantly viewed" standard.

So that left radio as the link between many Bills fans and the game, and flagship station WGRF (96.9 Buffalo) came through, putting its announcers on cell phones at one point to keep the broadcast going when the power failed in the booth.

(And about that "only NFL team" claim - last time we checked, the Jets and Giants both play their games in New Jersey, don't they?)

*The Entercom cuts hit the Rochester cluster last week, too: cuts there included at least one on-air position: WCMF (96.5) night guy "Big Marc" Ferenchak, who'd been one of the handful of survivors when WCMF changed hands from CBS to Entercom a year ago.

(Ironically, one of the jocks who lost his job in that shakeup is returning to the air - Dino Kaye, who's been doing sales for WHEC-TV since losing his WCMF gig, has been hired by Stephens Media to do afternoons at its WFKL 93.3. He'll be selling for Stephens when he's not on the air at "Fickle.")

Bruce Mittman's Community Broadcasting group is adding another signal to its Watertown-market cluster: it's paying LiveAir Communications $200,000 for the construction permit of WEFX (94.1 Calcium). The new station will join a cluster that already includes talker WATN (1240 Watertown), ESPN outlet WBDB (1400 Ogdensburg), talker WQTK (92.7 Ogdensburg), oldies WGIX (95.3 Gouverneur), AC WTOJ (103.1 Carthage) and top 40 "Border" WBDR (106.7 Copenhagen).

Finger Lakes Radio Group is adding another translator in Ithaca. In addition to its existing mini-cluster of top 40 startup WFIZ (95.5 Odessa) and translator W242AB (96.3 Ithaca, relaying classic rock "Wall" WLLW 99.3 Seneca Falls), Finger Lakes is paying $2,000 for new translator W299BI (107.7 Ithaca). What will it relay? The company's only other full-power FM in the region is AC WNYR (98.5 Waterloo), but now that crosstown Saga has set the precedent for HD2-translator relays with its "Hits 103.3" on WYXL (97.3-HD2) and W276AO (103.3), anything's possible. (And we note that "Hits" is now streaming at hits1033.com.)

At New York's WWPR (105.1), Boston native Free (late of BET's "106th and Park") joins Ed Lover as morning co-host.

Down the dial at WNYZ-LP (87.7), Jewelz Lopez departs as night jock - she's headed to Tampa, where she takes middays at WYUU (92.5). Meanwhile, Andre Ferro joins "Pulse 87.7" for nights...and what's the big announcement the station is planning for this morning during the Star and Buc Wild show? We'll update this week's column as soon as we know.

(Monday update: That would, as rumored, be the end of the "Star and Buc Wild Show," as the station moves to an all-music format in morning drive. The official word from PD Joel Salkowitz was that Pulse's "stationality" was ill-served by the personality-heavy morning show; given Pulse's well-reported budget issues, we'd suspect the bottom line was at play, too.)

*We can now put a price on the VERMONT deal that moved Randolph's WCVR (102.1) and WTSJ (1320) from Bruce Danziger and Ken Barlow's Vox group to their former partner Jeff Shapiro's Great Eastern: the stations sold for $700,000. And a correction from last week: the new slogan at WCVR is, logically enough, "World Class Vermont Rock."

WCVR and WTSJ will join all the other stations in the Upper Valley today as they remember the late DJ Pauline Robbins, who succumbed to breast cancer in January. Last October, the stations set aside competition for a day to honor the ailing Robbins with "Polly's Think Pink Radiothon," raising $37,000 for breast cancer awareness. Today, they'll again join forces for "Think Pink II," running from 6 AM until 7 PM on some 20 stations in Lebanon, Hanover, White River Junction, Randolph, Claremont and vicinity.

*The analog TV sunset will come a little early in southern NEW HAMPSHIRE. WZMY (Channel 50) in Derry is pulling the plug on its analog signal at noon on Dec. 1, reports Broadcasting and Cable. While the My Network TV affiliate is promoting the shutdown as an early opportunity for Boston-market viewers to make sure they're ready for the big day in February 2009, NERW suspects there will be little, if any, reaction, since WZMY (and its predecessor on Channel 50, WNDS) has always been one of the most cable- and satellite-dependent signals in the market. (Indeed, its off-air signal was never seen in our old Waltham home base a decade or so ago...)

*In NEW JERSEY, they're mourning Tom "Mr. Maze" Maciaszek. The longtime staffer at WOBM-FM (92.7 Toms River) and WOBM (1160 Lakewood Township) died last week after three decades at the stations. Most recently, Maciaszek had been the producer for the morning show on WOBM(AM).

*An obituary in northeast PENNSYLVANIA as well: back in 1971, Tim Karlson came to the region from his native Baltimore (where he was born Tim Kidwell) to work at the now-defunct WSCR (1320), then moved to the market's biggest station, WARM (590), in 1974. After a brief stab at doing TV weather in 1983 at WBRE-TV (Channel 28), Karlson made the move to TV for good as sports director at WNEP-TV (Channel 16) at the height of that station's dominance.

In 1992, Karlson was diagnosed with a brain tumor, but he remained on the air during treatment, turning his hair loss into a signature feature of his broadcasts, wearing "Karlson's Kaps" sent in by viewers. As the disease progressed, Karlson left the air in 2000 to work in creative services on the other side of the WNEP building.

Karlson was also a part of the broadcast team for the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Red Barons in that team's early years.

Karlson died Thursday at his home; he was just 56.

*Christmas came early in Pittsburgh: WWSW (94.5) was in all-holiday mode over the weekend, but fear not: with more than a week yet to go before Halloween, the station isn't on the all-Christmas, all-the-time bandwagon just yet, returning to regular programming this morning. (In our other life as news editor of 100000watts.com, we note that the first all-Christmas station this year appears to be St. Louis' WMVN, which flipped October 10 as it awaits a format change early in 2009.)

*A new station has formally launched in CANADA: CJLO (1690 Montreal) stopped testing and signed on for real last Wednesday (Oct. 15) at 1 PM, kicking things off with the Replacements' "Left of the Dial."

And Milkman UnLimited reports Darryl Kornicky is departing Newcap's CILV (Live 88.5) in Ottawa, heading down the 416 and the 401 to Kingston to become the new morning host at CIKR (K-Rock 105.7).

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