Terry Green Blogs About KUSP

I’m sorry to report that Sean Rameswaram, KUSP’s host of Marketplace, All Things Considered, and Fresh Air, has left our staff to return to the east coast. In addition to hosting the afternoon news line-up Sean was our “go-to” reporter, especially on environmental stories, and in recent months he has been the producer and host of Talk of the Bay. He leaves really large shoes to fill, and all of us at KUSP wish him well.

For now, the afternoon host on KUSP will be Wes Sims, and we’re happy to have him back. Wes was the regular Friday host of Talk of the Bay for a period of time, before leaving our area a few years ago to serve as News Director of BYU Broadcasting, which includes public broadcasting stations KBYU FM and TV, in Provo, Utah. Wes recently retired from that position and returned home to the Monterey Bay area. We’re very happy he’s able to step in for a few weeks while we organize a open hiring process for Sean’s successor.

KUSP’s Fall Pledge Drive finished at 1:00 PM on Saturday 10/15. When all on-line and over-the-phone pledges were tallied and checked, the total came to a little over $103,800. This tops our Spring 2011 and Fall 2010 drives, both of which finished at just over $100,000. In fact, the $103,800 total is the most raised on a KUSP pledge drive since the spring of 2005 — when the state of the area’s economy, and the profile of public radio listening on the Central Coast, were both very different than they are today.

Our drive total did come up short of our $118,000 goal. We knew, going in, that this goal would be a stretch to reach. We were spurred along by our success in making all of last year’s pledge drive goals early, and we felt, given the growth in our audience lately and the positive feedback about our recent programming efforts, that this was a good time to aim high and see what would happen.

Topping our results for any drive in the past six years, at a time when the economy is as shaky as it is, has to be considered a success.

We’re deeply grateful for all the gifts we received — over 1,000 donors called in or pledged on-line — and for the hard work of the scores of community volunteers, KUSP programmers, and staff folks that made it possible for the station to realize your support. Thank you all!

This afternoon All Things Considered reported the hiring of Gary Knell, who has been the President and CEO of Sesame Workshop (as you’d guess, they are the production company for Sesame Street) as the radio network’s new CEO.

Click here to get to the NPR News blog, “The Two-Way,” which has a pretty complete breakdown and lots of interesting links.

I’m sure we member station folks will be hearing more from Gary in the next few days. I’ll pass along any especially interesting insights.

Update 10/3/2011 4:15 PM: here is another post from “The Two-Way” that includes an interview with Gary Knell airing on All Things Considered this afternoon.