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First of all, thanks for all the emails and calls and comments about the last KMHD post.
I wanted to add that there are reasons why the KMHD DJs kept this in the family. Believe me, many times I've wanted to write the last post but I didn't for these reasons:
ONE:
I didn't want to jepardize the station fund raising. Around 75% of the operating funds for KMHD come from listeners. If I had blown the whistle on the scandal of how the music was not getting to us, I was afraid that listeners would stop pledging.
Since the DJs were taking care of business on our own (many of us deal directly with labels and distributors), any reduction in funds from our listeners could have seriously harmed the existence of the station.
Once OPB takes over operations, not only won't that be a concern, but I believe the good things that OPB brings to the station will actually help fund raising.
TWO:
At the Mt Hood Community College board meeting last Wednesday, several DJs spoke out about how badly the station was run, how the paid staff (with the exception of Calvin Walker) was incompetent, disrespectful to and and at odds with the DJs.
This seemed to shock those in the room who were unaware of the situation at the station. The college president and JoAnn Zahn knew and, although I can't confirm it, I'm pretty sure it's why they took the station in the direction of OPB.
So now that the DJs publicly opened the door to the issue, I proceeded with the story.
Even though one KMHD DJ, commenting on my last post, said that this wasn't news and that everybody already knew it, he is dead wrong. When I told several music industry insiders in Portland about it, people who know what's what, they were shocked.
Should we have raised these issues before. Maybe, maybe not. Since at least two of the staff jobs are union protected, and two former general managers were unable to oust Gomez, most likely nothing would have been done to fix the problem.
It was risky on my part to write that last post, but I think you expect that from me.
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And nothing less, Mister D'Antoni!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the "voice"
KMHD is that college jazz station that's on late at night, right?
ReplyDeleteWhen a bad employee can't be dismissed for cause, when you can show cause, over many years and more than one GM, something else is wrong. My take so far is that Gomez is not overworked. He is enjoying abusing the DJ and the radio station too much to excuse his destructive acts as "prioritization." And who paid for that wonderful jazz CD collection he has? Does he have receipts, or were they sent to KMHD for airtime consideration and he kept them? How many of his friends received "gifted" copies? How can you get them back?
ReplyDeleteGomez can be memorialized in history as "the guy who locked away the music."
Prioritize that.