CKNW Editorial
for December 6, 2001

The mass firings at this and associated stations last Friday came as no surprise to me. In a moment I’ll tell you why.

It’s always dangerous to mention just one or two. In this business, you don’t get to know all the people who make the station run simply because you’re in another physical and time space. I have no doubt that this is a very unhappy Christmas for many families and I wouldn’t want them to think I don’t empathize with them just because I don’t mention them.

I’ll just mention two – both of whom I do consider friends. Leigh Mackay, who always ought to have had one of the major shows in my opinion and who is a thorough professional. Leigh and his lovely wife Bunny traditionally used to produce my Christmas music show and one only had to see what happened when they didn’t to know what they meant to the program. Terry Moore and I go back a long way. Terry is the pro’s pro – able to do anything and everything. Of all the people I’ve had sub for me when I’m away – and I assure you I mean no disrespect to the others – Terry was my preferred choice and for this reason … when I came back, the show was the way I left it. I didn’t have to answer any criticisms … Terry knew what the Rafe Mair Show did, and it showed.

Why am I not surprised?

First off, because the rumours were everywhere and happily, the most outrageous did not come to pass. But mostly I could see it coming because prior to Corus taking over, CKNW had come to be the worst managed radio station in captivity.

Now let me pause here and say that I’m not about to kiss anyone’s ass here. The jury’s out on Corus and they have some pretty big tests to pass.

In the last four or five years, prior to the takeover, this station went from an institution that knew what it meant to the community to one that, at the top, lost all contact. It’s a tribute to the programming people and the News Department that this didn’t show in the sound.

I think it was the uncertainty of who was going to win control that took management’s eye off the ball. It became unreal – like the prisoner’s last supper … money was no object. Golden handshakes and platinum parachutes were the order of the day. But most of all – and I’m firmly on record on this one – the damn fools running the place, not just the CKNW brass but the WIC fat cats too – moved the station from a pair of very low rent locations to the highest in Vancouver – from no rent to a million dollars a year. It’s breathtaking when you think of it and you can understand why new shareholders would demand that something be done. Unfortunately instead of the real culprits paying, it’s those who have put so much of their lives, emotionally as well as physically into this station. Someday you should have a look at this place. One floor of the hugely expensive Pacific Center – the 21^st - is filled with hardware – hardware that could be anywhere. On the main floor – the 20^th - there’s a lobby that’s twice as big as the entire studio I started in 21 years ago. All the big kids had corner offices complete with expensive telescopes, the better to look at the mountains with. When Shaw Cable took over anyone with half a brain knew that heads would have to roll. They didn’t make their money winning lotteries but knowing how to run a business.

It’s important to note what Corus has not done. It stayed with its programmers – Tom Plasteras and Ian Koenigsfesr - on the CKNW side because, I assume, Corus can read BBM measurements – ratings - and knows that the work done by the broadcasting portion of CKNW has produced outstanding results.

Let me tell you what good programming is not. It is not allowing anyone from the sales department within 100 yards of broadcasting. It is not allowing advertisers or important people have anything to say about what is broadcast. It is about hiring good people and letting them do their thing. It is about consulting with broadcast teams not to control what goes on air but to enhance it. It is about recognizing that over the past dozen years or so, listeners to CKNW talk shows have expected much more than the old "dollar a holler" and demand solid information … that the shows always do the difficult thing. Our listeners expectations increase all the time and good programmers understand that. Good programmers also stand behind their broadcasters when they get in trouble for if we didn’t have that happen once in awhile, we wouldn’t be cutting close enough to the bone. Good programmers are able to deal with massive events like September 11 and help the station be as informative and incisive as were the national TV networks.

Corus has obviously recognized that through all the appalling executive decisions, the programmers never lost sight of what it is that makes CKNW great.

What about the future?

I don’t know. Does the Corus brass, who are all in Toronto and New York, know what a heritage station is? Do they understand that one of the ways Vancouverites pass from youth to maturity is to wake up one day listening to CKNW and wondering how that can be? Do they understand the close connection to the community this station always has had and must retain if it is to remain Number One?

I can only tell you this – I have talked to the president after I sent him an eight page letter and he assures me that he and his colleagues do understand these things. And, as I say, leaving the program management in place is an encouraging sign.

It’s very sad indeed to see people lose their jobs and nothing I say should minimize my feelings in that regard. But CKNW had, under the old WIC management – which had to their credit, one must remember, originally built ‘NW to what it was, then lost its way – started down a very slippery slope to becoming just another radio station. I hope that slide has been stopped.

We’ll just have to wait and see.