WMUB, the NPR radio station based at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, has announced that due to funding issues, the station will likely soon be operated by Cincinnati Public Radio. (Thanks to RNR listener Thomas Kemp for pointing us to the news.) The changes are detailed in a news release by Miami, and described on the WMUB website, where they note that WMUB Forum on Friday, January 23rd will be devoted to this topic (live at 9 AM, recording repeated at 7 PM). This comes only 7 months after they announced significant programming changes to be more competitive and to increase their strategic partnerships, but it sounds like the numbers still don't work. Miami President David Hodge is quoted as saying that "the financial obligation of WMUB can no longer be borne by the university with the economic challenges we face."
It will be interesting to see what it means to have WMUB operated by CPR. It could be a way for them to continue some or all of their programming with a new source of funding and other resources, or it could mean that 88.5 becomes a "repeater" for CPR content, and that the Oxford-based station ceases most operations as we've known them.
I'm sure that CPR will do a fine job of it, but what they will not be able to do is pay any attention to events in the "rural" listening area served by WMUB (geese, since when did our city become a cow pasture?). Lots of Richmond organizations use WMUB to communicate events. It was a stretch, but worked for Richmond to call WMUB a local mainstay.
I cannot fathom any such feelings about sending dollars down to Cinci . . . but who knows. Media consolidation, from the paper-to-Indy to the radio-to-Cincinnati, it's what's for dinner.
Probably, folks in the big time media outfits see that they have no chance to compete with a small and nimble media storm like the RNR, and are in full retreat. Step into the void, Chris!
Comment by Thomas Kemp — Friday January 23, 2009 @ 9:54 amMy understanding is that WMUB will become a repeater for WVXU and will lose all (or almost all) of its local programming.
IIRC, WVXU itself went through a similar change in 2005, turning over its operations to CPR and eventually giving up its WVXR New Paris/Richmond repeater (and all of its far-flung repeater frequencies). Almost all of WVXR/WVXU's local programming ceased shortly after CPR took over. With a few exceptions, WVXU broadcast the NPR feed and stopped making locally produced talk shows, music shows, call-in shows, etc. The WVXR frequency that supplied the WVXU signal to this area was sold to a Christian radio station several months after WVXU was taken over by CPR.
The Christian station often bleeds over into WMUB's frequency, at least in my house. I can't get WVXU (the Cincinnati frequency) at all. Frankly, I don't care, because WVXU is no longer the station I knew and loved.
WMUB was never as eclectic as WVXU, but it did have some good local programming. I am sorry to see it go the way of WVXU.
Comment by Marymary — Monday February 23, 2009 @ 2:55 pmWhat a huge loss for public radio! WMUB’s local programs were superb, unequaled. The area will lose John Hingsbergen’s “Free Advice” and “Mary Jo’s Kitchen,” not to mention “Interconnect” and “Forum.”
Miami University now has the dubious distinction of being the only major Ohio institution of higher education without a public radio station. Surely Miami’s president and board of trustees could have developed a plan to save WMUB. Instead mega-infusions of money will continue to go to athletics and construction.
Umpteen thanks to WMUB for the gifts it has given us over the decades.
Comment by James Reiss — Monday April 6, 2009 @ 11:49 am