April 23, 1983
WAER's silence will be broken only by sound of baseball
By Cindy Hyle
Baseball will provide the only sounds on WAER-FM's airwaves for the next two weeks as the Syracuse University.radio station seeks new staff members for a program change.
Station manager David R. Anderson ordered FM88 closed down yesterday afternoon after firing five key staff members in a dispute over the pending programming change that emphasizes jazz and news. Some students say the new format does not allow student input and neglects the needs of minority listeners.
WAER will air only Syracuse Chiefs' baseball games, both home and away, Anderson said yesterday. The station should be able to hire new staff members and resume regular 24-hour broadcasting in two weeks, he added.
WAER went off the air at 3:22 p.m. yesterday but resumed broadcasting the Chiefs-Charlestown Charlies' first game last night from Toronto.
Anderson fired five of the station's top 11 student staff members for not complying with orders concerning the format change. He said he did not think the station could run effectively until those positions were filled.
"It was a drastic move, but it needs to be a drastic move," said Anderson. "The students refuse to recognize the management and the administration's decision for a format change."
The dispute between Anderson, who is paid by the university, and the student staff members is over Anderson's announcement of the new format, effective June 1. The current format is a mixture of rhythm and blues, jazz and urban contemporary music selected by student staff members.
Four SU security officers accompanied Anderson into the WAER studio yesterday afternoon when he announced the shutdown. Staff members left peacefully.
Some students believe jazz will not be a successful format.
Dick Lindsay, a news and sportscaster and four-year WAER member, said jazz programming has not been successful in the Syracuse area.
"So what if we're not doing well in the ratings book?" Lindsay asked. "You can have a professional station without having high ratings."
Anderson said the station's programming currently does not meet the needs of the community and that more news, particularly in the morning, would serve the community better. He said that at any given time about 1,000 people are listening to the station.
Anderson said he had asked the senior staff members to meet with him individually by yesterday to discuss the new format. Thursday he told them that if they did not meet with him individually he would fire them for not cooperating with WAER's management in its attempt to implement the new format.
Anderson said that four senior staff members met with him and said they would accept the new format, two were out of town and said they would meet with him next week and five refused to meet. He fired the five who refused to meet.
Joel Thierstein, program director, said he had met with Anderson before and had been abused verbally. Thierstein said that the other staff members were afraid of similar treatment and did not want to meet with Anderson. Yesterday, Thierstein sent Anderson a memo stating why he and the other staff members would not meet with him. Anderson said he did not receive that memo until 45 minutes after the station had been shut down.
"I do not think Joel spoke for the whole senior staff," Anderson said. "Harassment is not my style. But if they feel intimidated by me, I'm sorry, but it's still their responsibility to meet with me."
The five who were fired were Thierstein news director Matt Silverman, production director David Levin; promotions director David Stevenson; and music director Glenn Kesner.
Anderson, who said the university administration supports him "totally," said he does not intend to negotiate with the fired staff members but that they can reapply for their positions.
This is not the first time the station has been shut down. An August 1981 power struggle between student employees and university administration resulted in the station manager Thomas Hardy's firing of two students and a 20-minute station shut down.
In September 1982 student engineers and disc jockeys were locked out of the studio and the station was off the air for four hours in a dispute with then-acting station manager Ronald Harig. That dispute centered on whether student engineers should be paid.
Anderson became station manager last September. In an interview at that time he said that part of the reason he was coming to Syracuse was that he was good at solving problems.
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Last Modified October 14, 2005 |