Public radio station KHNS saw an increase in income in the last fiscal year and topped it off with a record-breaking membership drive, staffers told members at the station’s annual membership meeting Friday.

Income from July 2010 through June 2011 totaled more than $450,000, up from last year’s $377,000. The figure doesn’t include the $70,000 brought in from July’s membership drive, up from last year’s $40,000.

KHNS general manager Kay Clements reported on an upgrade to broadcast equipment currently under way and additions to staff, including a Skagway-based reporter position she said would be filled soon.

She said the station would like to hire a resident who can assist with station engineering. KHNS now pays an engineer living in Talkeetna to visit periodically.

Program director Amelia Nash said she’s considering an all-talk format between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m., and other changes to 8 p.m. and late night time slots. Nash said any changes would take place starting in mid-November.

The annual membership meeting was the third consecutive one to fall short of a quorum, as defined by the station’s bylaws. Russ Bowman, chair of the board of directors that oversees the station, said a quorum was not necessary for the membership meeting because no official business was taking place.

Former station manager John Hedrick questioned that assertion. In the corporation’s by-laws, last amended in April, a quorum for the annual membership meeting is defined: “Ten percent of the voting members of the Corporation attending in person or by teleconference shall constitute a quorum at a meeting of the membership.”

About 46 members attended either in person or telephonically from Skagway, shy of 70 needed for a quorum as defined by the by-laws.

After the meeting, board member Russ Lyman also said the bylaws do not require a quorum of the membership for an annual meeting. He said no official business was conducted because the election results were only counted, not certified, at the meeting.

Certification is set for the next regular board meeting, along with election of board officers.

“We did not have a quorum,” he said. “But the membership meeting is mostly to update members and let them know what’s going on. We’d like to (have a quorum) but most of the time in the last few years it’s never happened.”

Lyman said he didn’t know why “quorum” for the annual membership meeting was defined in the by-laws if a quorum wasn’t required for the annual meeting to be conducted.

Haines residents Judy Erekson and Mike Case were elected to the board. After the meeting, board member Rita Brouillette submitted her resignation, leaving another seat open on the board. The board will address that vacancy at an upcoming meeting, Clements said.