Public radio station KHNS will employ a second, full-time reporter starting Nov. 3, staff reported at the station’s annual membership meeting Sept. 26.
The job will be based in Haines but will allow the station to devote more time to covering Skagway, news director Margaret Friedenauer told the crowd. The position also is aimed at providing more coverage of local arts and culture, she said.
Emily Files, a part-time reporter at KRBD in Ketchikan, will take the new job here, she said.
Station manager Kay Clements said in an interview after the meeting that a survey in the spring made it clear that listeners ranked local programming at the top of what they liked about the station, and what they’d like to hear more of. “It was clear that local news was really important, and that anything we could do to enhance that would be of value to our listeners.”
The station employed two reporters – including a full-time Skagway reporter – during the 1980s but eliminated the Skagway job after its budget shrank. KHNS also has used a second, part-time reporter intermittently. Station officials have previously expressed interest in increasing news staff, but cited limited funds.
Clements said funding the second reporter position came by a restructuring of station staff, including reducing hours of a development director position and by soliciting funding for another news position.
The hire will allow the station to have either Files or Friedenauer live on the air between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m., starting in late November, Friedenauer said. A morning host would provide a “local voice” in the morning and allow the public to get information like road conditions on the airwaves at that time.
Friedenauer said she would hope to also resume nightly local newscasts on a daily basis. Currently, local news airs Monday through Thursday. She also said the Saturday magazine “Lynn Canal Weekend” would be hosted out of Skagway in the coming year.
A profit and loss statement for July 2013 through June 2014 provided by manager Clements showed station income at $398,000 and expenses at $417,491. Station income included $283,000 in grants, $39,399 in memberships and donations, and $37,263 in underwriting. The station also raised $20,200 in special events.
Grants received by the station included $20,000 from the Rasmuson Foundation for equipment upgrades such as a digital telephone interface; $4,500 from the Alaska Community Foundation for business planning and money from the Douglas-Dornan Foundation for archiving certain historic, live-hosted programs by transferring shows from reel-to-reel tape to digital records.
Station expenses included payroll ($238,222), programming ($47,246), utilities ($37,497), professional service ($27,445), and information technology ($18,376).
Also at the meeting, Heather Lende, Judy Erekson and Maria Pointer were elected to the station’s board of directors. Other directors include Tekla Helgason and Deb Potter of Skagway and Eric Kocher, Diane Sly, Mike Case and Jeff Bochart of Haines. Bochart is president of Lynn Canal Broadcasting, Inc.