Idaho Radio News Etc.

Paul Harvey died today. He was 90.

USA Today has… the rest of the story.

The Idaho Press-Tribune has a great backstage look at Margo Vaughn’s battle with cancer.  The best news? She tells the paper that there are no signs of cancer right now — though she stops short of declaring her cancer in remission.

Despite that on-the-air cheeriness, Vaughn and her co-workers say it was a tough road:

“When the mic was off she would be sprawled out on the floor,” station program director KJ Mac said.

Business Manager

Peak Broadcasting is accepting resumes for the position of Business Manager in Boise, Idaho. This position will have overall financial responsibility for the Boise stations, with dual reporting responsibility to both the Executive Management in the local office, and to the CFO in the corporate office in Fresno, California.

Strong financial analytical skills are a must to effectively monitor spending history, sales trends and P&L issues.

The Business Manager will have overall responsibility for the market’s financial operations, including the Accounting and Traffic Departments. Responsibilities will include general ledger, accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll, and credit and collections; analysis of monthly financial statements; development of monthly forecasts and annual budgets

Strong Excel skills are mandatory, and a four-year accounting/business degree and/or prior broadcasting experience is preferred.

To apply, submit a resume, salary history and requirements by e-mail to:

kevin.godwin@peakbroadcasting.com

Kevin Godwin
827 E Park Blvd #201
Boise ID, 83712

Deadline for applying will be close of business on March 6th

Program Director/On-Air Personality

Program Director / On-Air Talent
KCIX (Mix 106) & KXLT (107.9 Lite FM)

Peak Broadcasting Boise is looking for a program director that lives AC, breaths personality, walks the Selector walk, and talks to the target. You will motivate and inspire a high rated, well liked morning show, keep the music of both stations perfectly targeted, become a creative spark to generate revenue in new and exciting ways, communicate with a target audience that expects personality more than liner cards, keep the web site updated and rich in content, and make our AC brands market leaders.

You will need a lot of experience, creativity, heart, passion, and intelligence. You must be a leader. You will need to live the lifestyle that the listeners do and be in front of them. We will give all the support you need. Underappreciated, outstanding professionals are encouraged to accept this challenge. No first time PD’s or a losing track record will be correct for this position. We will check references and previous accomplishments.

Deadline for applying is March 6th, 2009.

To apply, submit your resume, demo, & salary history to:
General Manager
Peak Broadcasting
827 E. Park Blvd. Suite 201
Boise, ID 83712

Or, send you resume, demo, salary history to:
kevin.godwin@peakbroadcasting.com

Both Peak Broadcasting and Citadel Communications announced they would slice paychecks for employees this month.  PB said it would pull 10% from all non-sales employees, while Citadel Boise asked for a 5% slice.

Peak and Citadel are doing what they think the must to survive, and clearly taking money from employees pockets is not an action taken lightly. However there’s a unique wrinkle here: the presence of personal service contracts.  Employees – especially on-air talent – are asked to sign these agreements.

The bargain is simple: you sign a piece of paper guaranteeing you compenstation and a series of raises, and in exchange you promise not to work for a defined set of competitors. In some cases it is just the local market area, but in others it can apply to larger geographic areas or markets by rank (i.e. you can’t work for stations in anything smaller than market 50, for example).

Employers like this deal because it legally binds you from going to work across the street (disclosure: I am employed under a PSC).  Employees don’t generally have a ton of choice in the matter since this is generally a requirement of employment — but they do provide some stability and a guaranteed raise each year.

Multiple source tell me that in Peak’s case, the company is requiring the contracted employees to take the cut.  They have been told they must sign a document agreeing to the pay cut.  However, it’s the other half of the deal that is at best problematic.  Employees tell Idaho Radio News that they have been told if they did not sign the agreement, they are subject to immediate termination without cause.

Those employees have a contract – a piece of paper that guarantees them a job. Peak is telling employees that they must sign the pay cut addendum or be terminated.  Experts I’ve talked to indicate this could be tricky for PB if an employee chose to challenge the tactic. A check of court filings shows no current lawsuits by employees against the company.

Yahoo HotJobs has some excellent advice:

If you have an employment contract, you may be able to refuse the cut altogether or at least quit and collect unemployment, but only if the contract states terms of compensation and says that your employer cannot alter the terms without your consent. The pay cut could constitute a breach of contract and an attorney can help you negotiate the terms of your release or fight for your full pay.

Another avenue is to contact your local unemployment office.  IRN regular Jim Smith has offered to talk to anyone with questions – wheter it is from Peak, Citadel or elsewhere in the state. Call your any Job Service office statewide and punch in extension 3283.

Comments have been moved to the Disqus platform. You can now log-in and create and account – which gives you the ability to rate comments, create avatars and more. Also – you can even use your Facebook account as your log-in (it’s part of their Facebook Connect platform – and neither I nor Disqus have access to your data).

More on this soon

UPDATE: It’s not working to my liking yet – so the old system is back for now.

KSAS/103.3 Kiss FM program director Keke Luv stayed awake for 175 hours plus last year to kick off the spring book (and raise awareness for child abuse prevention).

In a video posted to the Kiss website, Keke was asked what he would do next year to top it. He said (while riding in an ambulance) that he didn’t know… it wouldn’t be staying awake again – but it would be big.

Big indeed.

Somehow… some way, Keke is set to run seven marathons in seven days.  The details beyond that are sketchy — but since there really aren’t seven sanctioned marathons a week around here – I would surmise he’ll run 26.2 miles each day.  By the way – that’s enough to run from Boise to Donnelly… and back.

In the past few days… I’ve heard pretty much every station in town giving away Rascal Flatts tickets… KIZN, KQFC, KAWO, KZMG, KSAS, KCIX, KXLT… yeesh. Talk about crossover.

President Barack Obama hasn’t had a traditional sit-down interview with the New York Times yet – but he was heard on a Boise morning show last week.

Eddie Piolin, host of El Piolín por la manana had the exclusive chat with Obama last week. The syndicated host is heard locally on KPDA/La Poderosa 100.7.

KZMG/Magic 93.1 morning host Melissa Dawn has left Citadel.  She came to the group from KXLT/107.9 Lite FM and anchored news for KBOI for the better part of a year. After Citadel parted ways with Dan Tooker, Dawn moved over to Magic and was paired with Matt Johnson.

Melissa’s departure was penciled out before today’s pay cut was announced.

On the heels of Peak Broadcasting’s mandatory, across-the-board pay cut for non-sales employees comes a similar move at Citadel Boise.  Employees were informed formally of the cut today – and are being asked to sign addendums to their employment agreements (where applicable).

KCIX/ Mix 106 program director Brent Carrey and APD Lucas are leaving Peak Broadcasting.

The news comes less than a week after managers told staff they will be taking a 10% pay cut.

Carrey was also PD for Lite FM, which is now left without any jocks, a live morning show, an MD, or a PD.

KBCI’s Kiersten Throndsen reports that the Idaho Statesman will likely be cutting more jobs.

In a 10pm story, Throndsen called Statesman managing editor Vicki Gowler and put the results on TV.

Throndsen: Can you at least tell me, are layoffs going to have to potentially have to happen again?

(long pause)

Gowler: Eeeee…. ummmm… layoffs potentially will have to happen.

Bad news for the good people who work at the paper.

Journal Communications saw revenue fall in the fourth quarter of 08 — down 9%.  The company lost a stunning $223 million – which compares with a profit of $9.5 in the same quarter of 2007.

Publishing – down 10% (to $60 million)

Radio – down 7.7% (to $19.7 million)

TV – down 5.5% (to $33.4 million, despite an extra $6 million in political revenue)

“The overall economic environment and continued deterioration of advertising expenditures in Journal markets impacted our business in the fourth quarter causing lower revenue across all segments,” said CEO Steven Smith. “Fourth quarter total publishing revenue was off just over 10% and total broadcast revenue was off just over 6%. Overall Journal Communications revenue decreased 9.0% in the quarter and 6.5% in 2008. To date in the first quarter, we continue to see revenue declines across all of our businesses,” he added.

The Idaho Daily Statesman’s BSU basketball beat writer wrote a story about how airing the games on the 24/7 channel hurts attendance.  Then the same night the team notched a season-high crowd of 7,000+ fans. The game was on TV.

ANALYSIS

I’ve mentioned this to several people privately in recent months – and even ran a poll at the beginning of the year that foreshadowed my thinking – but Peak Broadcasting is facing a serious challenge this year. Now another round of cuts at the group have brought the issue front and center.

Peak Broadcasting

In 2007 a group of former Citadel executives purchased two radio clusters.  One from CBS Radio in Fresno, and one from Clear Channel Communications in Boise. The company forked over $90 million to buy the Fresno stations, and although the price for the Boise cluster was not disclosed, filings indicate it was in the $25 million range.

If you think that those Citadel execs -  Todd Lawley, Kevin Godwin, Tim Lyons and the crew – had $115 million in their pockets – you’re crazy.  Instead the group purchased the stations by taking out a loan or series of loans.

One of those was a cash infusion from GE Capital of nearly $70 million – expressly for the Fresno cluster purchase. The deal was announced in April 2007 – right after Peak closed the deal on the Boise stations.

“(GE)’s knowledge and experience in the broadcasting space is unrivaled, and their financing guidance allowed us to move forward with ease and to focus on transitioning our quality programming, customer-based advertising solutions and new media innovations to the Fresno market,” Lawley said at the time.

GE was excited too. A GE VP said this of the deconsoldation that allowed Peak to spring up: “This trend provides opportunity for new industry players to break out into new markets and expand programming to reach new audiences.”

Peak is also backed by DAG PE – a private firm that has an equity position in the company in exchange for cash.

Now that the economy has cratered and advertising receipts have dramatically fallen – Peak faces a challenge far different from that of Citadel or Journal (and in a different way, Impact).  PB has to service the extensive debt by making payments of some frequency to GE Capital.

It isn’t much different than buying a house: you sign an agreement and say you’ll make payments on the principle plus interest.  If you lose your job or take a pay cut or something else catostrophic happens – you still have to find a way to make that payment – or you go into default… and eventually get booted out of the house.

When things were great and all the PB stations in Fresno and Boise were generating tons of cash, servicing debt wasn’t really an issue.  Now – when the stations aren’t – Peak’s highly leveraged nature is an achilles heel.

No one knows where Peak is in relationship to its debt payments. In all likelihood it is fine right now. But the series of recent moves show that it could be struggling to service the debt: layoffs, PT cutbacks, more layoffs and now a 10% pay cut for staff.

Todd Lawley, courtesy R&R

“It’s hard because we’re still the market leaders, and everyone is working really hard,” Lawley told the Fresno Bee. “But, when faced with everybody taking a nominal pay cut versus us letting go several people, I think it’s a pretty easy decision that we can do that. I’m tired of seeing people become unemployed in this town.”

Lawley is right: most people would say that a company-wide pay cut is better than people out on the street without a job.  Peak has 75 people in Fresno and a similar number here.  Ten percent of that would be 15 people looking for work across the two clusters – not an insignificant number.

But calling ten percent a nominal pay cut is at very least insensitive.  If an employee is making $25,000 per year – that’s $2,500 that they lose.  After taxes that would be about $72 per paycheck – the equivalent of a power bill or even a trip to WinCo.  It certainly isn’t nominal.

Journal and Citadel have a similar challenge – but it isn’t as all-or-nothing dire as it is for Peak. If JBG or CDL can’t service their debt payments, they have lots of assets they can attempt to sell because they operate in lots of markets and have economy of scale.

Impact is privately funded by Wendell Stark – which is why the company has been able to beef up in the face of this economic blizzard we’re all facing.

Back to the house example: it’s like Peak owns one house.  They can clamp down on expenses by turning down the heat and laying off the maid and can stop watering the lawn to save money and pay the mortgage.  Journal and Citadel own a whole neighborhood of houses: they can sell a few and still operate.  (And Impact owns its own dang house and doesn’t have to pay a mortgage to anyone. )

First layoffs – then a severe cutback in part-timer hours — now Peak Broadcasting has taken another measure to stem the tide of a weak economy: non-sales employees will take a 10% pay cut.

Before you go “why not sales?” try to remember that those employees are all on commission to varying degrees – meaning they’re probably taking home less money these days anyway.

I’ve got more ratings stuff to write about (I hear your e-mails…).  There’s some obvious storylines that I’ll get too including more on KTIK – KAWO’s drop – and a look at AM leaders.

I’m a little obsessed with Twitter right now… and I don’t even have an account.  At least on a personal level… but I run @ktvb.  I’ve noticed a few local stations are also now on the service – including @580KIDO and @1071KHITS.

Others? Comment away…

Citadel and Peak continue to battle it out for the top spot in the market – with Citadel raking in a total of 27 share points 12+ in the book – or an average of a 4.5 share per station.

Peak notched a 24.9 share or 4.15 per station.

Journal continues to fade, with an 18.9 total – or 3.15 share per station.

Impact is still far back in the pack with a 7.6 total, which averages out to 1.9 share points per stations..

From spring, Peak, Citadel and Journal all lost ground. Impact gained – increase from a 5.2 to a 7.6.  However, they also have one more frequency in the market – but they also lifted KTMB from a 0 to KPDA’s 1.9

KKGL/96.9 The Eagle had an incredible, off-the-charts great spring 2008 book.  With the change of seasons, the Eagle went into hiding.  The station fell dramatically in all demos – including in P18-49, P25-54 and M25-54.

The Eagle isn’t alone however — KJOT/J-105 also fell to new lows in those same demographics.

And the “other” rocker – KSRV/96.1 Bob FM also saw some deflation – falling all those demos from spring, though it now soundly beats KJOT in most combinations.

KZMG/Magic 93.1 seems to be stable once again. The station’s abysmal morning ratings in the spring of 2008 seem to be rising again – and the Melissa and MJ pairing seems to be stronger than the show formerly in its place.

Update: Seems that people with access to monthlies say they show a different story…

1T – KIDO (up more than 2 points from fall 07)
1T – KIZN (down from fall 07)
1T – KSAS (up from fall 07)
2T – KQXR
2T – KTIK

A couple of interesting notes here – there’s a three way tie at the top, with KIDO seeing a big number, likely partially fueled by BSU football – though the station’s last book with Rush Limbaugh drew a very large share.  Some salce for KIDO: Glenn Beck outrated even Rush.  KSAS shows continued strong results – though the station was down a bit from spring. Lucky has a double-digit share at night, and Keke Luv’s afternoon show grew as well  KIZN is still strong despite falling from last year and last spring.

KQXR saw an improvement though it’s still well of the spring 2007 numbers.  The big surprise is KTIK – which saw very very strong numbers – especially in the afternoon, home to Idaho Sports Talk with Caves and Prater.

Idaho Statesman photographer/reporter Joe Jaszewski takes a look at Boise’s newest radio station – KWYD/Wild 101 – for a story in today’s business section.  Read the piece here.

Analysis later. Got demos or more? E-mail them here – anonymity guaranteed.

KIDO-AM  7.8
KSAS-FM 5.6
KBOI-AM  5.4
KIZN-FM 5.4
KTHI-FM 5.1
KQFC-FM  4.7
KXLT-FM 4.5
KTIK-AM 4.1
KCIX-FM 3.9
KQXR-FM 3.9
KKGL-FM 3.7
KZMG-FM 3.7
KSRV-FM 2.9
KRVB-FM 2.7
KAWO-FM 2.1
KJOT-FM 2.1
KPDA-FM 1.9
KQLZ-FM 1.8
KDBI-FM 1.6
KCID-AM 1.2
KQTA-FM 1.2
KWYD-FM 1.0
KGEM-AM 0.8
KWEI-FM 0.8
KFXD-AM 0.6