[Rfu-station] Re: [RFU] Station manager questions

[Mike Lehman]

Andrew,
I was meaning to get to that tonight, but I appreciate the reminder 
nonetheless.

For starts, a job announcement that went out recently via one of the 
Prometheus lists for the Pacifica station in Los Angeles, KPFK, is a 
good basic description of what a non-commercial station looks for when 
hiring a station manager. Of course, WRFU can't offer full benefits and 
$65k/year, but read it over for a good general idea of what we hope RFU 
can get on the cheap...

 >>>> KPFK job description for station manager
The General Manager is responsible and accountable for overall 
administration, personnel, programming, financing, technical operations 
and public relations of the station. Working collaboratively with the 
Local Station Board (LSB), the station staff, and the community, the 
General Manager is responsible for monitoring and guiding the station.

*QUALIFICATIONS:*

Education: College degree or at least 6 years equivalent experience.
Experience: Experience in broadcasting, and/or in a non-profit or 
community organization supervising employees and/or volunteers, desirable.
Skills and Abilities:  Emphasis on communication skills (written and 
oral); management skills (e.g., planning, motivating, organizing, 
innovating, etc.); and industry skills (programming, marketing, 
fundraising, etc.)  Ability to work with diverse communities. Must be 
detail oriented. Requires good judgment. Ability to think clearly and 
manage multiple changing priorities. Requires critical thinking, 
commitment to work collaboratively, and ability to advise and support 
coworkers facing difficult challenges.
 >>>>>

Interestingly, they don't mention the FCC at all. But for WRFU, since we 
have no chief engineer or office staff, the SM must be able to keep 
current on, interpret, and apply FCC policy at WRFU to the best of their 
ability, as well as navigate the often clunky but now required 
interaction with the FCC's online license-holder database in order to 
keep our paperwork up to date, including license renewal in a few years 
when that is needed.

There are two other organizations you also need to interact with, 
Socialist Forum, which holds the license, and UC IMC, of which RFU is a 
working group of and which houses the station, studio, and transmitter.

I confirmed last weekend with SF that they are still interested in 
passing along the license to UC IMC once the FCC announces the transfer 
protocol they intend to use for LPFM licenses. My comrades in SF don't 
need much hand holding, but their names are on the dotted line as 
responsible for the proper operation of WRFU in accordance with FCC 
rules and to avoid situations that could result in legal liability for 
the station. It was for these reasons that I often asked people to 
rethink something they proposed, because everything that any individual 
or programming group does on RFU affects not only them and the station, 
but other people who've been willing to put their names on the dotted 
line to make it possible for virtually anyone to walk in and rather 
easily go on the air at WRFU.

RFU more frequently and closely interacts with UC IMC, since the station 
itself is part of the IMC's working group structure. UC IMC also owns 
all of the station equipment, including the transmitter and tower. The 
consensus agreement that put WRFU on the air set this up, with SF 
contributing the vital FCC license as its part of the deal and the IMC 
agreeing to host RFU without rent, but with regular payments to cover 
the overhead costs of hosting the station, studio and tower, along with 
actually owning the equipment. Should the station ever shut down due to 
losing its license or the volunteers making up the working group losing 
interest, UC IMC can dispose of the equipment by selling or donating it 
to support other Indymedia operations, either in town or around the world.

It would be especially helpful for the station for the new permanent SM 
to be able to devote their attention primarily to developing the station 
and its volunteer infrastructure. This is one reason why Dan is 
currently listing himself as interim SM, because he already has a lot of 
other responsibilities. But we'll struggle through, no matter what.

However, the fact that the SM still remains burdened with so many tasks 
that the members should be doing has been my greatest disappointment and 
failure as the first SM. I cannot list all those I am in debt to for 
giving of their time, efforts and resources to put and keep WRFU on the 
air. Most members don't know of the debt we are in to so many in the 
community for supporting WRFU.

It is the SM's responsibility to both make sure essential station 
functions are maintained and to facilitate and encourage the members to 
do as much of that as possible. There are many members who I don't know 
or I never see at any RFU meetings. We only require that any individual 
member show up for a meeting once every two months. But far too often, I 
find that I was the one calling meetings making suggestions or doing the 
work. The station manager has the ultimate authority in an emergency to 
take any action needed to preserve the station or its license, including 
but not limited to taking shows off the air, prohibiting members from 
broadcasting, and securing the studio and station equipment. Normally, 
these functions are left to the members operating through consensus, but 
the SM always retains these powers for use in an emergency.

Just to be clear in case it isn't by now to every member, but I always 
did my best to encourage each and every member to get involved, take 
responsibility for some task, no matter how small, and find their own 
voice to take on the air to serve the community. My failure to get more 
of our members active in station business was less than what I wanted to 
acheive. I always did what I thought was best for the station and the 
community. No doubt, there have been times when I fell short and this 
has been, as I already mentioned, my greatest disappointment.

What all members need to keep in mind is that the station isn't half of 
what it could have been by now. We absolutely need to complete the 
fundraising for the permanent tower, get the paperwork done to allow us 
to put it up, and then follow through so that everyone in C-U can hear 
us, along with many others in Champaign County. This is the primary goal 
that the next SM must focus on or the station will eventually fail. But 
there are many other things that can be done to improve the station that 
will only get as far as how much the members support the SM.

As I've documented above, the new SM has a very full plate. Like me, 
they are responsible to the FCC,SF, and UC IMC for everything that 
happens at the station, yet they only have YOU, the members, to make 
that happen. The new SM will either succeed or fail just like I have, by 
their ability to mobilize, motivate, and grow the membership both 
quantitatively and qualitatively.

I would be glad to answer questions that any member might have about the 
station manager position. I will be available to support and advise the 
next and future station managers. But I will no longer be making 
decisions when the membership can't or won't. That will be up to the 
station managers that follow me.

Every member should consider whether they could be the new SM. If 
nothing else, every member should try to attend the next station meeting 
on Tuesday, Feb. 5 at 8pm at UC IMC to decide where to go from here. In 
the end, the SM can do their best, but our successes and failures depend 
entirely on our membership and the support they can give the next and 
future station managers.
Mike Lehman

Andrew Ó Baoill wrote:
> At our meeting last week we decided to appoint a new station manager 
> at our next meeting. Interested members were asked to contact the list 
> to express interest.
>
> One thing that would help with the process would be if we could see a 
> list of the duties of the station manager. We know the station manager 
> is the primary contact point for communication with the FCC. I 
> understand that the SM is also meant to have some responsibility 
> regarding ensuring we abide by FCC regulations, such as on 
> obscenity/indecency, logging, technical specifications. Is there 
> anything else?
>
> Andrew
> -- 
> Andrew Ó Baoill
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> Inst. of Communications Research, U. of Illinois
> Communications / Participatory media / Political action
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> andrew at funferal.org / baoillo at uiuc.edu
> aim: funferal at mac.com
> +353-87-241-7003 / +1-(217) 384-3142
> http://funferal.org / Galway, Ireland / Urbana, IL, USA
>
>
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