KOIT FM, the station you may recognize for wall-to-wall holiday music, mellifluous canned DJ voices, and the inimitable, irrefutable jingle, "Lite rock, less talk," is ready to speak truth to power.
So say allies at Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. (SAG-AFTRA), who are circulating a petition to support the station's 5-member bargaining unit as it negotiates a new contract with Philadelphia overlord, Entercom Communications.
Since Entercom took over in 2007, KOIT staff say they've endured massive pay and severance cuts, personnel supplanted by computerized voice-tracking and pre-recorded programs, and union protections worn down. They've accused the company of eroding creativity and talent at the station, whose staff members embrace the old-fashioned ideal of terrestrial radio.
It turns out that even the skinny-vanilla-latte of FM stations saw itself as a portal to a broad community of listeners.
Entercom has long vied with three other radio kingpins (Clear Channel, Cumulus, and Citadel) for control of an ever-narrowing FM dial. It currently owns more than 100 stations nation-wide, with five clustered in the Bay Area -- two classic rock, one sports, and two adult contemporary.
Listeners amassed with pitchforks when the company bought R&B station KBLX three years ago, assuring that corporate ownership would dilute KBLX's well-hewn "quiet storm" brand identity. In fact, their arguments had merit: one of Entercom's first actions, after signing the deed, was to fire a long-standing morning show host and replace him with canned broadcasts from comedian Steve Harvey.
We have yet to receive comment from an Entercom spokesman. The company will hold its next mediation session with KOIT on May 20.
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