Before moving to Sarasota, Joan McKniff lived in Paris, and before that Washington D.C. and New York City. Like many transplants from big cities, she says when she moved to West Central Florida, one of the things she had to adjust to was a dearth of interesting news and information programs on the radio.
To McKniff, National Public Radio had always meant “lots of interesting shows,” but for years she couldn’t hear any on the Tampa Bay radio NPR affiliate, WUSF. She ultimately purchased a laptop computer so she could listen to BBC and NPR. “I couldn’t get over the mostly music-only programs here,” she says. “Especially as there are so many ways to hear music.”
For McKniff and thousands of others in the Tampa Bay, the wait will soon be over.
This article appears in Aug 26 – Sep 1, 2010.