Over the holidays Tampa's community radio station, WMNF 88.5 FM, announced some major programming changes beginning early in the new year — actually in just a few days.
(And let me say right at the top that I will be part of this new scheduling change. More on that later in this post).
Troubled by declining revenue from the station's fundraising drives over the past three years, and concerned about NPR affiliate WUSF switching to an all news & information daytime schedule, WMNF's Program Director Randy Wynne unveiled a schedule a week and a half ago that reveals that the station's news and public affairs programs will no longer air during the 10 a.m. -2 p.m. slot as has been the case for years, but instead will air in the morning and afternoon drive-time slots.
Based on public comments on the station's website, many listeners are upset that the station will no longer air Fresh Air. Since September, the station had continued to air it at 10 a.m., as it has for years, a day after the program came down off the satellite. The delay had never been a significant factor, but became one when WUSF began airing the program for the first time a day before, at noon and 7 p.m.
The changes at 'MNF mean that after the station's morning music programming ends at 9 a.m., two of the station's most popular programs will move up three hours on the daily schedule. Amy Goodman's Democracy Now!, will now air at 9 a.m, followed by another listener favorite, Rob Lorei's Radioactivity talk-show call in program, now at 10 a.m.
A variety of public affairs programs will continue to air at 11 a.m. (including Duncan Strauss' Talking Animals, which is getting extended to an hour every Wednesday). Music then runs from 12 noon to 3 p.m.. At 3 p.m., five different program will air each day of the week, including music/talk hybrids like Franco Silva's Latino 54 and The Women's Show (which moves from its two-hour slot on Saturday mornings to one hour a week on Thursdays).
The WMNF Evening News will now air in the afternoon, and in a somewhat different format than the one that has aired for nearly eight years. The program moves from 6 p.m. to 4 p.m. and will air for only half an hour, with Free Speech Radio News then running in its entirety at 4:30.
At 5 p.m. the station will hold another hour of talk radio, with a rotating list of hosts, including myself. I served as a news reporter and anchor at the station from 2000-2009, and will be returning to the airwaves once a week to host a program on local/state/national politics on Thursday afternoons. This won't change my role at CL. I'll continue as News & Politics Editor here, and I hope occasionally to use my hour on WMNF to do on-air interviews and commentary that will augment stories I'm covering for CL.
Music then begins at 6 p.m. and runs for 15 hours straight until Democracy Now! begins the next weekday morning at 9 a.m.
Obviously making such changes can be a traumatic event for some listeners, particularly for fans of the station's afternoon Sonic Detour programs, which will no longer exist (as evidenced by some of the comments on the station's website).
Listed below is the new schedule, as written on the website:
