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Public Comments
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I've lived in Cleveland for right around 8 years now, and I have always told people one of my top three favorite thigns here is our great local college radio stations and ;eading the way for almost 50 years has been WCSB. Any hour of the day there was something intersteing to hear, including many genres of music, movie scores, and even some world music. Additionally, WCSB was incredibily important to our local music scene. It gave increased access and promotion for many of our local bands and musicians, while also hosting some great events that really brought the community together.
The switch to a pre-programmed 24/7 jazz station is such a shame. Even though they may have some "paid internship" opportunities for CSU sturdents, the real world and diversese experience WCSB brought can never be reaplaced.
I don't know what caused this transfer to happen, but I feel like there was some behind the scenes dealings that we are owed and explanation for. The president of ideastream and CSU both are non-Clevlanders, and I feel like this new "partnership" is just a big checkmark for both their resumes when they no doubt lease Cleveland in the near future for "bigger opporrtunites," leaving the our city and our music scene worse off.
SHAME on CSU and SHAME on Ideastream. Nobody asked to kick one of the best student led stations off the dial. And it was really dirty to do it on World College Radio Day. Ideastream was given reign over one of the last vestiges of creativity, diversity, cultural enrichment that CSU offered and has painted it landlord gray. We don't need more monochrome radio. This smacks of an initiative to squash voices of dissent that may be speaking on particular current issues and appease wealthy donors.
This was one of three radio stations I actually liked. I can't stand commercial radio and after working in sheet metal, developed a loathing for the same 50 classic rock songs played ad nauseum. I told friends and coworkers about 89.3. I can't even stand NPR stations anymore since entities allegedly dedicated to cultural enrichment keep becoming tools for political propaganda and homogeneity. I listened to hundreds of hours of 89.3 while driving routes for work. I recorded bits of music to look up later if i didn't catch the name of the artist. I loved the Halloween themed programs. I could hear new but obscure music and vintage obscure music. These stations make listeners aware of local artists and promote under represented local cultural events. The students who ran the station gained far more practical experience than they would through internships and a very different skill set for solving problems live instead of making pre-recorded content.
Smooth jazz is a dilution of everything that influenced jazz in the first place. It's the musical equivalent of office wallpaper. CSU has been trying to sanitize its image for a while, ridding the place of any programs geared toward women and cultural diversity, and this is yet another step in that direction. We do not need more on-hold music on the radio.
Intervention is desperately needed. The students are getting a big education throughout this debacle. They have been repeatedly told that this was a Win-Win - but their autonomy was ignored and sacrificied. Please stand up for them, and prove to them that they matter. These young people have answers to questions that we don't even yet know how to ask.
Kevin Martin publically stated in the recent City Club forum "I would not put myself in the place to make judgments about what is important in terms of the values and the priorities of Cleveland State University. That is not what I do, and that's not what public media does," This was a bit disgraceful to hear, since educational opportunites were promised by Ideastream in this deal, and public media touts education as essential to their values! Mr. Martin also denigrated the value of clubs in having professional value... while sitting at The City Club! Is that cruel irony?
I work with CSU students, both as an instructor, and as a member of WCSB. They have intelligence, grit, and love for arts, and politics, and community. How I've seen them dismissed in this deal is a full tragedy.
Thank you for being involved!
When I woke up Friday morning on October 3 to being locked out of the radio station, I felt like a best friend had just kicked me out of their life without warning. I had no idea the community of my hometown would rally behind this cause as much as I can recall since Art took my Browns. For this I am grateful and I hope both my current outgoing councilman can see that before taking his leave to work to sell other city councils on AI surveillance technology.
Alex Howe
Formerly of Good Morning Metal on WCSB
The Germans, largest ethnic community in Cleveland just lost its only native language public radio program.
The familiar Sunday sounds of German melodies from the Cleveland German Radio Program (CGRS) at WCSB 89.3 FM at Cleveland State University, hosted by Ambassador Renate and David, gave way to the bland elevator music as Ideastream Public Media’s JazzNEO took control of the stations programming.
In an instant, on national College Radio Day, nearly 50 years of student- and community-run programming—not to mention ethnic broadcast legacy—vanished from Cleveland’s airwaves.
For half a century, the old WCSB (now going by “XCSB” as it remains in limbo/transition) had been more than a student organization. It was a independent radio hub, a beacon of Cleveland’s community - a place where punk sat beside jazz, talk shows mingled with esoteric late-night programs and under served ethnic voices. "Preserving the Past and Promoting the Future" as Ambassador Renate, the German Voice of Cleveland stated uncountable times on the CGRS.
WCSB promoted itself on the Cleveland German Radio Show (CGRS) as the "...Station with all the Nations". Ethnic Programs for the German, Polish, Hungarian, Arabic, Slovenian and Latin and many more had an audiences and culture flourished. Immigrants, Students, artists and outsiders found a home here where expression and opinion aired in their own language.
And now, without warning, it was all gone.
As shocking as it feels locally, what happened to WCSB fits a national trend: slow absorption of college radio stations by public/NPR affiliates.
CSU is the third American university in the last month-plus to remove students from their own station. Cleveland State University and Ideastream silenced independent ethnic voices by abruptly seizing control of WCSB’s student-run radio station — a move that columnist Leslie Kouba sees as part of a growing and troubling trend of suppressing free speech in America.
Public media relies on listener trust. Alienating those listeners can lead to donor defections, negative press and lasting reputational harm—or all of the above, something CSU and Ideastream are now confronting in real-time.
Peace Friends,
David and Ambassador Renate Jakupca
Cleveland German Radio Show (CGRS)
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/17EmyhMZwL/