Listeners gave WFCR such an earful when it canceled four niche programs in January that the University of Massachusetts-based public radio station next-to-immediately restored one of the programs, 'Tertulia,' albeit for fewer hours a week.
But that isn't the half of it.
Four months later, activists are waging offensives on two separate fronts to bring changes to WFCR, one of which could involve Congress.
Town meetings in Pelham and Shutesbury have both endorsed petition articles asking the station at 88.5 FM to create a citizens advisory board, an issue Amherst Town Meeting, no stranger to bold initiatives and heated debate, takes up tonight.
At stake is the very independence of the media, said Martin Miller, general manager of WFCR.
'Should a political body address the content or editorial decisions of ANY media outlet?' he asks in a letter to Amherst Town Meeting members. 'The First Amendment protects the freedom and independence of the media, whether private or public.'
Its critics say the station is out of touch with listeners and lacks transparency. Western Massachusetts is a folk music center of the country, they say. WFCR doesn't seem to recognize that, or it wouldn't have canceled the 22-year-old program 'Valley Folk.'
The nationally syndicated programs 'The Thistle and Shamrock,' an Irish music show, and 'Afropop Worldwide' were also canceled along with the locally produced 'Tertulia,' which features Latino music and is back on the air.
Budgetary considerations were the main reasons for the changes, Martin said. WFCR is seeking to hire a Spanish-English reporter to open a window into Spanish-speaking neighborhoods that aren't well represented on air now. Demographics are changing, Martin said, and the station can't afford to do everything. 'As my parents used to say, money doesn't grow on trees. You have to get it from somewhere.'
Seen from another perspective, the cancellations amount to a 'folk massacre,' which is how Roger Conant, of Pelham, described the loss of 'Valley Folk' in an email to friends in January.
'Valley Folk' host Susan Forbes Hansen had kept listeners apprised of folk music performances all over the Valley and beyond. When musicians were going to be in the area, she would play their music in advance.
As an illustration of how listeners have taken it on the chin, according to Amherst folk musician Paul Kaplan, was when Emily Harris, formerly of Sweet Honey in the Rock, was to appear at Pioneer Arts Center of Easthampton but got sick and couldn't come. A call was put into WFCR during the afternoon classical music show asking that an announcement be made to alert ticket holders. The response, Kaplan said, was: 'This is a classical music program. Announcements like that are appropriate for 'Valley Folk,' and 'Valley Folk' no longer exists.'
Folk music enthusiasts mobilized after getting Conant's email. Some, including Conant and Kaplan, came up with the plan to bring petitions calling for a WFCR citizens advisory board to town meetings.
Others, such as Carolyn Toll Oppenheim, of Northampton, and the group Shays2: Western Mass. Committee on Corporations & Democracy, began to focus on a larger problem. They discovered that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting created guidelines for public media in 1978 requiring public TV and radio stations to have citizens advisory boards. The only problem: stations connected to state agencies and universities, as WFCR is, are exempt.
Oppenheim's group contacted U.S. Rep. John Olver, D-Amherst, who sent an inquiry to the Congressional Research Service to find out why.
'The point is, we want to get to the bottom of it,' Oppenheim said. 'It's not about Martin Miller. He can come and he can go. What we're doing basically is we want to draft a letter to all our state representatives and state senators and congresspersons and say there is something wrong in the law going back to 1978. It has to be corrected.'
Miller argues that WFCR's management is already advised by two volunteer organizations, the WFCR Foundation, a 17-member board formerly known as the Friends of WFCR, and the WFCR Advisory Committee. The first group is charged with providing financial support, among other duties. The second group, which includes three community members and a representative each from the five area colleges, 'advises the station manager on a variety of matters, including program changes,' Miller said.
Conant said the WFCR Advisory Committee isn't the kind of citizens advisory group that town meeting petitioners are seeking, as its involvement with the community is 'minimal or nonexistent.'
Oppenheim is planning to be at Amherst Town Meeting tonight, but the people she really wants to talk to are in Congress, since it could take an act of Congress to close the loophole exempting some stations, like WFCR, from having a citizens advisory committee.
'They unfortunately have the legal right not to talk to us,' Oppenheim said of WFCR. 'But that is an outrageous thing.'