Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

EOB weighs future of radio station

Las Vegas radio station KCEP 88.1-FM is either ahead of its time -- and has been since its founding in 1973 -- or is an unusual footnote in the decades-old, federally backed "War on Poverty."

The station is owned by the Economic Opportunity Board, one of about 1,000 nonprofit organizations nationwide founded in the early 1960s under a federal act to fight poverty.

A spokeswoman of a national association representing those organizations says the group doesn't know of any other station-ownership arrangement like this.

Jean Childs, the new EOB executive director, suggested at a recent board meeting that selling the station for $5 million to $10 million would be a way to dig the organization out of the $2.3 million debt it had as of July when she took over.

Both the EOB -- the valley's largest nonprofit organization -- and KCEP -- a bottom-of-the-dial home for hip-hop, soul, gospel and 6 1/2 hours of talk shows a week -- are funded by taxpayers.

Selling the radio station to raise money for the organization is an idea that has been brought up at least twice in the last three years. But in spite of the financial boon to the organization that a sale of the station could provide, there has been no in-depth, public discussion about the station, what it achieves related to the organization's goal of reducing poverty, or whom it reaches.

As soon as Childs mentioned the idea of selling the station in the late July meeting, board member William Robinson, who is also a North Las Vegas councilman, said, "I wonder what the hues and cries of the community will be."

Board Chairman Claude Logan followed with, "We don't want to lose the voice of the community."

When asked a couple of weeks after the meeting about the board's reaction to the proposal, Chester Richardson, a former member of the board, said, "The image of it (KCEP) is mythical," saying that some of its supporters consider it an untouchable part of the community.

"But the perception and the reality are two different things."

Richardson, currently vice chairman of the Southern Nevada Workforce Investment Board, a group that decides how to spend federal and state funds for job training, said, "It's clear that less than 10 percent of the programming serves the mission of (the) EOB."

"Hip-hop and gospel are all good for the soul -- but it does little for empowerment of the poor," he said.

Lawrence Weekly -- board member of the EOB, Las Vegas city councilman and host of a Saturday morning show on the station called "Straight Talk" -- has a different take.

In the days following the meeting, when asked about how the station helps fulfill the EOB's mission, Weekly said: "Fighting poverty doesn't mean it's only 100 percent dealing with impoverished people."

Years of losses

KCEP, which entered the 2004 calendar year with a $227,824 debt itself -- according to that year's audit -- has been mentioned several times in recent years as an asset the EOB could get rid of, always in the context of lessening the nonprofit organization's financial burden.

During this period, the EOB has been the subject of two federal investigations, a state-ordered review, a loss of funding and constant turnover in its leadership. Financial mismanagement and faulty delivery of services to the poor have been cited in each of the investigations.

The radio station's most recent audit shows that the station, which cost nearly $1 million to run in 2004, finished that year earning $96,107. At the board meeting where selling the station was discussed, the profits were touted as a "first" for the station.

The same audit showed that $238,650 was paid back to the EOB during the year to cover a "cash advance" from the parent organization. However, the EOB receives specific federal grants for specific purposes, and federal guidelines generally prohibit moving money around from one program to another.

In fact, that same issue is what brought the attention of state and federal authorities in early 2004 -- $2.1 million went missing from a child care program, and board members later said it was used for other programs, though no detailed records indicating when, where and how the money was used were ever found.

The 2004 audit for the radio station also showed that the station received $178,468 in "unearned grant revenue." That amount is listed under liabilities, but not under cash entering the station's coffers, as it should be, which means the money must have been spent.

Both Childs and KCEP General Manager Lee Winston did not return calls seeking explanations and comment.

Target audience

Apart from the station's financial management and status, another issue raised in recent years whenever selling it has been discussed is the programming itself, what it achieves and whom it reaches.

Fernando Romero, president of Hispanics in Politics, a local nonprofit organization, made a point that others echoed: KCEP is aimed at blacks and virtually ignores the valley's Hispanics, who have become far and away the region's largest minority group in the decades since the station was founded.

Recent census estimates show that Hispanics make up 25 percent of Clark County's population, while blacks are 10.8 percent. At the time of Census 2000, twice as many Hispanics lived below the federally defined poverty level in the Las Vegas Valley -- or 56,507 Hispanics, compared with 24,625 blacks.

Romero said he had conversations with EOB board members in the 1980s about getting some Spanish language programming on the air, but he was told there was not a large enough Hispanic population to warrant the move.

Decades later, he said, there may be as many as half a dozen local radio stations in Spanish, "but it's not the same thing (as KCEP) -- they (the Spanish stations) are owned by corporations."

"As far as the Hispanic community is concerned, what KCEP is about, I'd have to say, 'no se' -- I don't know."

Richardson, the former board member, said, "I don't think the Hispanic community has ever understood what the KCEP station is."

But Tony Sanchez, immediate past president of the Latin Chamber of Commerce, said the station's very location -- on Washington Avenue near D Street, a historically black neighborhood -- serves an important purpose for all minorities, since "people don't usually like to base things like radio stations in minority communities."

At the same time, he wondered, "Should they expand (to reach the Hispanic community)? Everyone is having to retool for the ... impact of the changing face" of the Las Vegas Valley.

A different but related question the EOB board will have to consider in deciding the future of KCEP is whether the radio station helps serve the purpose of its parent agency -- fighting poverty.

"Maybe now is the time to bring up this issue," said board member Darryl Martin, who was recently promoted to assistant county manager.

"The goal is to eliminate poverty in our community ... Does it fit the current mission? Is it the kind of business we should be in?"

Lisa Holland, a spokeswoman for the Community Action Partnership -- a Washington-based group that advocates for the nation's 1,000 agencies that arose, like the EOB, from the early 1960s federally backed "War on Poverty"-- said last week that she knew of no other community action agency nationwide that owned a radio station.

Sheldon Danziger, professor of public policy at the University of Michigan and an expert on public policy as it relates to combating poverty, said most of these agencies "typically focus on direct service issues."

"Running a radio station was never a goal of the war on poverty," Danziger said.

However, Logan, the EOB board chairman, said the station's "talk shows can provide information on health and other issues that can get out to the public."

According to its own Web site, the station offers 4 1/2 hours of talk shows each week, and two hours on the weekends. That includes an hourly nationally syndicated show airing weekdays aimed at blacks.

In any case, the future of the station may not rest on whether selling it would get its troubled parent organization out of a financial bind, or whether it meets that organization's goals.

It may rest more on feelings.

"You have someone in denial ... it's an emotional subject," board member and KCEP host Weekly said.

"I'm not there yet in terms of raising the issue."

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