[Kzyxtalk] Another in a series of proposals for KZYX: Bob Woelfel for manager, program director and business coordinator.

[Rick Sacks]

Marco, thank you !



On 6/16/2015 1:43 PM, Marco McClean wrote:
> On 6/15/2015 10:14 AM, Doug McKenty wrote:
>   > ...Mary Aigner's fate depends on who the next manager will be, and
> what happens in the meantime.
>
>       Again, if KZYX must have a manager, please put forth Bob Woelfel's
> name. He can do all the management paperwork tasks, and the program
> director tasks, and the ad sales (business underwriting) tasks, and the
> intelligently-conciliating-disgruntled-members-and/or-airpeople stuff,
> and do it all with good cheer; he's been doing it all his life since he
> got home from military service, and he knows Mendocino County's business
> and social and political scene like the back of his hand, and I don't
> know anyone who doesn't like him.
>
>       I have seen people in the office screaming at each other and the
> world, and he walked in, glanced at them, continued on into the kitchen,
> ate a pickled egg, then put up his hand and said a few simple calm
> things and they all shut up and went to do their jobs and have their
> lives, and they were all satisfied that they'd been heard, by each other
> and by him, and they were amused at how they'd been carrying on. It was
> magical.
>
>       I can't count the times something about KMFB --a single piece of
> equipment or a complicated system-- was seriously messed up and Bob
> called me in to fix it, and I said something like, "That's too hard. We
> need a whole new [fill in blank]," and he said something that put it in
> a new light and made it easier, and I fixed it. There were times he had
> a special project for me and I couldn't figure out how to do it, and he
> said, "How about if we..." and it became clear, and I did it. He knew
> that what he wanted could be done, and that made it so I did too. And
> when it was something I wasn't qualified to touch, he knew that, and
> he'd call one of half a dozen radio engineers he's friends with, and
> they'd jump to help him.
>
>       He saw that all of us were paid. He set up a system where we were
> responsible for bringing in advertising money for our own shows, and we
> were paid by the hour /and/ we got a generous cut of the money we
> contracted. This would work with noncommercial KZYX with business
> underwriting as well as it worked for commercial KMFB, which had the
> same broadcast range as KZYX and cost a fourth the money to operate,
> even after paying all the airpeople and engineers.
>
>       He loves to practically live in the radio station, leisurely
> accomplishing things and enjoying himself in the background and leaving
> the independent airpeople alone to do their thing, and when he's
> required by the more dependent airpeople he appears and helps them.
>
>       He attracts real radio people and lets them do their work in their
> own way, and when someone goes entirely off the rails he waits until
> their show is done and then tells them his concerns and they correct
> themselves. In all the years I've known him, I'm sure he had his own
> politics and his own opinions and /I don't know what they are/; think
> about that for a moment, really. He gives everyone a chance to shine, no
> matter what they believe in or are for or against.
>
>       That's the sort of person who should run KZYX. And once we were in
> the printer room talking about the general subject of appropriate
> language and he said to me, "I don't mind shit or goddammit, but if you
> can, Marco, please hold the motherfuckers and cocksuckers until after
> midnight." (That was the only time I ever heard him say any of those
> words.) In all the years that Bob Woelfel oversaw KMFB there was not a
> single audience complaint to the FCC on any subject, and KMFB was way
> more free than KZYX has ever been, and there was no electronic profanity
> delay nor any need for one.
>
>       Some people are too much. Sister Yasmin drove Bob crazy with her
> drama and anguish and so on, yet he kept her on for nearly ever anyway,
> and even when he was pushed beyond any administrator's endurance he
> didn't fire her-- look at what he did: he had me build a special studio
> just for her out at the transmitter site, so she could keep doing her
> show and he wouldn't have the aggravation of her being all in his face
> at the office, until she could control herself and things could be
> normal again. See this? He didn't fire her; he made a way for her to
> solve the problem herself, and trusted her to do it, and of course she
> did. That's his way.
>
>       Some of the best people at KZYX and KOZT and probably four or five
> other stations around here started at KMFB.
>
>       He helped homeless people. He brought the animal-rescue people in
> to talk about their work, and when they were having trouble homing
> abandoned exotic dragon-creatures he set up habitats and kept them in
> the office and did a show about them at random with the rescue people
> until they had homes. When an airperson couldn't afford a doctor, he
> took him to the doctor and paid for it and let him convalesce in his own
> apartment. He helps with local events like the Film Festival... I could
> go on for miles, here, and not run out of reasons why Bob Woelfel should
> run KZYX. All by himself he can handily replace John Coate, Mary Aigner,
> David Steffen, et al., and the station will save a ton of money and will
> improve and not continue to stagnate. He is a saint, a fricking saint.
>
>       There is no-one else with Bob's Woelfel's skills and
> qualifications. I admire Bob Young, who runs KNYO, and Ed Nieves, who
> runs KMEC, but they're needed at KNYO and KMEC, and that's the only
> reason I'm not recommending them too.
>
>
>
>
> -end-
>
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