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Bangor MetroMetro Guide

In the mid-1980s, the founders of what would become the community radio station in Blue Hill and, later, Orland were meeting to decide what call letters the station should use. When he heard the combination WERU, it hit Noel Paul Stookey—one third of Peter, Paul and Mary—like a flash.

“WERU: We Are You! It was a no-brainer,” Stookey recalls. That was the birth of the station identification heard by tens of thousands of listeners to one of just two full-power, noncommercial stations in Maine. (The other, WMPG in Portland, serves the dual role of community station and training ground for University of Southern Maine students interested in broadcasting.) WERU-FM, on a sparsely settled stretch of Route 1 halfway between Ellsworth and Bucksport, attracts volunteer staff and listeners whose main interest is their community.

These volunteers reflect the sentiments of a nationwide cadre of people who, as one listener puts it, “have had it with the voice-tracked sterile sameness of computer- driven McRadio.”

“Commercial radio has its place,” says Matt Murphy, general manager. “Our focus is service, not advertising revenue. Being a small nonprofit means we can be accessible and eclectic.”

Eclectic may be an understatement. WERU’s programming schedule features blues, jazz, reggae, Latin/Zydeco/Delta blues, soul and funk, electronica, Arabic/Islamic, West African and other genres of world music. Informational programs—with titles like Radio Active, Democracy Now, Free Speech Radio News, and CounterSpin—generally have an other-than-mainstream take on public affairs.

Eclectic does not preclude excellence: In its July 2003 issue, Esquire magazine ranked WERU among the 12 best radio stations in the United States.

Money could not, and did not, buy such accolades. Because it is funded by donors, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, occasional grants and periodic fundraisers, WERU relies heavily on volunteers to make ends meet. They are, in fact, WERU’s secret weapon. About 75–80 volunteers are at the microphones each week, plus about the same number who take part behind the scenes. Others choose to step forward to help during special events, assisting during quarterly pledge drives and at the Full Circle Fair, the station’s summer fundraiser held each year at the Blue Hill Fair Grounds. The station survives on a full-time, paid staff of just seven people, with part-timers together equaling one more position.

Volunteer Jeff Amsrud of Deer Isle tuned in for several years before finding time recently to help out once a week, listening to new music and adding appropriate material to the music library. He and other behind-the-scenes programmers make additions to the “new music” shelf, saving on-air volunteers time by previewing music from around the world that is one of WERU’s trademarks. At some point, Amsrud says, he might volunteer to host his own show, as he did in college. For now, the cabinetmaker by trade is content to listen in his shop, tuning out when something airs that doesn’t interest him. “The whole idea is to appeal to a lot of people’s tastes,” he says.

Maggie Overton, the station’s music director, agrees. She oversees WERU’s music collection, totaling more than 50,000 compact discs. “I think we serve the community well because community members are doing the programming.”

A prime example: During hour two of his three-hour music show, Joel Raymond pauses to take a listener’s phone call.
“Hello? Yes, I can try…Neil Young? ‘Stupid Girl’? Hm, I might have to go to vinyl on that one.”

Raymond hangs up, makes sure there’s enough time left in the current song to cover his absence and heads for the basement. That’s storage for “vinyl,” the record albums that now back up optical media from artists all over the world. The station received more than 4,800 discs just last year, many from artists with no hope of having their music played on mainstream stations. The burgeoning collection snakes beyond the music library to several open shelves in the kitchen. The casual visitor expects to find more CDs in cupboards by the green tea.

Back in the on-air studio, Raymond says he’s always had the freedom at WERU to play whatever he wanted. Since he began volunteering here in 1993, he has let loose his eclectic taste in music on the listeners. He turns up the monitor as a live recording by Elvis Costello from the 1970s blends into Paul Anka’s version of “Wonderwall,” by Oasis. “That works,” he says and smiles.

“It’s pretty easy to like new music; a lot of it doesn’t sound like new music,” Raymond says, adding that many current releases reflect rock’s 1960s childhood. He enjoys sharing similar-sounding music of different decades with an audience that may not know or care about the difference, educating listeners and himself in the process.

Two studios away, several people finish taping a program, one of the few that is not aired live. Brook Minner, who hosts the station’s early-morning block each Friday, is one of the participants. As shelter coordinator for the Bangor-based Spruce Run Domestic Violence Project, she joined the discussion about homelessness and shelters in Maine; the taped show will precede a live overnight national broadcast on homelessness. Minner values the informative nature of community broadcasting. “It’s really great to have WERU provide avenues for the sort of information that might not get heard elsewhere,” she says. “I love that they do a lot of locally produced content.”

And so, apparently, do a lot of people in the region. WERU boasts a membership of about 2,700 people, who donate more than half of the station’s $450,000 annual budget.

Yet the geographic base of supporters is slowly going global. Back in time, devoted listeners would site new houses where they could get radio reception to WERU. Now, the station offers live streaming on the Web, making “We Are You Radio” available all over the world. Though the station is enjoying a growing cult following by worldwide fans, WERU is firmly focused on local listeners, and the station has extensive checks to ensure that its homespun fare is what the community wants. “Everyone’s feedback is considered,” Overton says, noting that listeners are usually more apt to pick up the phone, call the announcer who’s on the air, and ask for a particular song or voice an opinion if it’s a call-in show.

Reaction to such programming is usually quick, with listeners calling or emailing to say what they like or don’t like. Station manager Matt Murphy says that kind of feedback is much more useful than a costly rating survey. “Our measure of our success is listener input,” he says, adding that he’s always looking for new ways to measure success. Changes in technology, especially on the World Wide Web, are offering new ways to make community radio more meaningful.

While volunteers and paid staff alike prefer direct feedback, they don’t just wait for the phone to ring. A community advisory committee holds “listening sessions” periodically, welcoming comments from anyone in the station’s coverage area. And 15 minutes at the start of each board of directors’ meeting and program advisory committee meeting is set aside for public comment.

Among the station’s longtime listeners and frequent callers is Rufus Wanning of Orland. Wanning attended the celebration the day the station went on the air, in Noel Paul Stookey’s converted chicken barn known as “The Henhouse.” (Ten years ago, WERU moved to its own building in Orland.) Wanning is among the many political activists who find people at community radio willing to listen and eager to help those with agendas for change to get their messages out. He calls the staff “a good bunch of people who are anxious to keep everybody happy.”

Some people travel many miles to give their time and talents to the station. In its earliest days, some of the volunteer announcers came from as far as the Camden-Rockland area, since the signal traveled across the water unobstructed. These days, most volunteers travel less, but they seem no less enthusiastic about locally produced music and informational programming. Amy Browne, news and public affairs manager for WERU, says she receives “a million requests” for coverage of local events. She sees a big part of her job as advising those who ask about ways to get their issues heard, in mainstream media as well as on her station.
The responsiveness strikes a chord, and so does WERU’s coverage style.

“Our features are more in-depth” than most hard-news outlets have time or space to offer, she says. Absent the pressures of advertising to “keep things moving,” noncommercial stations can give the time needed to explain and analyze the many sides of complex issues. Listeners find comfort in the more leisurely pace that even emotionally charged topics generally receive.
Which brings us to The Soapbox.

11:02 a.m. Office manager Joan Federman answers the station’s main phone line: “This is Joan, how can I help you? Oh, Soapbox is over . . . yes, once a month . . . ”

The hour-long program started right after the attacks on the World Trade Center. A rare call-in show with neither guests nor a self-winding host, the program at first ran daily, giving a shocked and grieving public a forum in which to sound off. As emotions cooled, the program aired weekly and then monthly.

Now, host Matt Murphy says barely a word once he has explained the format and greeted each caller. He prompts a caller for a Web address or phone number to help listeners connect, but keeps his opinions to himself. “My job is just to make people welcome,” says Murphy, who’s been the station’s general manager for 7 years.

Like any manager, Murphy thinks often about finances, although WERU may be in better shape than most community stations. The mortgage was paid off last year, allowing the board of directors to begin planning for a capital campaign. Planned improvements include a building addition, new transmitter and studio-to-transmitter link, and what the strategic plan calls “partnerships with like-minded community organizations.”

In a community broadcaster’s perfect world, happy listeners would open their checkbooks eagerly. In the real world, that’s not always the case. Yet, WERU listeners defy the odds, with roughly 99% of those making pledges putting their money where their ears are. “That’s unheard of,” says Joel Mann, programming and operations manager. He says listeners like the social and cultural diversity reflected in the many styles of music they hear; and he says they value the insights, perspectives, and varied viewpoints in the public affairs programs that seldom seem to come from big corporate media.

But it doesn’t mean that WERU is just a comfortable place for aging hippies to tune in and have their opinions confirmed.
“If you don’t want to be challenged or made mad, WERU is not for you,” Mann says. Sometimes the audience complains. When that happens, staffers, volunteers, and the program advisory committee mull and consult, and, only after thoroughly examining a programming need do they make changes. Then, it’s a matter of finding someone willing to donate some time and talent to put together a show to fill the unmet need.

That need and a pool of available talent don’t always coincide; but Mann says WERU has been fortunate, rarely lacking for long the people to round out the station’s offerings in words and music. Some novices find their first experiences behind the mic intimidating, and most longtimers face a continuing education process to keep up with technological changes.

“We’re here to show them how it’s done,” Mann says of staff’s role with the volunteer voices of WERU. “But they’re the ones who make the decisions.”

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