Waco’s public radio station faces uncertainty after 25 years on the air

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WACO — Last summer, Molly-Jo Tilton, then 21, drove from Austin to Waco, hoping to launch her career as a local radio reporter and end a grueling six-month job search.

Her destination was KWBU-FM, Waco’s small but plucky National Public Radio member station. Each week, its combination of national and local programming reaches an estimated 15,000 listeners in McLennan County at 103.3 FM. The station turned 25 this year and has built a reputation for finding and developing talent.

Veteran station manager Brodie Bashaw handed Tilton an offer letter at the station’s studio-office on Baylor University’s campus.“I got in my car afterwards and just started crying,” Tilton said. “I called my mom and my boyfriend and was like, ‘I got the job! It’s my time to be a local reporter.’ ”Neither Tilton nor Bashaw foresaw that within a year their jobs and the station’s future would be in doubt.

Baylor University in March cut its $209,000 annual contribution to KWBU as part of a larger cost-cutting push. Four months later, President Donald Trump signed a law dismantling the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributed $164,000 to KWBU each year.

The one-two punch left a $373,000 hole in the station’s annual budget of about $1.2 million, a 32% reduction.

The hits came at a vulnerable time, as KWBU had spent most of its reserves in a bid to grow listenership.

Nearly every NPR station in Texas and across the country is affected by the sudden end to federal funding, with major stations such as KUT Austin and KUHF in Houston losing 6% and 9% of their respective funding.

Yet the consequences are existential for many smaller stations such as KWBU. With just eight full-time staff members including Tilton, there is little fat left to cut.“The board of directors has mandated that we have until the end of this calendar year to prove that we can be financially sustainable,” said Bashaw. “This is serious.”

KWBU has launched a last-ditch fundraising campaign to save the station, aiming to raise $500,000 and 1,500 new members by Dec. 31 to replace lost Baylor and federal funding. Station membership is now around 1,000.

“We believe that this is possible,” said Joe Riley, KWBU’s president and CEO.

“With about 15% to 16% of our listenership donating, ideally on a monthly basis, this station can continue indefinitely for the next 25 years and beyond. But if the station goes away, it doesn’t come back. That would be the end.”

Building a Waco audience

Allison Allen, a now longtime Waco resident and Baylor alumnus, was not the stereotypical picture of an NPR listener when she first caught an episode of “This American Life” while living in Dallas in 2000. She grew up in a conservative Baptist home and cast a vote for Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush that year.

Back then and now, Allen didn’t see public radio as “left-wing propaganda,” as the White House described public broadcasting in May.

Rather, she was beguiled by the deftness of storytelling showcased by the American Public Media program’s dulcet-voiced host, Ira Glass.

“It was entertainment, it was engaging storytelling, but it was also educational,” Allen said. “ ‘This American Life’ felt like this epic show that I was listening to; like someone sitting around the radio in the 1940s for a fireside chat.”

She moved back to Waco in 2002 “and realized, ‘Oh my gosh, this little town has a public radio station.’ I felt like I hit the jackpot.” Allen made her first donation to KWBU that spring.

Brodie Bashaw was bootstrapping the nascent public radio station from a converted closet at Baylor University at the time. An underpowered transmitter located in a cow pasture in Robinson served KWBU until 2014, when it was moved to reach more listeners across Waco and McLennan County.

Since those early years, the station has invested in local news as well as programs led by local volunteers. KWBU listeners can still tune in to nationally syndicated programs such as “This American Life,” “Fresh Air” and “Latino USA,” but some of the most popular programs are local.

Ross Burns, a retired librarian and Waco resident, began hosting “I Hear America Singing” on KWBU in 2014. The folk music and history show has earned Burns “a lot of fan mail” over its decade on air, said Joe Riley, the station CEO.

“We get the letters and just hand them off to him,” Riley chuckled. “People are actually surprised when they learn it’s produced locally.”

More recent additions to KWBU’s local programming include “Living It,” a show hosted by Meg Wallace of Mobilize Waco, which profiles how Wacoans with disabilities find joy and navigate life. The station in June launched a weekly local news show, “Friday Forum with The Waco Bridge,” hosted by Tilton and Bridge Editor-in-Chief J.B. Smith.

If KWBU goes silent, it would mean the departure of public radio from the Heart of Texas region, and the loss of a platform where McLennan county residents can share their stories, Riley said.

KWBU board member Cara Chase added that if the station can meet its fundraising goals, local and regional collaborations will only become more central to the station’s mission.

“The bottom line is, we need a bunch of people to give us $10 a month,” if KWBU is to transition into a 100% listener-supported station, Chase said.

A talent pipeline

KWBU has always made do with a small team, and there are few tasks the station’s single local reporter is not asked to do. Those duties include reporting, editing, photography, pledge drives, hosting programs, training interns and conducting on-air interviews.

Ryland Barton got his first shot at radio journalism with KWBU in 2013, just as Tilton would more than a decade later. Barton rose to the pinnacle of the profession this month as a newscast anchor at NPR’s national office in Washington, D.C. He credits his success to his time in Waco and the mentorship of Bashaw.

“So much of the experience I was able to tout when I applied for this job — live, on-air work, operating the board — I would not have developed without KWBU,” Barton said. “I think they’re one of the things that makes Waco a cool, vibrant city. They’re a jewel in the community.”

Michael Hagerty, who worked for the station from 2001 to 2006, now produces Houston Matters, Houston Public Media’s highest-rated program.

“I’m very proud of all my radio children,” Bashaw said.

Barton fears the demise of NPR affiliates such as KWBU would make entry-level reporting jobs a rare opportunity.

“I had been trying and trying to get a job at any NPR station anywhere, even in Alaska, so I was really blessed to have that opportunity pop up,” he said.More than that, he worries about the disappearing opportunities for local voices to reach a state and even national audience. NPR is a news ecosystem that allows member stations to share each others’ stories and features nationwide.

A story Tilton produced in February on Baylor University’s Black Gospel Archive found its way onto NPR’s “All Things Considered,” one of the nation’s leading news radio programs.

“It was a big achievement for me, but it is also incredible to know that I got to share a story about Waco and Baylor with the rest of the U.S.,” Tilton said.She savored the memory as she pondered a new task on top of her workload at the station: Figuring out if she has a future in Waco.

“I want to stay, and I want to do everything I can to make sure this station survives,” Tilton said. “I’ve fallen in love with this station and I’m just starting to make connections, make friends, establish relationships with sources. But if it doesn’t survive, I probably won’t stay in Waco, because to be honest, there’s just not much other work in my field here.”

Disclosure: The Waco Bridge and KWBU collaborate on the weekly “Friday Forum” program but have no financial or legal affiliation. Baylor University and Houston Public Media have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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