Listening to Western North Carolina

The first thing I heard when I turned on iHeart’s WKSF (99.9 Kiss Country) Asheville, N.C., on Wednesday morning concerned the goats. The caller raised goats for petting zoos and to take to nursing homes. The goats were unhappy about being inside, especially because she hadn’t bought enough diapers before Hurricane Helene. Another caller agreed to host the goats for a while, but only after it was established that they wouldn’t need an electric fence. 

On Wednesday morning, iHeart Asheville was being hosted by WKSF’s Eddie Foxx along with Mark Starling and Tank Spencer from N/T sister WWNC. The broadcast was being heard throughout the seven-station cluster. 

Like many of the callers that morning, this one told the team, “If it wasn’t for you guys, nobody would know anything.” Like many of the callers that morning, her voice started to break as she told listeners, “We are going to be OK.” “There’s no other choice,” said one of the hosts. “You know it’s OK not to be OK now,” they told another caller.

The news followed. FEMA rescue teams had helped rescue 500 so far, but also continued to identify fatalities, such as the family that made it to their roof, only to have the house collapse. President Biden was arriving in Western North Carolina. Elon Musk was sending Starlink devices throughout the area. Motel owners talked about the damage to their properties room by room and the catastrophe of losing foliage season.

Most of the calls were about connecting people with supplies, meals, and services. An EMT for the Buncombe County Rescue Squad encouraged listeners to request wellness checks via its website. Troyers Amish Store in Fairview had chargers available. “If you’re going to one of these places, try to be neighborly,” the team told listeners. They were headed out to help deliver supplies after the shift, adding, “If you see us, don’t be afraid to ask for a hug.”

WUSY (US101) Chattanooga, Tenn., PD Justin Cole called in. He was Foxx’s former morning producer and stuntman. Cole had just established his own mom’s safety, having been called from a National Guard aid station. US101 was doing a relief drive from three locations, and Foxx allowed how weird it felt after years of such events for his town to be the one in need of help.

A listener called to talk about all the offers of help she had received. “We are loved from across the country,” she told the team. “We are not alone.” Before the morning team left, they introduced Episcopal bishop Jose McLachlan, who had called to offer prayers before, and was now going to end the show each morning, He offered prayers for first responders and for the departed, including “those we do not know by name.”

On noncommercial Triple-A WNCW, midday host Martin Anderson had a suggestion I hadn’t yet encountered elsewhere. Listeners who had the ability to leave the area should consider doing so, rather than taxing resources for those who could not, or at least consider going to a shelter. “Don’t be overly brave,” he said.

On WNCW’s local news, one of the lead stories was about Asheville’s Mission Hospital, where 20 water tankers were now arriving daily, along with 100 medical personnel coming from sister hospitals. Until now, Mission had been forced to send its instruments to Charlotte for sterilization.

Some of the information being shared on WNCW was for benefit concerts. The station’s own fundraiser was supposed to be taking place now; instead, listeners were being asked to donate to emergency relief. WNCW was playing music Wednesday morning. Many of the songs were from local musicians, many of whose own safety had just been established. Some of the songs were mountain themed; a few were aspirational about better times ahead, including a version of Robert Earl Keen’s “Feeling Good Again” recorded at WNCW.

That afternoon, when I turned into Saga’s Classic Rock WTMT (The Mountain), the first thing I heard was a press briefing from Asheville’s city manager, Debra Campbell. Questions included how much water the city had (enough to get through Friday at the moment) and whether, that being the case, she would encourage people to leave if they could. “That’s totally a personal decision that a family has to make on its own,” she said. 

The afternoon team I heard was also taken from stations around the cluster: the Mountain’s Skip Richards joined by WOXL (Mix 96.5)’s Shannon Steele and WOXL-HD-2 (The River)’s Jordan. Perhaps because the station content was following the press conference, one caller asked for her problems to be relayed city officials. She had received her Social Security check but didn’t have the gas to get to a bank that still had cash and thus couldn’t buy food at stores that weren’t yet able to take credit cards.

That particular caller seemed to think the Saga team had some connection to the city manager and could pass along her feedback.  But many of the calls were along those lines. In ways, it was like hearing a customer-service hotline (a good one, anyway). When a woman with no immediate prospects for having her power restored declared, “It’s OK, because I love to camp,” the hosts thanked her for her positivity.

Western North Carolina radio has been deservedly praised on social media for its post-Helene efforts. One of the most meaningful Facebook comments I saw about iHR/Asheville was from a small-market owner whose take on major-group clusters is usually much less charitable. Some of the efforts of local radio have been national news. 

As we ponder radio’s role in the community, and whether Congress should protect it, it was eye-opening to realize that radio’s function wasn’t just news, it was, essentially, a more urgent version of “Swap Shop” — the feature that some small-market stations can’t get rid of, even in good times. 

Hearing Asheville radio made me oddly wistful for New York’s recently departed WCBS-AM. I hope not to hear a New York-area disaster reported anywhere in the near future, but coming across the ad hoc news teams of the two clusters did remind me of what was lost.

I’m also newly resolved that broadcasters have to find some way to offer their communities 24/7 locality, despite their cash crunch. As has been pointed out before, “wait until they need us during the hurricane” is not a strategy for fighting Spotify, and it’s not the only time I want to hear great radio. (And having heard Asheville radio in happier times, with ample localism and appropriate sense-of-place, I’m not making that claim about these particular stations either).

Hearing ad-hoc teams assembled from throughout two different clusters has, however, sent me back to one of my recent contentions, just in time for NAB New York. If seven stations can afford only one local talent, it is better to network seven stations, each contributing one local jock, rather than seven different “local” stations with only one jock. That wouldn’t have been the answer for Asheville this week, but it would be more satisfying radio without having to wait for a crisis.

It was also clear here that radio’s public service efforts are a good reason for the industry to advocate for keeping all of broadcast radio in cars, not just AM. WKSF is a three-state powerhouse signal. The market’s News/Talk leader is not WWNC, but FM WCQS (Blue Ridge Public Radio), which I also heard represented via the press conference. It’s also a reminder both that broadcasters should not stop trying to put physical radios back in homes, and that our device promos should also include a smart-speaker skill for getting emergency info from radio.