CAB Meeting Approved Minutes July 2020

Community Advisory Board Meeting Tuesday, July 14 12:00 – 1:30 PM Zoom Meeting during Quarantine 220 E. Parkcenter Blvd, Room 700, Boise ID 83702 Board Members in Attendance: Julie Adams DeFord Susan Bechdel Tyson Chaplin Dennis Hall Chris Bragg Paul Ries Laura Bond (on phone) Tom Jans Board Members Not in Attendance: Jen Martinez Shelley McEuen

Laurie Ahern Mark Wheeler Andy Huang Teresa Yragui Bob Otten (on phone) Kendal Shaber Bill Vasconcellos David Lombardi

Jeremy Woodson

Leon Smith (exited the CAB)

Staff in Attendance: Tom Michael, General Manager Bethany Taylor, Membership Larry Newton, Underwriting

Chelan Lippincott, Major Gifts Valerie Hadley, Office Manager Paul Stribling, Programming Kyle Kitterman, Business Manager

Call to Order: Laurie Ahern called the meeting to order at 12:03 pm.

Approval of the Previous Minutes: Motion to approve minutes by Dennis and second by Teresa after slight changes from Dennis & Tom Jans.

Committee Reports Governing Committee: David recapped conflict of interest issues and why the By Laws revision was made. Subsection 1 expands conflict of interest to be consistent to be in line with rules of professional conduct in many sectors. Notify and disclose possible conflict of interest. Subsection 2 mentions only using brand of BSPR for only promoting BSPR, and not other intentions. David recommends changes to policy. Mark asking about using branding in support in such things as City Club. David said that this would be appropriate use of brand, just not for individual use. David made motion to adopt amendment 1 CAB July 14, 2020

from 7/7/2020. Seconded by Bill and all approved. With motion carried, new bylaws to be circulated and posted online with updated approval date of 7/14/2020.

Nominating Committee: Teresa and the others have been working on recruitment. See the information in the packet in terms of geographic area. The committee is proposing 2 students, one from CSI and one from BSU, as well as another candidate from Canyon County. Concluding with a final term this year is Paul Ries. All other members with terms ending have confirmed they are interested in an additional term, except one. The goal would be five additional members. Kendal asked if CAB members could be high school student, beginning a discussion on that. David agreed that nothing prohibits those under 18 but if they are not college student members, they still have to make a financial contribution to be members. Bill stated they have a high school member on another board of which he is a member. Teresa mentioned do we want CAB to reflect membership or total population, and so would like to increase Magic Valley and Canyon County visibility. Teresa asked to have everyone encourage others to apply for CAB membership and that the application is on website.

Fundraising Committee: Fundraising is down, but Teresa talked about how the team did a great job dealing with circumstances. Sent meeting minutes for further details.

Advocacy Committee: Julie said the next meeting is 7/30/20. In summary, events have been cancelled so the advocacy meeting has been having a hard time being advocates and reaching the community.

Programming Committee: Andy said the committee decided on acting as consultants for programming at station. Andy shared updates with Paul S. and Tom, including that Latino USA will be coming as we are losing Live From Here, which will bending the second week of September. The Daily will be launching on July 27 at 6 PM and run Monday through Thursday.

Station Report: Kendal asked Paul about The Daily, about how podcast will crossover to program, and Paul S. explained, the big thing is just the relevance and formatting. The Daily has done a good job of this and Planet Money is another example. Podcasting helps introduce the content and broadcasting side to younger demographic. Kendal asked about numbers and Paul said they look very good for The Daily. It’s a halfhour show that has been paired elsewhere with Marketplace, which is what we are doing. At the moment, in other markets, it has performed as well or better than All Things Considered.

Tom following up that there will be ratings for Spring books later this summer. We were #3 overall in the Fall and #1 in the morning slot. As we look at bigger markets, NPR experienced a drop-off with their news magazines during the pandemic. Why? Massively reduced in-car listening. Don’t know it that will be temporary or long-lasting.

The station announced a digital initiative with new app for BSPR. It’s coming out of internal Digital Culture Accelerator group. Team started working with Q Catalyst to be central hub for an informed and engaged Idaho, in order to grow audience across the board. We have an audacious goal of doubling our digital audience in three years. Tom showed the Digital Culture Accelerator Playbook, which includes metrics to see how we will track how we do against our targets over the next three years. It’s exciting to see where we need to be and the incremental steps to get us there.

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Revenue has been assisted by recent grants, including America Amplified for the Mountain West News Bureau ($110k), a third year of funding for the Bureau partners ($225k), and potentially a third year of Report for America ($6K).

Training: Sáša went through an Editorial Integrity and Leadership training, based in Arizona. We have Major Gifts Training occuring with Veritas and CPB for Chelan and Tom. And the Underwriting group going through training as well, with Kirk Nelson at Market Ingenuity. Training is important to sharpen our tools during uncertain times.

We received a major award for the LOCKED podcasts, called the Al Neuharth Award. Kristin is pushing on a “get a friend” to become a member initiative and Bethany is trying to help reinvent events. Tom shared the content on the Racial Justice page and discussed workgroups, media clubs, and the webinars that news staff, Idaho Matters, and the Mountain West News Bureau is attending to improve their telling of these stories. Laurie discussed the PBS Newshour conversation with a book editor about To Kill a Mockingbird and how high schoolers all read and to look at it through a different lens now. Laurie also suggested the documentary 13 as educational viewing. Teresa asked about adding interns due to increased diversity and the station wants to continue this, but it was difficult with Covid-19. We will continue to review our hiring policies. The next opportunity is through New Mexico, which is hiring a new reporter for the MNWB. Tom introduced new Business Manager, Kyle Kitterman. He described the fiscal year that just ended, although the accounting through June 30 is not finalized. Kyle described the unrestricted funding from the $224K CARES Act via CPB, which helped address fundraising shortfalls. Tom described how we planned and understand in our 3-to-5 year plan how we were going to have to draw on savings to cover MWNB and Idaho Matters, as their initial grants have ended. We experienced a permanent cut in University subsidy and we have withstood that for now.

Kyle reviewed charts for financial overview, describing Sources and Uses, rather than Revenue and Expenses. We have growth in membership and in grants. We lost some ground in underwriting and in university funding. Overall, the station seems to be poised for success and in the correct position.

Paul R. asked about funding cuts as being labelled permanent. Mark explained that he had to submit scenarios pre-COVID for permanent cuts. In the end, the university took a mid-range cutoff about $50k.

The Boise State University funding gap is around $50 million, so this year may be rough. Mark called it the worst crisis for Higher Ed since World War II. Dennis asked about where the station is about making the announcement of major donation from estate and Tom mentioned that it’s been on hold for now, but scheduled for Fall 2020. Dennis also asked about when the App would be released, and we are about a month behind, so it will be done in August. Tom showed the app pages and explained they have worked with university on branding. He also showed the Talk to Us section in order to comment on and for news stories. First a soft launch and then we will start promoting.

Dennis sent kudos to Idaho Matters for Wednesdays show about virus information. The Doctor’s Roundtable on the program has been very popular. Teresa brought up Rachel’s stories about water and the Magic Valley.

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Old Business / New Business / Good of the Order Laurie thanked Kyle for reporting the financials. Bill had question for Paul S. regarding The Daily and Reader’s Corner. Laurie stated she is happy that Latino USA as a good addition. Kendal asked about the promotion of upcoming program additions. She also brought up that though the state of affairs for the University is grim, how can the radio station support it? Dr. Tromp will be interviewed closer to when classes begin. This also began a discussion on how the CAB can continue to support the university.

Mark and Chris discussed institutional issues and how COVID has impacted all schools. All auxiliaries’ forms of income are going to be impacted negatively, such as dining and athletics. Mark encouraged Kendal and all to share how important universities are to the state and to communicate that widely.

Chris echoed that and all will watch how budget discussions go in the next legislative session. Tom also mentioned the impact of university research on local business and the local economy. The meeting ended with a discussion of how all industries are going through tough times.

Laurie thanked all in attendance and ended meeting at 1:25 pm. Next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, September 8 and once again, probably as a videoconference.

Reminder of remaining 2020 CAB meeting dates: Sep 8, Nov 10

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