Caryn Mathes
"We are not going to screw this up," KUOW president and general manager Caryn Mathes says of the station's purchase of KPLU. "We are going to do something that's just fabulous for the community." KUOW

Seattle's KUOW revealed on Thursday that it plans to purchase rival NPR affiliate KPLU and turn it into an all-jazz station. Staffers at KPLU are in shock. Earlier today, I spoke to KUOW president and general manager Caryn Mathes about the deal.

First off, what’s your message for people who relied on KPLU for their news?

Our plan is that nearly 100 percent of people who were able to get news before will be able to get news after. If the deal is approved, then we can decide what content to deploy on which frequency.

Can you walk me through this frequency issue more? Someone in Burien, for example, doesn't get a strong KUOW signal. I thought that KPLU, which you can hear in Burien, is being converted to an all-jazz station. So is someone in Burien now going to be able to tune in to KUOW and get a strong signal, and get news that way?

Yeah, let me get a map. But lemme see... The problem with the maps that we have is that all that it shows shows is the guaranteed primary licensed reach—the FCC guarantees you a certain coverage area which cannot be encroached upon by any other station to the point of obliterating you. The reason why we haven't just published the maps is that they’re hard to understand. They show the protected signal coverage area. But a signal goes where it wants to and terrain impacts it. So we haven't put this up because some people might freak out and say, "Oh, we don’t show up as within the circle." But the signal might actually get to you, depending on terrain. But you asked about a specific city—can you say again?

I mentioned Burien just as an example. Is KUOW's signal going to be boosted so that it comes in better in Burien? Is KUOW going to reach a larger geographic area? Is that's what you're saying?

Yes, to the latter question. Because we'll put the content that was on 94.9—we'll now spread that out and put it on some of those 11 frequencies that KPLU has. We'll take their 11, our three, and look at the map and reapportion what content goes on which of those fifteen, and try to get full service to everybody in the area.

The other option that we have as well is both stations have digital HD 2, 3, and 4. So you can also fill in the gaps and say, if the primary signal that you're closest to is 88.5, and it's going to be all jazz now, we could put the news content—we could simulcast 94.9's content on 88.5 HD 2, and then you have a digital device, or if you Bluetooth it through your phone in your car, you could still get it. We're going to do everything possible to make sure that nobody's deprived of what they had access to before.

It sounds like, bottom line, somebody in Burien or Auburn—and these are some of the places that I've heard from, from listeners who've been writing in who say they relied on KPLU for news—you're saying those people will be able to get KUOW on their radio now. Whereas they weren't able to get a good signal earlier.

Yeah. We're going to reapportion it to try to blanket the area with both jazz and news. And we've got 15 frequencies to work with if the deal is approved.

The other thing is that KPLU has had a news staff. What is going to happen to those folks?

We're two different institutions. The UW is a public institution, and Pacific Lutheran is private. So a merger or a deal that included taking people would not have been possible. Because as a state institution, any jobs we have open, they have to be openly advertised and all comers can apply. So we'll be looking at, for our editorial priorities and being able to optimally cover this entire region, how many people do we need? Is that more people than the KUOW newsroom currently has? If it is, then we need to create those jobs postings, and then KPLU people, like anybody else, would be welcome to apply. But the difference in the type of ownership of stations—that's why we have to do it that way.

I know it's unsettling. I know people are worried—"Nobody's job is guaranteed"—but just because of the two different structures here, that's how it has to work. About a month ago, when I wasn't sure but it looked like this acquisition was going to go through, I brought the leadership of the content side of the house here at KUOW into knowledge about it and I said, you need to start working on what our editorial priorities, statement, and deployment of resources, what the gaps are—you need to start developing that plan for me now so I know what you need. They haven't finalized that yet.

I'll be better able to talk about how many positions will it be—I'll know more in six to eight weeks.

The assumption that I was hearing from inside KPLU, from folks who were understandably in shock yesterday, was that because it's going to be an all-jazz station, the new jobs being talked about are going to be music and administrative jobs. Not news jobs. Do you anticipate expanding KUOW's newsroom to include almost a dozen reporters? That's what KPLU had.

I get this point, but I have no idea how many. All I can say is that it's absolutely a possibility that we would augment the size of our news team to add more people. But again, until I get that outline from the leadership in news and content-making at KUOW—of here's how we'd deploy reporters, and here's reporters who would stay out in the field, and here's reporters who we would have at the home base—I don't have any of that detail yet. So I'm sorry I'm not able to answer your question in any more specificity. We're still building this. I just can't speak to numbers right now. Even on the music side, we're still building that.

One alarming thing I saw yesterday was the VP for Marketing and Communications over at PLU, Donna Gibbs, was asked about the loss of KPLU. And she said, "I would point to the fact that we’re living in the time of proliferation of avenues to get news from—whether it’s Crosscut or bloggers. The Seattle P-I was going out of business and now they have a vibrant online destination." But have you been on the online-only SeattlePI.com at all lately? It's a shadow of what it was. They really do not have much good editorial content—in fact, much of it is advertising that seems like it's been repurposed and repackaged. Can you comment on the concerns that people over the loss that this represents to local news coverage in Seattle and the region?

We have an unwavering commitment to continuing to produce quality, valued content and to produce that on all platforms. VP Gibbs is right if she said—I didn't catch all of that quote—if she said that pressure on broadcast is growing. You look at Edison Media research. Their latest report—they do a report called "share of ear"—where they interview a sampling of media consumers. So "share of ear," of what people use to get content and/or music, is down to about 52 percent, total for AM/FM radio. If you look at the report from seven years ago, it probably would have been in the ninety percentile. So that's a reality.

But broadcast is just one platform. We see our audience, and I know KPLU does too, the digital audience growing. Right now, there's no universal aggregate tool that can aggregate your broadcast and digital and on-demand listening—we're working in the NPR system to try to get that. Broadcasting is just one platform, but we want quality content on all of the platforms. I totally believe in the converged newsroom idea, where you don't have to worry about which side of the fence a story started on. Some stories live out their best life as only web-only. But most stories have multiple lives. It may start on the web and cross over to broadband. It might starts as an conjoined story that rolls out simultaneously.

We're looking for this robust effort where we roll things out—we're going to meet people where they are. If you're a broadcast consumer, fine, we'll be there. If everything you know about only comes through your smartphone and you only want to stream or in a podcast, fine, we'll meet you there. If you want to pull stories from coverage on a Facebook page, fine, we'll meet you there. I think broadcasters, and content makers, are being called upon to be really nimble and service all of these portals where people are getting their content. We've gotta be in all of those places, so that's why I'm saying as big as KUOW's newsroom and content-making staff is, we might need to get a little bigger in order to fulfill this vision we have of being fully robust on all platforms.

I also wanted to get your reaction to Cliff Mass, who's weighed in. He's saying, "It is a sad day for our region. We lost most of the PI, KCTS has given up its public affairs programs, KUOW dropped most local programming, the TV stations have reduced staff, and an independent group of journalists at KPLU will be let go. Our growing region, one of national importance, has a constantly reduced collection of reporters and independent media voices. Can the public save diversity and quality in public radio? There is a way: a massive refusal to support KUOW if the transfer goes through. No pledge support."

How do you respond to that—the idea that some listeners might be so upset that they don't support KUOW?

Well, I'm not going to debate Cliff in an interview. I don't know that there's anything KUOW could ever do to make Cliff satisfied with us. So I don't even want to pursue that, because I think he's in a particular camp and he'll never get out of that camp.

But I guess my hope would be that people would stop assuming, and applying, the commercial consolidation model to what this is. This is not that. Commercial stations consolidate so they can deliver more money to shareholders, they can run the services as cheaply as possible to generate more profit. That is not what this is about.

We don't serve shareholders in that sense. Our shareholders are the people of the communities of the Puget Sound area. Our whole reason for being is to produce quality valued content, connect the dots so that people can figure out the complexity of their lives, how does the Puget Sound region fit in with the nation and world—helping people make good choices as informed citizens. That's our stakeholder group. If we're doing our job, post acquisition, to give people quality news and information, some joy and discovery, and some delight, then they will give us money. Our work is to fulfill all those categories we just listed.

If we're relevant, if we're resonating with people's lives, people will give us money. Listeners control things more than they think. When a change is made that scares people, they like to characterize it as, "Oh, the management of that station did something to us." And it's like, management is always responding to listener behavior. What are you consuming? What are you listening to? We get that in aggregate form, but when you look at the numbers year after year after year, and you get patterns of usage, you can kind of tell what's really happening, and what people like and what they don't like. And you can never satisfy every individual, but in aggregate, we maintain our journalistic integrity and we give people information that's relevant and resonant with them, and meet people where they are—and that's what we do. So please, if people could stop using the template of what happens in a commercial consolidation, for this. There is no comparison.

I think part of the reason folks jump to that model is the secrecy with which this was done, or the fact that nobody knew about it and it got sprung on everyone yesterday. That's where it feels a bit reminiscent of the corporate buyout model.

Ah, okay. To some degree, when you're having delicate, lengthy, tedious negotiations, in order to get useful honest information to the table, it has to be confidential. That’s a pretty common tenet of what negotiations mean. You can't really do that in the public eye. It's a messy process.

We were notified there's a willing seller under these conditions. Okay, is there a willing buyer? And because UW is a public institution, that leg of it all had to be done in public, and hence it's now out in the open.

But I understand that people's first reaction when you hear about change is fear, and an assumption that it's going to be something lesser. I wouldn't have pursued this if I thought that's how it's going to end. I mean, why would you do that? Our goal is always to give our constituents more. So we feel that, 'Wow, this is a way to give people way more, a chance to have a music platform and build it out and give it big muscle and reach. What kind of new listeners can we win to public radio through that music portal?'

I'm excited, and my excitement is tempered by the compassion that I feel for the KPLU team, because I know it's scary. Because of the structure, as I said, I can't make them any guarantees. We will have positions of various types open to which they can apply, and I can't make any guarantees right now. But the end goal is to be more for this community. So I hope that commitment offers some comfort to people. But I know the real proof will be in, you know, 'Show me what you're doing.' And we'll build it, and we'll show people where our commitment and where our heart lies.

How is KUOW is doing right now?

I think we're a very strong station. I count us among the—and this is my terminology—the mega stations. There are about 20 to 25 megastations in the public radio system, and these are stations that produce a lot of content and/or syndicate content nationally, they have budgets upwards of $12 million a year, so we're definitely in that category. But just like anybody else, the erosion of the people coming through the door through conventional broadcast means—we've been challenged by that as well. NPR is struggling with that. There's been double digit percentage loss in NPR's drivetime audiences, because their audience is distributed through the network of affiliated stations, and stations' numbers are going down. So it's just an evolution of how people are using media.

We don't have a nice clean aggregated tool [for measuring our audience]. But when you look at the different platforms individually, broadcast is steady to declining in some day parts. Our midday is trending upward over the past three years—that's where we made a big change. But most of other day parts are fairly challenged—but that's not unusual, that's the whole public radio system. Our digital audience is growing phenomenally. But how do we turn those consumers into contributors?

That's part of the puzzle that we'll be looking at. But KUOW was a strong station when I got here. In January I'll have been here two years. And my goal is to just make it even stronger and provide better service. I want us to get into the vanguard of experimenting with new types of programming. We've got Garrison Keillor, one of icons of public radio, who's announced his retirement. The Car Talk guys, god bless 'em, one of them has died and they can only get so much mileage [out of re-runs]... So you'll probably see Car Talk fading from the scene. Diane Rehm, from my old station, she's still going strong, but she’s in her late 70s. So we're getting ready to have a pretty sizable shift here, in the national public radio landscape, with the changing audience demographic and the changing of some of the tent poles of content, and we need great minds to start making new stuff. And I want KUOW to be in the vanguard of, 'What is that new stuff? What's next?'

The only other point that I didn't make is that of the twenty strongest stations, the mega stations I was telling you about, 60 percent of them have multiple stations with different formats on different stations. That tells you that this model does work. You've got KQED in San Francisco, you've got WAMU, my old station, Wisconsin Public Radio, Houston Public Media—there's a bunch of them. There's almost 16 or 17 where, this is the way they've gone. They've stood up a second station or acquired a station, and made discrete services on each station. News on one, some other kind of music on the other. Oregon Public Broadcasting has done that. That bigger footprint gives you more service in your community. And when you have more service and good quality stuff, then the money will come.

It just seems a bit premature to say this deal is going to result in more of everything. I mean, you've said you don't know if you're going to able to hire the KPLU reporters. So for me, that's the one thing that seems still up in the air.

But you know, "more"... some people are confining [their thinking so] that there has to be more bodies to make more content. That's not necessarily so. But, I'm expecting to maintain the high quality that most stations have been known for. I mean, the defining difference that they're known for is that you've got boots on the ground, eyewitness accounts. That's important. That's one of the things that sets us apart from commercial news. You can trust that we didn't just parachute in from the next county for an hour or two to do the story. We're in these communities, learning the stories, learning the people—we're not voyeurs. We're there for a relationship with these communities.

But isn't that where you do need the bodies, where the actual count of people in the newsroom really matters?

That's the point I'm trying to make. If that's our goal, and it is, then logic would dictate, yeah, we probably are going to need some more people. Because this is a big region, from South of Chehalis up to Victoria, B.C.

So we get some economies of scale by supporting partnerships, like the Northwest News Network partnership. So if we have those partnerships plus, probably, some more people, we're going to have those kinds of resources to maintain the quality of what we're doing. I think what's disturbing people is, they want a number. I can't... I don't know yet. But we're going to build something good. I saw a tweet. He said, "Please, KUOW, don't screw this up." I savored it, actually, because we are not going to screw this up. We are going to do something that's just fabulous for the community.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.