WAMU 88.

5 - COMMUNITY COUNCIL MEETING

DRAFT Minutes
Wednesday, December 2, 2020

WAMU Community Council Members Attending:

Navroz Gandhi, Susan Weiss, Michele Manatt, David Bradley, Nakeisha Neal Jones, Raymond Weeden, Heather
Voorman, Christy Gavitt, Dave Nemazie, Sojin Kim, Manuel Ochoa, Lucinda Crabtree, Michael Akin, CC Gachet
and Alexis Moreno

WAMU/AU Staff Attending:

Seth Grossman, Dawnita Altieri, Nichole McCoy, Monna Kashfi, Matt McCormick, Mike Scher, Rob Bertrand,
Diane Hockenberry, Lynn Croneberger, Wynde Priddy, Ester Ciammachilli, Alexya Brown, Chris Chester and Jon
Peck

Members of the Public Attending:

Carey Paquette, Nigel Mote, Holly Cooper, Steve Kaffen, Sen. Cheryl Kagan, Barba Baumann, Ward Cooper,
Denise Burgess, Mindy Resier, Sonya Baskerville, Tina Murray, Hollis Summers, Stella Tarney, Gar Young, Austin
Naughton, Peter Crespin, Glenn Ihrig, and Lionel Rosenblatt

Welcome – Navroz Gandhi, Council Chair and Old Business

Navroz Gandhi called the meeting to order at 6:33 p.m. The September 9 meeting minutes were approved and
seconded by David Nemazie. A question was asked about the format used for the September minutes. It was
agreed that we would return to a summary of the meeting discussion.

The meeting moved to the station update.

Station Update

Seth Grossman provided an update on the Framework for Action plan since the September meeting.

Seth announced that the search for a permanent general manager launched today. This was an update to the
question of whether WAMU would have an interim or permanent general manager. AU leadership decided to
accelerate the search for the permanent GM. This will also minimize the number of transitions for the
organization. A search advisory committee will help guide the search and after the candidate field narrows,
finalists will be asked to meet with a wide range of stakeholders, including representatives from the Council.
Seth will work with Navroz and Susan to identify individuals on the community council to participate in
interviews and provide feedback for the final selection. The current timeline for finding a new GM is late April,
early May. We will continue to keep you updated on the progress of the search.

A group of content producing staff have filed a petition with the NLRB and will be represented by SAG-AFTRA.
We're in the midst of an election and we'll get the report from the NLRB with the results.

AU and WAMU are focused on issues related to the pandemic and the associated impacts, how it affected our
finances and audience numbers. You will hear from colleagues next about that data.
Navroz asked a question about Sasha’s replacement on the task force.

Monna responded that Sasha will be replaced and that the task force wanted to make sure that a representative
from 1A participated in the task force, so there will be two new members in the coming weeks.

Mike Scher gave an update on the station’s financial standing. Mike’s presentation provided historical context as
well as an outlook on the possibilities of WAMU’s financial position in the future. In 2017, revenue grew,
operating reserves started to recover and the operating revenue, grew substantially. In 2020, we were on pace
for about $40 million in operating revenue and the impact of the pandemic hit us in the fourth quarter.
Substantial losses in underwriting occurred principally. The team is continuing to watch spending and make
appropriate cuts to meet the demands of this time.

Lynn Croneberger reminded Council members about the upcoming campaign and its goal. So far, the campaign
is performing well. During the pre-campaign, the station raised $124,000. The Giving Tuesday goal was
$200,000 and the station brought in $376,000. Lynn shared a slide of WAMU’s campaign thank you gifts this
year and highlighted WAMU’s partnership with the Capital Area Food Bank.

Michelle Manatt asked for an update on the social media policy following the update given at the September
quarterly Council meeting by the Social Media Committee Co-Chairs.

Monna Kashfi responded that the social media policy was implemented on September 30- the original deadline.
The committee of staff members put together the initial draft and committee chairs worked it through feedback
sessions from the WAMU leadership team, AU stakeholders, as well as other members of WAMU staff. Then,
every staff member was asked to sign the policy to acknowledge that they have read it and agree to abide by it.
It has now become part of the station’s onboarding materials for new hires. The station has also convened a
standing committee that will be part of the review process if there is an issue with a tweet or post that is viewed
as being in violation of the policy.

The policy will be reviewed on an annual basis to recommend amendments as needed One of the problems that
we had with the NPR policy that we'd been following is that it hadn't been updated in nearly a decade. Social
media, as it existed back in 2011 when that policy was being drafted is very different than what we're
experiencing today.

David Nemazie asked whether there was financial support that came from American University, federal
opportunities or national NPR due to the COVID challenge?

Mike Scher responded that WAMU received some funding via the first CARES Act via the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting --- a little less than $100,000 from the CARES Act that was earmarked. We are not eligible for the
PPP program. Very few stations licensed to another entity were eligible. Only nonprofits were eligible.

Monna Kashfi introduced Chris Chester and Jon Peck before their presentation on WAMU/DCist’s audience data
and 1A audience data.
Jon Peck, Director of station relations and audience engagement for 1A.

Chris Chester, Growth editor at WAMU

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The station has managed to increase its users on WAMU.org and DCist.com from January to November of 2020.
That represents an audience of 15.7 million users so far. In short, that's the best year the station has had in the
history of WAMU for the news operations and the year isn't over yet.

The Instagram audience grew 400% since the beginning of the year, excellent work from COVID and the protests
by our photojournalists and work by our audience producer Alexia Brown. 70% of the DCist audience was on
mobile and it is occurring in digital listening, too. Last month, 40% of WAMU’s digital streaming occurred on
mobile. Overall D.C. radio market broadcast listening was down 27% this year. Stay-at-home orders and social
distancing have had an outsized impact on terrestrial radio listening. Every station in the market is down double
digits with one exception and the reasons are kind of intuitive.

The station went from number three to number two in the market for the most recent weeks of data the station
has available but with the pandemic raging we'll continue to face structural challenges that are out of our
control.

Jon Peck explained that AQH persons is the average number of people listening in a given 15-minute period and
AQH share is of all the people in D.C., the percentage listening to WAMU during a different time period, during
"Morning Edition" or other times throughout the day.

Jon described his role with 1A which to add new stations and grow the audience with our existing stations as
well. The show has been doing very well with Jenn White as the host and it is on a good pace with positive
feedback from listeners. It is likely the additional stations will pick up the show in the future. 1A has grown
during the same period when most NPR programming has shrunk.

Navroz Gandhi asked if Chris can tell in terms of the digital listeners or digital audience what the additional
demographic data is in terms of age, ethnicity and other metrics that are typical with the radio demographics?
And is the traffic locally in terms of the district, Virginia/Maryland or outside of the district?

Chris Chester responded that the data is harder to get for digital traffic. There's an approximation in Google
Analytic for age. The station gets better local audience on DCist than WAMU and it's spread evenly between
D.C., Maryland and Virginia but there's good information that comes nationally and internationally as well.

Christy Gavitt asked whether staff are able to ascertain the ratings between these three stations depending on
the hour as well? In other words say between 8:00 and 9:00 a.m., 9:00 and 10:00, et cetera. Are you able to get
into that much detail? Are you able to say when WAMU is on at least during weekdays or weekends the most
highly rated?

Jon Peck responded that ratings exist for every hour of the day. It can be done by day part or by weekend, and
staff can slice and dice the metrics in a variety of ways. WAMU rates number one with Morning Edition when
other day parts are up and down.

Monna Kashfi gave an update on the Task Force’s progress and the next steps in their work. She also shared
how the Council may be engaged with this work in the future. Currently the Task Force is in the midst of starting
their work on prioritizing areas of focus and developing recommendations that will be shared with staff and the
community council early next year. Once feedback has been gathered, the recommendations will be finalized to
share by early March. JSA will provide feedback sessions based on the interviews they did with staff, community
council, former staff and outside stakeholders. Task Force members would like to engage with the council to
hear feedback directly. There will be an update on this at the February meeting or later in February.

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Lynn Croneberger shared the update that AU’s Board of Trustees approved the initial slate of advisors for
WAMU. The members of the Board of Advisors are Paxton Baker who made his career in the entertainment
business. Wes Combs, founding principal of Combs Advisory Services. Navroz is the connection between the
board of advisers and community council. Jay Kloosterboer was in HR with a company called Dover Corporation.
Gary Knell, current chair of National Geographic Partners and Emily van Agtmael, trustee of the Sunrise
Foundation, one of our largest family foundation donors and her foundation focuses a lot on education. Finally,
Margery Kraus, Chair of the AU’s Communication Committee on the Board of Trustees. There is one AU board
number to be named. The inaugural board meeting will launch at the end of January or beginning of February.

New Business & Announcements – Navroz Gandhi, Chair

Navroz shared that nominations for Council members were ready for approval. Susan thanked members of the
Nominations Committee for their work on vetting and meeting candidates.14 candidates were interviewed for 6
slots on the Council.

Council members were asked to approve the slate of candidates: Mr. Samson Girma, Mr. Isaac Hunt, Mr.
Richard Kaufmann, Mr. Troy Donte Preston, Ms. Ayanna Smith and Mr. Maceo Thomas. Michele Manatt
seconded the vote. All members were approved to join the Council as of January 1, 2021.

Public Comments

MD State Senator Cheryl Kagan (D-Montgomery County) asked if WAMU could provide a better avenue for
feedback- like an email address? She also commented that both the D.C. and the Maryland PSA’s about voting
were outdated and were using old scripts. Kagan relayed her experience in Oct. 2020 when she had difficulty
reaching anyone at the station to alert them about the dated voter registration information. Kagan underscored
that there was no contact name or information listed on the website for her inquiry. 

Michele Manatt affirmed that this matter should be looked in to. 

Diane Hockenberry responded that she would work with her team to make the email address more prominent.

Steve Kaffen commented that the station sounds good and that he believes the niche aspect that DCist is doing
is excellent and should be continued.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:46 p.m. and was seconded by Christy Gavitt.

Dates for Quarterly Meetings:

o 2021: February 10, May 5, September 8, December 1