Zoren: Another well-known radio personality in Philly market gets the ax

Attrition strikes again at local radio stations, this round of layoffs affecting what might be the market’s most popular program.

Radio doesn’t have many stars these days. Local television doesn’t either for that matter.

Time has passed since a station in either medium seemed compelled to go out and recruit someone who could trigger the local imagination and attract audience by the force of his or her personality.

The mess, circa 2008, in which Channel 3 successfully handed anchor posts to nonheralded players in the wake of controversy involving stars Larry Mendte and Alycia Lane, ended the days when stations would seek and pay large sums for someone to helm their shows.

Susan Barnett and Chris May proved a newscast could survive an abrupt change from headline anchors to talent yeomen from the weekend and standby ranks.

Since then, you’ll notice you don’t see “faces” of a station the way Jim Gardner, Larry Kane, John Facenda, Diane Allen, Marc Howard, Tom Snyder or Mort Crim.

Yes, you have important players, such as meteorologist Adam Joseph at Channel 6 or morning raconteur Mike Jerrick at Channel 29, but you don’t have as many household names or on-air people everyone recognizes.

About the only anchor on current air who has the status and recognition Gardner or Kane once did is Channel 3’s Ukee Washington, and it would hard to argue he makes a significant difference in Channel 3’s ratings.

Channel 6’s Brian Taff, Channel 29’s Sue Serio, or Channel 10’s Tracy Davidson may have their followings, but would you place them in the same category as the past anchors mentioned?

No.

Only Washington and Joseph have that allure, and frankly, I’d guess Ukee, turning age 67 in August with almost 40 years at CBS 3, almost 30 years as a news anchor there, and 10 years as lead anchor, has to be considering when he would like to try a life that doesn’t commit him to performing at 5, 6 and 11 p.m., let alone the years he began work at 3 a.m. and the extra newscasts he anchors for Channel 57.

Once Ukee decides to take time and smell some roses, the era of star anchors in Philadelphia television ends.

For radio, the days of the star are long past.

As with Washington, Joseph, Jerrick, etc., there are scattered radio personalities will meaningful followings.

Pierre Robert has been in his midday spot at WMMR (93.3 FM) for as long as I’ve been writing this column, which is 42 years.

There’s the amazing Patty Jackson, who has survived industry and personal health challenges to hold down the 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. slot at WDAS (105.3 FM) while doing a Sunday morning show.

Patty may be the only one left in the market who has an audience that attends to her every word and idea.

Interesting that both Robert and Jackson work from the late morning to midafternoon, Jackson logging one more half-hour per weekday than her WMMR colleagues.

What’s missing with one possible exception, is the local morning show that matters.

Yes, there are niches.

WIP (94.1 FM) and the Fanatic (97.5 FM) field hosts that are celebrities to sports fans.

Meg Bragle, Melinda Whiting, Miss (Courtney) Blue, Bob Craig, Josh Jackson, and others are beloved by classic and jazz music fans at the only venue that presents those music genres, WRTI (90.1).

Dom Giordano is one of most recognized names with his brand of topical talk on WPHT (1210 AM).

WXPN (88.5 FM) appeals to the alternative music crowd while WHYY (90.9 FM) caters to leftish news junkies.

Every Uber driver I encountered during my recent recovery from heart surgery, especially those with spotty English, was tuned toWTDY (96.5 FM).

None of them are heard in the early morning, which I tend to spend with John Scherch on ‘RTI.

Gone are the days of morning drive powerhouses like John DeBella, Harvey in the Morning, or the late Ken Garland.

Nowhere do you find the program with which everyone you know is somewhat familiar and that spawns phrases, catchwords and local jargon that enters the Philly vocabulary or is immediately understood.

The closest we have today as a morning stalwart is Preston and Steve’s 6 t0 10:30 a.m. show on WMMR.

Preston (Elliot) and Steve (Morrison) have been entertaining in the morning since 1998, when their radio address was the defunct Y100.

Since 2005, they have held down the morning post at WMMR and might be the only radio hosts of star status outside of the niche performers: Jackson, Bragle, Giordano, Spike Eskin, etc.

Let’s face it, radio is not doing well these days. It is no longer the automatic supplier of ample ad revenue it once was. People listen to radio but not with the loyalty or passion I remember from monitoring WIBG or WFIL from under my pillow in my must-know-every-word-to-every record youth.

Preston and Steve seem to defy what’s happening in radio.

Especially some of the sadder repercussions of tough finances and owners who are not as tied or committed to broadcasting as the founders of most local stations were.

In short, radio, especially local radio, is losing its most essential asset, the local personality who resonates with an audience and creates a following, one that will go to see him or her at personal appearances to take promotional trips with them to Alaska, London, Rome, etc.

More and more, on-air voices at local radio stations are being laid off, relegated to odd, unpredictable hours, to asked to be good soldiers in moves that will spell local radio’s demise.

One move is taping a complete program that can be aired in a different market, perhaps several different markets.

A local voice could be heard anywhere that a station owner has another station, but locality and loyalty to a personality is surrendered in the process.

Layoffs have been most unkind.

They came to roost last fall when Andre Gardner, an afternoon fixture at WMGK (102.9), was axed overnight after a decades-long career that began at other stations and ended at ‘MGK.

One would think Gardner was among the untouchable. He was certainly resilient and popular enough to create that impression.

Preston and Steve’s show also seemed untouchable.

It has the ratings, following and happy combination of ingredients — music, talk, comedy, joshing among regulars, public servicesuch as its annual winter holiday food drive — that keeps listeners planted at its spot on the dial, the way I wake up only to John Scherch or Bobbi Booker at WRTI.

The hosts don’t do it alone. Like many morning shows, it features a cast of daily participants. These include Casey Fosbenner, Marisa Magnotta, Nick McIlwain and until Friday, Kathy Romano.

In the latest cost-cutting move at Beasley, one of the three most prominent radio station owners in the market, along with Audacity and iHeart, Romano, who did the news and added to the general conversation with Preston and Steve for 22 years, was summarily dismissed.

With a day’s notice.

One might think, “Well, the necessity of radio economics these days calls for some harsh decisions, and Romano was one on a show of six personalities, so …”

One might think that, but I think the 22-year tenure tells a story. As with Andre Gardner and others I might mention, Kathy Romano was on the air long enough to rate a good fee for her services.

Perhaps Beasley was pruning where it thought there was an abundance of voices, or perhaps it thought news, one of Romano’s key chores, could be related by anyone.

It isn’t a keystone of Preston and Steve’s show anyhow.

Either way, a successful radio personality of long-standing both in the industry and on the program on which she played an integral role and shared in the popularity of her show was chosen to be unceremoniously let go.

The buzz at all radio stations is, “Who’s next? Am I? Is anyone safe?”

Preston and Steve have reason to believe they are — safe, that is.

They recently signed contract extensions that cover them to about 2030. Pierre Robert, who follows them, has a pact that is good through 2027.

But what might be going through the minds of Fosbenner, Magnotta and McIlwain?

Do they think they dodged a bullet? Or are they worried the next round of belt-tightening at Beasley will find them in the crosshairs?

Romano wrote on Instagram that leaving Preston and Steve was not her choice.

Her departure was well-covered for a week before I had this chance to comment. Comment is necessary because these layoffs are becoming a trend and hitting the favorites as well as the lesser knowns.

Preston and Steve’s show should have been invulnerable. It is a definite gem among Beasley’s holdings, and Romano was a significant piece of its success.

Such a layoff makes one worry about the future of local, personality-based radio.

All broadcasting is based on personality.

Going back to television and radio having fewer bona fide stars, the danger is blandness and conformity that neutralizes broadcasting to nothing.

Look at how bland most of our local newscasts are. Look at the parade of unfamiliar, short-term faces that populate them.

If Kathy Romano can be tossed aside in the same way Andre Gardner and The Fanatic’s Tyrone Johnson were, local radio is in a tougher, more threatening position than I imagined.

Like Gardner, Romano left on an up note. Her Instagram post also says, “This isn’t a good-bye, just the turning of the dial to what’s next.”

Obviously, Romano did not have time to think about what that might be.

Maybe Patty Jackson, the crew at WIP, the hosts at WRTI and WXPN, and the talkers like Dom Giordano at WPHT show us the way to go: niche broadcasting.

Going for the general audience, as Preston and Steve do, might not have that rosy a future.

P.S. In their 27 years on the air and my 48 years writing about broadcasting, I have never met Preston Elliot or Steve Morrison. I think an interview is in order.

NBC10 anchor

Frances Wang, writing on social media, announced her May 5 departure from anchor chores at Channel 10 by saying, “The person who has been working since childhood is finally taking a break.”

Wang, who has been with NBC10 as an anchor for three years, added she is not finished with telling stories.

She worked in Miami, Sacramento and Spokane before coming to Philadelphia, so there’s no telling whether her next chapter will be here.

Personal appearance

As Kathy Romano and Frances Wang know, one of the best parts about working in television and being part of a particular show is the people you meet and associations you make.

Fifty years ago, I was given my first regular TV gig by Marty Jacobs at the bygone Channel 48.

My producer, who I spoke to daily by telephone before finally meeting her before my first appearance, was Linda Munich, widely known in the TV industry for her years as vice president of public affairs at Channel 6.

Linda and I would appear on programs for six years before she went to to Channel 6. When Channel 48 closed in 1983, I was a regular guest on Linda’s Channel 6 public affairs shows.

In life, the conversations that began on the telephone and continued on the air never ended. Linda and I are close friends who know every facet of the other’s life and work.

On May 21, we appear together again as speakers presenting a program about the evolution of television from a three-network world to today’s digital age at a Broadcast Pioneers luncheon at McCall Golf Club, 201 N. Lynn Blvd., in Upper Darby.

Tickets must be obtained in advance. They are $40 for nonmembers of Broadcast Pioneers and $35 for members.

You can order them at www.broadcastpioneers.com.