John Scott: Hartmann is History on Green960

This is it. The cat's out of the bag. Now we know what's going on: John Scott has truly lost his senses (at least his sense of the size and importance of the loyal San Francisco Bay Area audience of The Thom Hartmann Show on Green960).

The organizers of this group blog met with John Scott, programming director of Green960 at 2pm this afternoon at the Clear Channel offices in San Francisco to find out why the strange and seemingly non-sensical program changes that occurred to Green960's show schedule a few weeks ago.

The bottom line is ...

---

John Scott plans to ENTIRELY DROP The Thom Hartmann Show from Green960 (KKGN-AM)!

That's right. Soon, Hartmann will be history on Green960. No Hartmann at all. Not two hours. Not one hour. Nothing. NO HARTMANN on Green960.

Thom. Totally. Gone.

---

According to Scott, the decision has been made, and "the decision is final."

I don't think so.

As long-time listeners to Green960 will recall, Scott's programming history at Green960 has been anything but disciplined, consistent, and "final." Scheduling changes at Green960 happen about as often as most people wash their cars. Over the last few years, we've seen everything on the Bay Area's only liberal talk station from college basketball to ultra-hard-sell debt-elimination informercials to the best progressive radio programming in the country like The Thom Hartmann Show. After the hurricane of listener protest that erupted after Scott took The Stephanie Miller Show off the air (presumably another decision that, at the time, was "final") ... Scott rescinded his decision and put Miller back on the air on Green960 in her old morning drive time slot.

John was very gracious to meet with us today, taking a full hour of his time to do so, and explained to us in some detail the reason he'd made the earlier programming decision and had decided to give Thom's show the axe: Thom's Arbitron ratings on Green960 are, according to Scott, the "lowest of any talk show host on Green960." Lower even than Mike Malloy's ratings (I like Mike, for about half an hour at a time ... though I think it's a bit "Alice in Wonderland" to believe that Malloy actually has more listeners late in the evening than Hartmann did in the morning on Green960). Scott showed us two documents he'd prepared to bolster his case: one that showed Green960 as number 32 out of 98 in the Bay Area radio market (not bad, seems to me ... in the top third ... could be a lot worse), and another containing proprietary information that showed the stations audience share during most recent monthly rating period. The second document did indeed show a boost in listenership to Green960 during June and July of 2009 ... but that's where the data stopped. The increase in audience share which seemed to coincide with Scott's recent programming changes was limited to just those two short rating periods (the data were were displayed in biweekly recording periods, if my memory serves me correctly), and we had no additional data against which to compare the hand-picked numbers Scott showed us (e.g. we shown no data from previous years which would establish if this bump in share had occurred in other years during the same calendar periods).

Scott then went on to make very clear to us that ultimately what matters most in the radio biz, as in any other business, is profit (one could perhaps quibble with that ... but as a general principle, it's certainly true). But then he contradicted himself by telling us that Green960 has never made a profit in the 5+ years of its existence, and that Clear Channel was keeping it on the air only as a "loss leader" because they couldn't come up with another programming format that they thought would do any better than liberal talk on this station.

So, according to Scott, the bottom line (profit) is all that matters ... except when it doesn't matter at all.

Scott also noted the fact that Ed Schultz was a bigger name and had more clout nationally as one of the reasons to keep Schultz and ditch Hartmann ... despite the fact that Hartmann is the top-rated liberal talk radio host in America (Thom's the only progressive in the top 10, ahead of Schultz by several slots). Scott saw as unconvincing our rebuttal that what works nationally is really irrelevant on a local radio station, and that, for the Northern California region that Green960 reaches, Hartmann is just much more representative of our own special local brand of SF Bay Area liberalism than is the gun-totin' Schultz with this "voice from the heartland."

In another contradiction, Scott said that Schultz was only doing "a little better" than Hartmann had been doing on Green960 in the morning time slot. So ... since Schultz was slightly ahead of Hartmann, Hartmann gets kicked completely off the station? When asked what Scott planned to air during Hartmann's current 4-6pm time slot, Scott replied "local programming." Oh, boy. Hold on. Here we go again! Apparently, Scott plans to revive the failed "local programming" experiment that he already tried and then abandoned a couple of years ago. I remember Scott had his own show on Green960 for a while (thankfully, it wasn't a long while ... Scott's show and the whole "local programming" thing was, shall we say, a real yawning festival).

When we asked Scott if he'd be willing to put a referendum on the Green960 web site asking listeners to chime in on which host, Hartmann or Schultz, was better suited to have on the station during the coveted morning time slot, Scott replied "You'd have to pay me [i.e. the station]." In other words, no, he was not willing to consider that. The die has been cast. Hartmann is out of the lineup. Completely. Period.

Again ... I don't think so.

I think Scott can be persuaded. Green960 listeners have already succeeded by a massive show of indignant protest in convincing Scott to reverse earlier boneheaded programming decisions like the one to drop The Stephanie Miller Show. He "un-made" that decision after a huge outpouring of negative listener reaction showed him he was wrong. I think we can do it again!

Here's the plan:

1. Write a short, polite (at least relatively polite), but firm message indicating your abject, horrified disapproval of John Scotts' recent decisions first to demote Thom Hartmann to only two hours a day on Green960, and then, unfathomably, to entirely drop Thom Hartmann, America's best liberal talker, from the Green960 lineup.

2. Send that message to John Scott, his boss at Clear Channel (Green960's owner), and Clear Channel's CEO:

---

John Scott

Programming Director

KKGN-AM (Green960)

340 Townsend St., 4th Floor

San Francisco, CA 94107

johnscott@clearchannel.com

Phone: 415-972-1111

Fax: 415-356-5571

Green960 Feedback line (call 24/7): 415.356.5546

-

John's boss (owner of KKGN-AM: Green960):

Michael Erickson

Clear Channel Communications, Inc.

200 East Basse Road

San Antonio, TX 78209-8328

michaelerickson@clearchannel.com

Phone: 210-822-2828

-

Mark Mays

Chief Executive Officer

Clear Channel Communications, Inc.
200 East Basse Road
San Antonio, Texas 78209-8328

(210) 822-2828

---

3. So that each of the three gentlemen above knows that the other two received also your complaint, make sure you "courtesy copy" (cc) the others on each message/fax/letter you send.

4. In addition, phone calls to all three individuals above are a great way to add fuel to the raging fire of Green960 listener indignation at Hartmann's demotion and unceremonious ousting from the station's regular weekday schedule.

5. Send a link to this post to as many progressives as you can think of, especially Hartmann fans in the SF Bay Area, to let them know of the terribly harm that's about to be done to liberal talk radio in the City by the Bay, and encourage them to take action also.

6. Spread this info far and wide on progressive message boards, etc. ... and don't forget to comment on the Green960 blog, as well. Click here to go to Scott's latest post.

(Notice the part where Scott writes: "Want Thom Hartmann to be on Green 960-2? Say so." Great. Scott's screen-testing Thom for a spot on the all-digital Green960-2, after canning him on the station's AM radio signal. Gee ... thanks a lot, John.)

7. Sign the petition to get Thom Hartmann back, live, all three hours, in his old time slot, nine to noon weekdays, on Green960 (or other comparable station in the SF Bay Area).

8. Join our group!

(This site is a group blog; see the sidebar for info on how you can become a "Green960 Fixer.")

I want to say that I think John Scott is a progressive who does in fact support the liberalization of America (although he also does the programming for right-wing talk station KNEW-AM, another Clear Channel property). I also think he care's a lot about his job (one certainly can't blame him for that, especially these days). It was kind of John to invite us to meet with him at his office and discuss the whole thing today, and he seemed genuinely concerned to hear our grievances and to let us know what he had to say about them. I think he's a bit mixed up, though, and is making a very foolish decision in kicking Thom Hartmann to the curb on the Bay Area's only progressive AM talk radio station ... but it's his decision to make, not ours.

Without us listeners, however, there is no Green960, and John Scott has no job. I told him that I understand he's doing what he thinks is in the best interest of the station ... but that I think he's wrong, that he's making a really, really bad business move, that he'd better be ready for a firestorm of extreme discontent from disappointed, disaffected, disillusioned, flabbergasted, and outraged Thom Hartmann fans, and that such is the magnitude of the negative reaction I expect at the news of Hartmann's elimination from the station's lineup that Green960's reputation in the progressive community could be seriously hurt and station owners could easily see a mass exodus of formerly loyal Green960 fans to other stations (like locals KGO-AM, KPFA-FM, KQED-FM, and via online stream from Portland's KPOJ).

Although Scott didn't tell us when Hartmann's show would be getting the axe, I imagine the plan is for it to happen sooner rather than later.

The San Francisco Bay Area NEEDS a good, progressive talk station, with the nation's best liberal talkers, like our favorite, Thom Hartmann.

You know what to do, Hartmann fans ...

Let the fireworks begin!

Let's Fix Green960!