Radio Dazed

[October 13th, 2004] The future of KPSU, a rare outpost of eclecticism on Portland's radio dial, is in doubt this week, as the Portland State University station and Portland Public Schools can't seem to tune in to the same frequency.

For the past 10 years, KPSU has leased 73 hours of airtime each week on KBPS 1450 AM, the frequency run by Benson High School's communication-studies program. KPSU pays Portland's biggest school district $46,000 a year to rent the station on evenings and weekends.

At midnight on Oct. 15, the current contract ends, and Benson might kick KPSU off its airwaves. That would reduce Portland State's station to a weak FM signal barely audible beyond its downtown campus.

Will KPSU go mute? Depends on whom you talk to.

Ava Hegedus, KPSU's station manager, claims her station is still in negotiations to sign a new contract. But Bill Cooper, KBPS's station manager and Benson alum, disagrees, saying that negotiations are definitely off.

"We decided it's time for all of the airtime on KBPS to be devoted to students," Cooper says. "Basically the sticking point has always been that we wanted to have time to broadcast live sports, and they've always been hesitant to do that."

First switched on in 1923, KBPS is a key part of Benson's communications curriculum. The station allows students to learn about radio history, improve their announcing skills and log on-air broadcasting time.

When KPSU began renegotiating with Portland Public Schools in August, the college station was shown a new contract that allowed KBPS to reclaim some KPSU airtime to broadcast high-school sports. Hegedus says KPSU wasn't happy with the contract but entered the next meeting, on Sept. 14, intending to work something out.

"The meeting kind of ended with a question mark," Hegedus says of the session. "Cooper came back later that day with a termination-of-contract notice, saying, 'You guys are going to be off the air on the 15th of October.'"

Cooper's superiors don't exactly say he's wrong. But Portland Public Schools general counsel Jollee Patterson insists negotiations between Benson and KPSU are still on. Patterson says that she's handling the discussions and Cooper still has a voice in the matter, although Benson Principal Christie Plinsky has the final say.

What she'll say--and whether KPSU will still be on the air come Saturday morning--is anyone's guess.