S/WB Radio: NonCom WVIA Parts With Longtime GM Bill Kelly

Bill Kelly

Public broadcasting station WVIA TV and FM has severed employment ties with emeritus executive director Bill Kelly following an outcry from supporters and exodus of members so loud and deep that the organization’s board of directors dug into their own pockets to buy out Kelly’s contract, according to The Citizen's Voice.

“We wanted a way to honor our legal obligation to an employee of 40 years while acknowledging how we hurt our membership,” said Alex Fried, vice chairman of WVIA’s board of directors, one of the 22 board members who came up with the $291,878 to buy Kelly out of the balance of his contract.

WVIA-TV lost almost half its members since the June 2013 announcement of the executive transition where Kelly, as emeritus executive director, would take a development post to raise money for a new endowment fund. For that he would be paid a salary of $199,000, slightly less than his regular salary but on the heels of his final year total compensation of $600,955.

At that time, WVIA-TV had about 15,000 members. It has since lost 6,300 members, said Tom Currá, who succeeded Kelly as executive director. About 2,300 existing members declining to renew specifically identified executive compensation as the reason.

Also, one in three members who failed to renew were lumped into a relatively new category for WVIA membership called “unprecedented hang-ups.” These were not cold calls, Currá said. Rather, they were renewal reminders, via phone, to members. The station attributed most of those abrupt rejections to the executive compensation issue.
The loss of members represents more than the loss of those members’ pledges. Federal funding, typically $1 million annually for the station, is partially calculated based on local membership.

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