Former Head of St. Louis Public Radio Sues For Defamation

Former St. Louis Public Radio general manager Tim Eby claims in a defamation suit filed this week that newsroom staff falsely accused him of racism and financial mismanagement after he was forced to resign amid controversy nearly three years ago.

Stltoday.com reports Eby served as general manager of the station for 11 years until September 2020, when he was ousted after employees publicly alleged he failed to combat systemic racism there.

In his lawsuit, filed in St. Louis Circuit Court, Eby claims that statements made in articles the station published after his departure included false characterizations that hurt his reputation.

“Tim had worked in radio since he was in college and was passionate about his work,” the suit claims, adding that as a result of the accusations he “was unable to find a job in his chosen field.”

Tim Eby

The lawsuit names the University of Missouri Board of Curators as defendants.

The station — KWMU 90.7 FM — is a National Public Radio affiliate licensed to the UM Board of Curators and operated by the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

A spokesman for the University of Missouri System on Wednesday said the university disagrees with the claims. “We are looking forward to responding to the lawsuit in court,” the spokesman wrote in an email.

Rachel Lippmann, a member of the organizing committee for the St. Louis Public Radio Guild, said the group’s members also dispute claims in the suit. “The St. Louis Public Radio Guild stands by the important reporting of its members,” Lippmann said.

Eby’s suit argues that staff resentment and financial strain both intensified at the station after the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Corporate donations plummeted. Leadership had to cancel large fundraising events and the university forced “wildly unpopular” mandatory salary reductions that affected the majority of the station’s staff. Eby, according to the suit, took a voluntary 10% pay cut amounting to about $15,000. He was paid about $142,000 at the time of his departure.

Then in July 2020, the suit says, 26 staffers frustrated with the lack of diversity and treatment of minorities at the station sent Eby and then-executive editor Shula Neuman demands for a list of changes, including more diverse hiring and the return of a Race, Identity, and Culture editor.

Eby’s suit claims the station refused several of the demands that were “financially impossible” or would create illegal “race-based hiring criteria.”