Iowa Public Radio makes cuts

IOWA CITY (AP) — Iowa Public Radio has bought out, laid off or reassigned five employees and will leave four other positions unfilled in an effort to cut costs.

The umbrella news organization, which is made up of employees at radio stations at Iowa’s three public universities, said it must reduce expenses after state and university funding dropped off this year. That funding makes up about one-third of the three stations’ total revenue.

Iowa Public Radio CEO Mary Grace Herrington said Thursday the cuts will affect the marketing and music library. She said none of the cuts will come from news or talk show programming, and none of the shows currently on the air will be eliminated.

“The jobs affected are not necessarily part of the listener’s space,” Herrington said.

Herrington said the cuts are the last part of a four-year merger between the radio stations at the University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa. Of the five people cut, two took early retirement packages, one was moved to another role within a university and two others were laid off.

The nine positions were about 14 percent of the total organization staff. After the cuts, Iowa Public Radio will have 55 employees.

The staff cuts come despite overall good news at Iowa Public Radio. Listeners to the stations have increased by 22 percent since the merger began in 2005, and individual membership is up 7 percent from a year ago.

The listener increases can equate to more revenue, Herrington said, because they enable stations to charge more for air time.

“Things are going in the right direction,” Herrington said. “We just need to be very careful with our operating dollars.”

The stations are overseen by a five-member board of directors and will run on an operating budget of a little more than $6 million a year.

The stations generated about $7 million in revenue in the 2009 fiscal year, which just ended. That figure will be cut by 10 percent in the current fiscal year in part because of a 17 percent reduction in funding from the universities and 8 percent cut from the state.

“The good news is, we’re re-engineering our efforts in development and shoring up operating expenses,” Herrington said.

Iowa Public Radio broadcasts on 21 frequencies across the state.

In 2007, the stations went to three formats: news, classical music and alternative music. Herrington credits this change in part with driving up membership numbers.