A new locally-driven radio station is set to debut in early 2015 in downtown Phoenix, born out of community desire for diverse media and a special opportunity from the Federal Communications Commission.
Rachel Sherman, the organizer for 102.9 FM, sees the station as a way to better represent Phoenicians in broadcast media. Inspired by Prometheus Radio in Boston, Sherman and other members of the downtown arts and culture communities pursued an FCC license for low-power FM (LPFM) radio in 2013.
When the applicants received the license, they extended outreach to other organizations in order to find a broad range of content for 102.9 FM.
“We’re casting a pretty wide net, because we want to bring in a variety of members who want to be engaged,” Sherman said. She went on to say that radio should be ” a conversation between the audience and the people who are producing it.”
102.9 FM is based on Buckeye and 12th streets and will run on low-power FM waves in downtown and south Phoenix.
By June 2015, Sherman hopes to be on the air hosting local programming at a syndication-level quality. The station has already begun sourcing local content, including a poll for the logo design currently up on the station’s website.
The station will highlight music and cultural production coming out of the state, as well as justice subjects including immigration, workers’ rights and health and education promotion.
“Radio is always being used in a public service space,” Sherman said.
Local listeners such as Vern Harner, who is pursuing a master’s of social work at Arizona State University, said 102.9 FM will be a more comprehensive portrayal of Phoenix metro area residents.
“On the radio, you can have real people in the studio sharing their stories,” Harner said, comparing community-sourced radio to other mediums where reporters and editors decide what is newsworthy.
It’s especially important for marginalized communities that information and stories come from a primary source rather than a traditional media lens, Harner, who is genderqueer, said. They cited a recent article in the Washington Post as an example: the feature provides an accurate illustration of genderqueer identities, but still conflates the concept of queerness in the headline.
Harner said that genderqueer, trans and non-binary individuals are often misrepresented as gay or lesbian in the media, and reporters rarely use terminology or definitions created by LGBTQIA communities. Encouraging local communities to share their stories firsthand would promote balanced representation of gay residents.
“One thing that comes to mind immediately is language,” Sherman said.
Sherman pointed out that the large and dynamic refugee population in Phoenix often doesn’t have linguistic media representation as an example.
“(Current) community and alternative news are great, but limited,” she said.
Sherman plans to help citizens produce their own content for the station, so they can then record and package their stories to be distributed elsewhere.
Christina Thornton, a Valley elementary school teacher and entrepreneur, said that the radio station’s nonprofit status will help make content truly locally-based.
“[In mainstream radio] the sponsors are a different demographic than listeners,” Thornton said. “There needs to be more of an interaction if we want diverse radio.”
Variety in FM radio would subvert consumers’ dedication to services like satellite radio or applications like Pandora, Thornton said. If 102.9 FM used the Internet to show behind-the-scenes content, the station would engage more people than typical radio, and would also help increase access for those who don’t consume radio in traditional time slots.
The station is also engaging the community through promotional events such as Ana Tijoux’s concert at Crescent Ballroom in mid-October that aim to fund the station and encourage local residents to produce and distribute content.
Upcoming events include a performance from Viento Callejero at Lost Leaf at 8 p.m. on Nov. 19. The station will also host a public dialogue about radio’s role in the community on Dec. 5 in downtown Phoenix, and also hold a posada celebration near Christmas.
The organizations 102.9 FM promotes will be movement-based organizations that prioritize people of color and non-male voices, Sherman said. True community radio will create safe spaces and encourage discussion among groups which have avoided the mainstream media, Harner said.
“Our notion of radio…is this passive noise,” Sherman said. “But it can and has been a hugely innovative tool to connect people.”
Contact the reporter at hjhayes@asu.edu
