The public radio station WAMU-FM will not renew its contract with Capitol News Connection when it expires April 30.
The AU-owned NPR member station no longer requires the services provided by Capitol News because the station has expanded its staff and is now capable of covering the news independently, according to Kay Summers, WAMU’s director of marketing and communications.
Capitol News provides WAMU with local and regional coverage of Congress in the form of segments called “news holes” that the radio station uses on-air. After the contract ends, WAMU will fill those holes with coverage from its local newsroom.
The decision will end a potential conflict of interest between the two parties, according to The Washington Post.
Melinda Wittstock, the founder and manager of Capitol News, is married to Mark McDonald, WAMU’s program director.
By ending its relationship with Capitol News, WAMU will have full editorial control over the content it broadcasts.
Summers said the arrangement between WAMU and Capitol News started in the fall of 2007 when the WAMU newsroom had a staff of only seven full-time employees and four people working part-time.
“It was a very small newsroom,” Summers said. “We didn’t have the local news resources to provide listeners with local and regional coverage of Congress, which is what Capitol News provided for us.”
Since 2007, WAMU has doubled its newsroom staff. The station now has 17 full-time and seven part-time employees and is capable of handling congressional coverage in-house.
As a result of the pending separation, WAMU will no longer provide listeners with popular programs such as “Power Breakfast” or “This Week in Congress.” After the split, WAMU will fill the empty time slots with its own coverage.
Summers attributed the growth of WAMU’s news staff to the tremendous support that the station has received from the community.
“It’s important to remember that the reason we are able to make this change, the reason that the newsroom has grown at all, is because the station has been the beneficiary of such incredible support from our members and our corporate business partners in the community,” Summers said.
Summers said that News Director Jim Asendio also played a major role in advancing the WAMU newsroom.
Summers started working for WAMU over four years ago, within a month of Asendio’s arrival at the station. Since then, Summers said she watched Asendio turn the station around and build it into a vibrant news source.
“This is at a time when other media are cutting local news service and cutting those jobs,” Summers said. “To see him being able to add them and bolster that coverage and provide that service to the community has been really remarkable.”
WAMU will continue to increase its staff and coverage of local and regional news.
“In many ways we’ve only just begun,” Asendio said. “This is not by any means the end of the line. This is very much, in my mind, the beginning of becoming a great newsroom.”
llandau@theeagleonline.com
