In Black America; Meredith Beal, President and CEO of Lasting Value Broadcasting Group; Part 2

From the University of Texas at Austin, KUT Radio, this is In Black America. In trying to get into radio, I wanted to get something small, not too big a shoe, so I had a consultant who kind of showed me the ropes, took me around to some of the stations that were owned by people that he knew, so I could kind of get it for you. And over the course of maybe a year or so, I just hung out and watched and learned and subscribed to all the publications. And in the meantime, he and a couple of other consultants were looking for a station that was not too big and not too far from Austin. And in the process, we were in Atlanta, Georgia, and one of the engineers that I mentioned that he has just done an engineering study on a station in Marshall, Texas, which is where my dad is from. In part of Bill, President and CEO of Lasting Broadcasting Group. In 2007, Bill was named Texas Broadcasting over a year by the Texas Association of Broadcasters, TAB is the Nation of Largest State Broadcasting Association.

Bill is the owner of KCLWA of in Hamilton, Texas, KCOX and KTXJFM in Jasper, Texas. President and in the broadcasting industry, Bill was Global Webmaster for Dale. He has managed Dale Human Resources Information online. And his previous position that Dale was marketing and communications advisor worldwide for Dale University. He has an extensive technical background as well as a creative one. Bill has held previous positions, bringing from chemists, network implementation specialists and software engineer to editor-in-chief of major magazines and trade journals. Music producer, imported for the Los Angeles Times, and executive with Motown Records. I'm John L. Henson Jr., and welcome to another edition of In Black America. On this week's program, Lasting Value Broadcasting Group, with President and CEO, Meredith Bill, part two in Black America.

Well, I would like to think that something would be done about the imbalance, but when you have these huge corporations, these conglomerates that own hundreds or more than 1,000 stations, and are able to leverage their multiple properties in a particular market to be so that a small broadcaster will have a hard time competing with his rate card against somebody who owns four stations. And that mode of monopolies doesn't seem to be waning any. I mean, even Clear Channel, which was the largest broadcast owner in the United States, is being bought by another, I guess, what they call them now, private equity firms. So it's only the problem is, and I think a few years ago, ABC News came out and spent a couple days with me up in Hamilton, and what they were addressing was the FCC was getting ready to vote at their time on the ownership rules, again, what you're talking about. How many radio stations, TV stations, and on newspapers can one company own in one city?

In 1999, Bill saw some deals stocked in form lasting value to combine entertainment and technology to enhance education and culture. Born and raised in Los Angeles as a child, he spent a great deal of time in Texas because his father is from Marshall, Texas. He attended the University of Houston, where he majored in journalism. After graduation, he moved back to L.A. to accept the position with the Los Angeles Times. In 1978, while helping his cousin at her package store, he was shot with a sawdoth shotgun. The doctor told him he had 50 pellets in his body, some in his chest, heart, lung, eye, and hand. In 2001, Bill left Dell computer to focus on broadcasting and education, donating web design and video production classes to Houston-Tillerson University in Austin, Texas, and partnering with Teach One Entertainment to develop cartoon characters and positive content for children. As a broadcast, he advocates localism and community focus while keeping a global perspective. On today's program, we conclude our conversation with Meredith Bill.

Well, I was born in Los Angeles. My parents, my father's from Marshall, Texas. East Texas, my mother's from Small Town, Canfield, Arkansas, right outside of Little Rock. So I've been coming to Texas on my life, but never in Austin would spend most of my time with my grandmother. A couple of weeks up there had a hot in Houston and Uncle in Fort Worth. I made rounds every year. But I went to school in L.A. If we had to wait for a financial high school, I went to New University of Houston after that. My major was initially, I majored in chemistry and minored in journalism and then swissed them around later. Because I always been interested in science and chemistry, and I did work as a chemist for some years. And you worked at Dell Corporation? Yeah, that's what brought me to Texas. And what did you do at Dell? I was a global webmaster. My initial job there, I was a worldwide marketing communication advisor for Dell University. And then when the internet and internet started, they transferred me over to the human resources. And I was a webmaster for there.

So they sent me around to send me to Japan, how webmaster for Japan, send me to England, how webmaster there. And before coming to Dell, I was a director of marketing and Motown Records, which was another fun set of years. Kind of like a reality show. I mean, if you could have brought a TV up there, a camera on any given day and whatever happened that day was better than any reality we see today. Tell us about that day at 1978 at your cousin's liquor store. Well, I had a cousin who wanted a liquor store on the east side of town there. And I went into the store to help her one evening and these three kids, teenagers, came in to rob her store. And one of them walked up directly to me and he had a stocking mask and a pistol. And he pointed in my face and I was standing there with my hands up. He didn't say anything. And there were two of them. And the third guy walked in and he had a trench coat, long trench coat. And he came around the corner there and pulled out a sort of shotgun of the trench coat and fired a shot, shot me in the chest and face.

And bullets travel faster than sound. So the experience is kind of dreamlike. I mean, I felt myself falling and then you hear the shot instance later. And I'm laying on the floor. Is this a dream? No. This is real. I'm laying on the floor. But I'm the good guy. And I was supposed to happen to me. And my next thought. I had been practicing a niche and Buddhism for a couple of years by that time. And one of the things that really encouraged me to get into it was reading in the literature that as long as you continue to practice. Sincerely, you never encounter an obstacle greater than your power practice at that point. And that a strong practitioner could alter the destiny being put to death. So my thought was, OK, this just must be an obstacle. I got up off the floor, call my mother. Call 911 and sat down and started chanting. Now, I'm going to get to which is our practice. Please came in. I stopped to give them descriptions.

They, I continued to chant. I guess they thought I was getting historical something. So they told me to shut up. And I was like, I know what I'm doing unless you can stop bleeding or something, you know, leave me alone. The ambulance came and took me to the hospital. X-rayed me and put me in the room and my parents come in. And I didn't know what they were telling them. I felt like I was OK if I got that far. But I had no idea how badly I was wounded. And they told my parents that I had approximately 50 shotgun pellets as a double out in my chest, five had gone in my heart, formed my lung, went in my left eye and dozens in my hand. And that I would die. And if not, that I would be a vegetable. And the only other experience that we had to relate to, I had a younger cousin who had had a similar incident about eight months before me. Different part of town in a liquor store, but he got shot in the same chest face, same eye with a shotgun from somebody trying to rob a store.

And he was a vegetable at that time. And he had been in the hospital the entire eight months. So the prognosis from the doctor has seen reasonable, you know, to my parents. There was one pellet that was floating in my heart and they were trying to see where it landed before they determined whether or not they were going to do open heart surgery. And it wound up being surrounded by scar tissue in a perfect place, not to do any damage. So literally, you know, me and the doctors watched my body heal itself. I walked out of the hospital seven days later, no surgery. They had me returned in a couple of weeks in one of my chest to heal up some before they determined what to do about my eye. Recently, they had talked about having to remove my just grotesque prognosis. But when I returned, I had 2020 vision and the hemorrhage was gone and I still have the pellet in the back of my eye. So I'm very, very fortunate. I mean, that whole incident really showed me what's important was not important before they're not worried about my girlfriend and the rent and, you know, so all now since top, you know, life and death are important.

And it really gave me a sense of appreciation about living and to really do what I could to make life better for everyone. Did that lead to the name your company lasting value? Perhaps. I mean, I've always wanted to create value and one of the foundations of nation Buddhism is the creation of value or the philosophy of value creation. And so, yeah, they had a lot to do with why I named the company lasting value and hopefully I can create value for a long time that that endures. What led you to enter the broadcasting industry? Well, I've been interested in media, like I said, I minored in journalism and eventually majored in journalism. My first media job was as a reporter with Los Angeles Times. So that experience working at, you know, one of the biggest papers in the world showed me a lot. It taught me about the manipulation of information. I would see what was coming across when I tell a type and I see the story go out and it's like, hey, that's not what happened.

So it really made me pay more attention. It taught me to value a primary research and trying to develop your own relationships to find out what's going on. And so over time, I wrote for a number of magazines and newspapers and I was editor at various magazines and newspapers. And always I've been interested in, okay, what is the news media TV and radio telling people? And as a person who's kind of a history buff, that interested me as well. And so not enough African-Americans control their space. So that was one of the reasons I got into it that when I was growing up in the 60s, there were probably a dozen black owned stations in Los Angeles at the time. And across the country, you know, there were a great many African-American owners. And now it's down to maybe two handfuls if that. And so part of it was to try to improve what was going on in the airspace that I could control.

You know, less sensationalism, more community oriented, value creating stuff. And less hype. On ownership, I can remember back in the 70s and early 80s, a Reagan Henry who had a number of radio stations since then have sold off. Currently, Kathy Hughes is, I believe, the largest African-American on a broadcast properties. Why is it important, particularly for African-Americans, to own some of these airwaves? Well, it's because public opinion is generated that way. I mean, historically in the United States, public opinion was created through or control through the pulpit and the classroom. But in the, I guess, mid 50s or, you know, sometime between 40s, 50s, 60s, the media became the more dominant element in contributing to the creation of public opinion.

And so the sensibilities are the people who are at a news desk or, you know, an assignment desk at a TV station or radio station. Their opinions have a lot to do with what gets broadcast and the context of what gets broadcast. So when an event happens in, in Europe, and you tune into ABC evening news or it's CNN or something, they, that newscaster is telling you, here's what happening, here's what it means. But the what it means is from the viewpoint of his own experience, looking through the lens of his personal experience. And since there is a pitifully low presence of non-white people in newsrooms, what stories get assigned and how important they are and where they are in the list of broadcasts is impacted by that. We definitely need more ownership and more presence in the media that we don't know in order for the public to get a healthy balance of thought.

Ironically, the broadcast private is that you do own, don't broadcast exclusively to an African American audience. And in particular, I believe one of your first broadcast properties in Jasper, Texas, of all places, tell us how you came about purchasing that property. Well, you're uniqueness of that property. Well, as I mentioned, in trying to get into radio, I wanted to get something small and not too, too, about off something too big to choose. So I had a consultant who kind of showed me the ropes, took me around to some of the stations that were owned by people that he knew, so I could kind of get a feel. And over the course of maybe a year or so, I just hung out and watched and learned and subscribed to all the publications. And in the meanwhile, he and a couple of other consultants were looking for a station that was not too big and not too far from Austin. And in the process, we were in Atlanta, Georgia.

And one of the engineers there mentioned that he had just done an engineering study on a station in Marshall, Texas, which is where my dad is from. So it's like, hmm, let me go check it out. So we checked the station out and so I wanted to make it an offer, but it could never come to an agreement on a price with the owner. Meanwhile, they were still looking at the station and Jasper popped up. It was a slightly newer facility, slightly higher revenue. And dragging death of Jasper Jr. sometime before I believe it was 1997 or so. But in my visit down there, it didn't seem to be a trouble somewhere in place. And also the time I was still working in Dell. So I bought the station, retained the management and the staff that it was, retained the programming. It was named FM Combo, the FM was doing contemporary country and the AM was doing news talk, ABC News Network.

And so I left the format as it was and continued to do my work at Dell while we looked for other stations. Initially, the idea was, I was going to buy a few stations. I had some buddies who were also interested in radio, they were going to buy a few stations. So we were going to get these stations and put them together and create a network. And around not too far after I got into the second station, I purchased KCLW up in Hamilton, Texas, which was a classic country or the vintage old-style country. And that signal just barely touches Austin. So I was still looking for something in Austin but figured Austin was price prohibitive. And then a KOKE, which is 1600 AM, became available. And that was kind of like the last opportunity to get something in Austin. So I had made a down payment on that. And again, my buddies were going to come in with me, but around that time they lost their liquidity. So I was wanting to sit in the seat by myself.

That station I was going to, I was considering doing children's programming. So I was going to affiliate with Disney. They had asked me if I was interested in selling the station. And I said, well, I haven't closed on it yet, but everybody got a number. I'm sure you can write a check big enough. And another company believes Rodriguez Broadcasting was also interested. So they were in a bidding war in Rodriguez one. And so that's why I did not wind up with the station in Austin. But Jasper, it was two years before they found out I was African American. At least, I guess the bulk of the community. And that's when some of the troubles started. And those troubles were what? Well, a handful of good little boys took exception to their largest media being owned by an African American. And so there was pressure put on my advertiser, some of the sponsors. The transmitter was sabotaged. I had been in an investigation by the FCC on a few occasions. One of the investigations is just completed this past week.

And that investigation has been going on since June. And it was a frivolous complaint as all of them were. But because it's a public facility, they have to respond. So I have to pay for a lawyer to go tell my side of the story. And this one was basically accusing me of turning over ownership of the station without FCC permission, which was nonsense. And since June until just his past week or so, the investigation was going on. It kept happening to send in more documents and more documents. But there was never an opportunity for me to communicate what was really driving the investigation of the complaints in the first place. And one of the congressmen from Congressman Brady, where Jasper's congressman. He had made a call on my behalf as did a couple of other congressmen.

But weren't giving any information. We're still investigating. We don't know how long it's going to take. So they did all they could do legally. And, you know, so again, this past week, both of those complaints were dropped. Now we found ourselves in a, some of the conjures where the Telecommunication Act was changed to allow these mega corporations to buy and own multiple properties, broadcasts, and newspaper. In a particular market. How is this current state of affairs having an effect on mom and pop monarchy on broadcast properties? Do you see a switch coming? Well, I would like to think that something would be done about the imbalance. But when you have these huge corporations, these conglomerates that own hundreds or more than a thousand stations and are able to leverage their multiple properties in a particular market to be so that a small broadcaster will have a hard time competing with his rate card against somebody who owns four stations. And that mode of monopolies doesn't seem to be waning any.

I mean, even clear channel was, you know, which was the largest broadcast owner in the United States is being bought by another, I guess, what they call them now private equity firms. So it's only the problem is, and I think a few years ago, ABC news came out and spent a couple days with me up in Hamilton, and what they were dressing was the FCC was getting ready to vote at their time on the ownership rules. You're talking about how many radio stations, TV stations and a newspaper's can one company own in one city and calling into question with these companies gobbling up media properties in these communities and then changing the program. What is it doing to the culture of small town America when you have a station, which is being programmed out of, say, the East Coast and they're in a small town in Texas. And you take off high school football, you know, that's religion in Texas. So the problem is most of them are looking at revenue and cutting costs and increasing revenue, so they can eventually sell the property for, you know, for hopefully a big game.

In the process, most of the time, they are reducing personnel, automating a lot of things. And so the preservation of what's going on in the community and the culture and the fact that small communities in particular are dependent upon the radio station for, you know, the community to function. For instance, when I purchased a Hamilton station, their newspaper comes out once a week and that's a Wednesday. Now, if you die on Tuesday, the paper deadline is Monday, so if you die on Tuesday and you're feeling it was that weekend, it's not going to get into the paper until the next week. So they're dependent upon the local radio station to be able to communicate, you know, the obituaries, for instance. How are you able to compete in this environment?

I'll take some creativity and ingenuity, and fortunately, I have a very low audience. Again, in KCLW, that's the Hamilton station. That programming, that vintage country, you hear, you know, Loretta Lynn had Crawford, all the old guys. And there are about a handful of stations across the country who play that kind of music currently. So the people who do listen really love it. And as well, we're also broadcasting on the internet. So I have listeners from all over the world. We got one of the Cowboys in Australia. There's probably 400 or 500 listeners in England who go to a pub after work and listen to the Curial Prom Show, which is our most vintage program in the afternoon. So it's been trying to take advantage of technology. And in the case of Hamilton, it's one of those old grandfathered clear channel signals. So not clear channel of the company. But back in the 30s, the FCC created some protective signals. And I inherited, when I bought the property, I inherited that coverage.

So you can hear the station, I live in North Austin, you can hear it there. You can hear it in Fort Worth, Colleen, Waco, Abelene. I mean, it has probably the largest geographic coverage in Texas. So trying to take advantage of that geography has been a challenge. I opened up a sales office in Colleen a couple of times, but I had the wrong people. I still think that was the correct move. So one is using technology to extend your source in a revenue, for instance, terrestrially we can only broadcast one high school football game. But there are several other communities within 20, 30 miles of Hamilton that are, you know, have one high school in the city. And so we've been broadcasting high school football on the internet. So the ones we couldn't broadcast on the internet, now we're bringing them on the internet. And that is expanded to, we've been doing schools in Austin. So Fluegerville, Connolly, Mainer High School, we're broadcasting their games every week on the internet. One of the things in most small towns and most small radio stations,

the most popular program is called the Trading Post, which is kind of like a swap mean on the air. Somebody calls up, I got a baby carriage, I want $25 for it, here's my number. So it's matching people, somebody calling them looking for, you know, Finder 457 Chevy. So in small towns and also in bad economies, barbed of trade, which is our original motor commerce in the first place for human beings, people kind of revert back to that. So our Trading Post show is one hour every day, but we wanted to extend that. So we're rolling on an online version of the Trading Post, where people can come and post their stuff and buy stuff 24 hours a day. In addition, along with that, we're launching an e-base style auction for local stuff. So doing things and coming up with a unique things. We have a thing called Watermelon Winces, where our air personalities are hiding watermelons around town and then giving clues so people can find them.

One of our other programs that is real popular is called Shout Out from Iraq, where we have deployed soldiers calling in every Friday, giving a shout out to their buddies on what have you. And on the holidays, for instance, when Mother Days comes around, we'll be collecting Mother's Day greetings from soldiers during the week, and on Sunday we'll broadcast them all that day. So as a small station, we're able to do more things and not have to go through a lot of bureaucracy in order to get something approved. If an air personality or the General Manager or DJ comes up with an idea, we talk about it and, hey, we can implement it pretty quickly. So being in touch with the community needs and then addressing them, for instance, last year, Texas was hit badly by force fires. And in particular, my General Manager, there was a fire that came burned all the way up to like his fence. And had not been for these volunteer fire departments, his house would have burned.

Mayor DeVille, President and CEO of Lasting Value Broadcasting Group. If you have questions, comments or suggestions asked your future in Black America programs, write us. Also let us know what radio station you heard us over. The views and opinions expressed on this program are not necessarily those of this station. Or of the University of Texas at Austin. You can hear previous programs online at kut.org. Until we have the opportunity again for Technical Producer David Alvarez, I'm John L. Hanson Jr. Thank you for joining us today. Please join us again next week. CD copies of this program are available and may be purchased by writing in Black America CDs. KUT Radio, one university station, Austin, Texas, 78712. That's in Black America CDs, KUT Radio, one university station, Austin, Texas, 78712.

This has been a production of KUT Radio.