After the firing of KUT and KUTX General Manager Debbie Hiott by the University of Texas at Austin, supporters of the stations have questions about the organization's relationship with UT — and whether they should continue to operate under the state's flagship university.
In an interview after her firing, Hiott called for such a change. She reiterated that call in an interview this week, saying her termination was a sign that UT was "willing to interfere" in the stations' work.
"That level of interference is something that the community should be concerned about," she said. "The community pays for KUT and KUTX and Texas Standard, and the community should be the ones responsible for the stations."
NPR stations across the country have taken steps to move out of the university-backed model, but detangling the stations from UT after decades would be a long, financially complicated process.
What is KUT's connection with UT?
KUT wouldn't exist without the University of Texas, if that wasn't made obvious by the station's call letters. Those letters stretch back more than 100 years, when the physics department decided to start experimenting with newfangled radio wave technology in the 1920s.
UT professor Robert Schenkkan created the station in its current form in 1958 under the purview of UT's School of Communication. In 1971, KUT became one of the first stations in the country to air programming from newly founded NPR.
Currently, KUT and its sister music station KUTX are part of UT's Moody College of Communication, and the stations broadcast from the Moody College building on campus.
UT holds the licenses of both KUT and KUTX to broadcast as nonprofit stations through the Federal Communications Commission, while the community provides material support for the station. It's a commonplace arrangement in the world of public media. KTEP, the NPR station in El Paso, has a similar agreement with the University of Texas at El Paso, as does WOSU, the Columbus, Ohio-based NPR station that's housed on The Ohio State University campus.
More than half of NPR stations in the country are licensed by universities, according to NPR.
When people donate to KUT and KUTX, does that money go to UT?
Technically, yes.
People give to both stations at varying levels. It could be a $5 a month donation or an endowment for specific programs like Texas Standard or the stations' internship programs. UT processes those donations, which then go to accounts managed by KUT and KUTX. That money pays staff salaries, equipment, operating costs, laptops, mixing boards, pens — pretty much everything staff members need to do their work.
Ultimately, staffers are university employees, but every dollar that's donated to KUT and KUTX goes to the stations' work, said Wade Lee, the organization's assistant general manager for strategy, engagement and development.
"If a donor says, I want this money to go to KUT, UT has to spend it on KUT," Lee said. "That's just how fundraising and nonprofits work."
For decades, the stations also received money from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Now that the CPB has been dissolved by Congress and federal funding to public media has been cut, KUT and KUTX rely even more on donations from the community. The cuts, which went into effect last year, amounted to $2.4 million over two years.
So the university has no financial involvement in KUT/X?
The stations' payrolls are processed by UT and employees receive benefits through the university, which also manages IT, HR and other facility-related costs like the electricity bill. KUT pays in part for those services every year to both UT and the Moody College of Communication.
Last fiscal year, KUT and KUTX paid $380,000. UT received $200,000 of that money and the Moody College received $180,000, according to KUT/X's financial services department.
KUT does not receive any money from the university; just those university in-kind services, which donations help pay for every year.
UT owns KUT and KUTX's backup radio tower out in Bee Cave, but the stations' pay to lease tower space in West Lake Hills for their primary broadcast tower.
The stations raised money to build KUT Public Media Studios, which was completed in 2012. But that space, which houses offices and the stations' studios, is within the Moody College and is owned and operated by UT.
KUT previously took out a loan with UT in 2012, when it decided to purchase a new station that became KUTX. KUT raised $2 million and then took out a 10-year loan for $4 million to purchase rights to the station after a vote from the UT Board of Regents. The station has since paid back that loan.
In short, while KUT and KUTX are responsible for fundraising to pay their operational costs, the university ultimately owns their building, hardware and licenses to broadcast.
How does this work with the journalism of it all?
UT has no oversight over KUT's journalism. KUT journalists have been reporting on Hiott's firing, but the university has had no hand in the editorial process.
But there is no formal agreement laying out that separation, according to KUT leadership.
KUT and KUTX interim General Manager Gerald Johnson, who took over for Hiott, said at a meeting with staffers last week that he was "surprised" there wasn't some sort of agreement outlining the editorial independence.
Johnson previously directed Texas Student Media, which has had an agreement outlining its editorial independence from the university for decades. Johnson, who will serve for three months as general manager while the university searches for a permanent replacement, said he would be open to discussions about KUT's editorial independence, but couldn't commit to finalizing any agreement.
"I don't know if I will have that completed in three months," he said.
KUT News reached out to the university for comment but has not heard back.
While there were some informal discussions with Moody College early on in her tenure, Hiott told KUT she never saw an immediate need for a formal agreement between the stations and the university about editorial independence.
"The biggest protection is — remains — the First Amendment," she said. "In my mind, if someone's willing to violate the First Amendment, they're also willing to violate some sort of little document between the station and whoever is there at the university."
Could KUT separate from the university?
Yes, but it wouldn't be an easy process.
UT holds the FCC licenses for both KUT and KUTX and the university is enmeshed in the stations' day-to-day operations — and has been for decades.
Any push would have to be approved by the UT System's Board of Regents, all of whom are listed as owners on the station's FCC license.
This is something stations across the country have done. Both KCUR, the NPR station in Kansas City, Missouri, and St. Louis Public Radio have made the move to separate from the University of Missouri–Kansas City and the University of Missouri–St. Louis, respectively.
Both stations partnered with nonprofits to take over their FCC licenses last year, but untangling from universities is a complicated legal process. KCUR committed to separating from its university within three years. St. Louis Public Radio also said it would separate from its university within three years.
In addition, both stations have to sort out how to pay for services like IT, HR and other in-kind services similar to the ones KUT and KUTX receive from UT.
Both stations are still in the negotiating process of that separation. After that, they must get approval from the FCC for the universities to sell the broadcast license and transition.
There have been discussions about a transition out from under UT among KUT and KUTX donors, according to Lynne Dobson and Greg Wooldridge. The philanthropists have given $2.5 million to KUT in the last five years through their Tejemos Foundation, which also supports Austin PBS and The Daily Texan.
In light of Hiott's firing, they had discussions with donors about how to separate KUT and KUTX from the university, Wooldridge said.
"We're steeping in it right now," he said. "It's kind of uncharted territory about how this would work and I've gone down a couple of rabbit holes."
Wooldridge said UT's push to move the KUT Festival off campus and Hiott's firing suggest a "red tide rising" among the university's administration, citing recent conservative-backed efforts to influence practice and policy at universities across the state.
Hiott said the possibility of moving KUT and KUTX out of the university was something she wanted to address before her firing. She said she would "advise folks, if asked," but that she wouldn't take a frontline role in any of those efforts.
"Whatever is going on has to be a community-led effort, not Debbie Hiott-led effort, not a KUT behind-the-scenes-led effort," she said. "It needs to be the community deciding this is a hugely important asset for us and this is what we would like to see done with this community asset."
Dobson said even if a coalition of donors came together to form a nonprofit to take over KUT and KUTX, she's not sure the university's regents would OK passing off the stations.
"I think it's a big mountain to climb," she said.
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