KQED — Facilitating Dialogue and Direction with Its Community
I don’t think we ever had as much valuable feedback, real engagement, or two-way conversation as we do now. — John Boland, President, KQED
I feel really energized and inspired by the way that we’ve been able to really integrate the Community Advisory Panel into the newsroom in ways that are meaningful and useful. — Holly Kernan, Vice President of News, KQED
I feel it’s important to show up right now. It’s not the time to punch the exit door. — KQED Community Advisory Panel member
Homelessness! Bay Area college students living on Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART).
Immigration! Families torn apart by government raids on local communities.
How many of us, after listening to or viewing stories like these, have been motivated to act but do not know how to help or whom to contact?
How many of us living in communities, or as a member of a constituency directly impacted by these and other critical community issues, wonder if what is actually happening on the ground is accurately being communicated to the public?
The dramatic refocusing of the public media model to better serve the needs of today’s diverse audiences, combined with an increasing tide of civic activism and involvement with media organizations, is redefining traditional relationships between media and the community and impacting how news and content are being shaped and communicated. At KQED, the station’s Community Advisory Panel (CAP), committed volunteers from across the Bay Area, are initiating innovative experiments to strengthen dialogue and communication between public media and the Bay Area community.
Community’s Role to Advise
With the exception of some specific entities (e.g., state-owned stations), any public media station receiving funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) must have some sort of a Community Advisory Board (CAB). A CAB’s role is advisory in nature, but it cannot exercise any control over the daily management or operation of the station. CABs meet regularly to review programming goals established by the station, service provided by the station, and significant policy decisions rendered by the station that relate to specific communities being served.
Partly because of the CAB requirement, many public media stations have found it challenging to find a role for their CABs that is satisfying, provides a value to their organization, and worth the time of the community members who serve on them. As an outgrowth of its most recent strategic plan, and the infusion of activist community members, this has not been the case with KQED’s own CAP (KQED’s version of a CAB).
Historically, KQED’s CAP has served as a positive mechanism for community relations, with individual members serving as de facto station ambassadors within their respective communities. Over the past few years, spurred by KQED’s strategic emphasis on “audience first,” new staff leadership, and a greater connection with the station’s content and news divisions, CAP has taken on a new energy and purpose. As opposed to the late-1990s and early-2000s, when the station had a difficult time recruiting and retaining members for CAP, recruitment is now much more competitive, and very few CAP members desire to end their six-year terms.
KQED has positioned itself as an organization that is deeply invested in its community. This shift is reflected in the types of individuals interested in serving as CAP members. The make-up of CAP includes community leaders and activists representing the Bay Area’s diverse constituencies and geographic regions. Being deeply involved in community issues, CAP members are by their nature very proactive and action-oriented. They are passionate about public media and eager to identify how they can best exercise their role as public ambassadors to raise awareness and find solutions to issues within their community. In creating an agenda for CAP, Yo Ann Martinez, KQED’s Project Supervisor for Community Engagement, stresses the importance for its 24 members to feel that they are making the most of their time and providing value back to the community.
I really wanted CAP members to be active in a way that they felt they were making crucial contributions, considering the time they put in and their talent. So I really push for something that is tangible, something that they can do, something they can be proud of, so they will continue on the panel and I can retain them for the full term. — Yo Ann Martinez
This past year, CAP created an action plan to focus better on the work they hoped to accomplish. Three subcommittees were formed around specific topic areas: Q-Cares, Content, and Nominating.
Q-Cares: Responding to the Public’s Desire to Act
The Q-Cares group was created as a way to respond proactively to community inquiries when there is strong interest in a particular story or issue covered by KQED. The idea for this function came about as a result of conversations between Holly Kernan, KQED’s Vice President of News, and CAP members during a retreat in 2016. Kernan was interested in exploring ways KQED could channel community interest and concern while maintaining a necessary separation between the station’s journalists and the public’s desire to help.
Every few months we’ll do a story that really elicits a big outpouring of our audience asking, “What can I do, how can I help.” As a community service organization, we didn’t want to always say to them, “Well that’s not what we do.” In responding to the public’s interest, we want to make sure that a clear firewall between our journalists and community activism is maintained. So, the problem we grappled with was: Can we figure out how we can serve these needs while making sure that the journalism is completely separate and insulated from any activism without having to send people away? — Holly Kernan
One story reported by KQED in 2016 that particularly resonated with the public dealt with the predicament of homeless Bay Area college students.
Public response was exceptionally strong to the plight of Brittany, a community college undergraduate who, while attending classes, was living on BART. Soon after the program aired, KQED was flooded with inquiries from the audience wanting to know how they could provide funding or housing support for Brittany. One KQED viewer ultimately provided Brittany with an apartment, but the sheer number of inquiries to this and other stories led Kernan to approach CAP for assistance.
CAP members saw Kernan’s conundrum as an opportunity for the panel to provide value to both KQED and the community in a manner that keeps the journalist separate from any action people in the community may want to take on an issue addressed in that news story. For CAP members, Q-cares provides a heightened sense of purpose:
When Q-cares started, I felt like, as a CAP member, I had a bit more ownership, and there was something more concrete that we could do rather than relying solely on the news team to give us something to do.–-Grace Sonia-Melano, CAP member
As a result, a system is now in place whereby Kernan can alert Q-Cares team members when a particular story generates a strong public desire to assist or contribute in some way. Any newsroom involvement begins and ends with these alerts.
All inquiries forwarded to Q-Cares receive some level of response. Members of the community may want to donate an item to a homeless person, for example, or volunteer, or provide a transportation voucher, or contribute to a nonprofit organization. The Q-Cares team reviews all inquiries and decides as a group how to address them. Having familiarity and experience in dealing with community issues, CAP members are uniquely qualified to connect the public with Bay Area organizations and resources positioned to help.
To accept funds from community members who may want to donate to a particular cause and to ensure a legal separation from KQED, CAP has established a Q-Cares Fund, a donor-advised fund managed by the Philanthropic Ventures Foundation (PVF). Funds donated through PVF are tax-deductible and can be earmarked by the donor for a specific purpose. Soon after establishing the relationship with PVF, Q-Cares had an immediate impact for one Bay Area immigrant family whose story was reported by KQED.
As reported in the story, the father in the family was arrested by agents from US Customs Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the arrest left the man’s pregnant wife and young disabled child with no means of support. After the story aired, people began calling and emailing KQED, asking what they could do to help. These inquiries were forwarded to the Q-Cares subcommittee. The family was already working with an organization providing legal services, so Q-Cares members referred other agencies to them, or suggested the family go through PVF. In addition, the family foundation of a Q-Cares team member was able to secure funds to provide groceries for the family.
Other initiatives that were facilitated through Q-Cares include support to secure housing and furniture for a homeless father and his son, and additional follow-up support for students profiled in the story on Bay Area homeless.
Q-Cares is still in its early stages, but CAP members and KQED are very enthusiastic about its long-term potential.
Q-Cares was a really exciting breakthrough. It was clear that CAP members could actually respond to community needs and still allow KQED to maintain high journalistic standards. — Holly Kernan
Content — Broadening the Conversation
Advising stations on content (or pitching content ideas) is an area where many public media community advisory groups concentrate their efforts. Though an occasional idea may actually make it into production, the majority of community-driven content suggestions often fall on deaf ears. Today’s news cycles are 24/7, leaving little time for producers or journalists to follow up on story ideas from the community. The demands of keeping up with rapid news cycles, however, can often result in reporting that lacks proper breadth or context especially when addressing complex issues impacting the community, such as immigration, poverty, education, and homelessness. Points of view from those most impacted may often be absent from a story’s narrative.
KQED’s CAP is composed of individuals who have experience or know first-hand the impact of these social, economic, and political issues on the people they serve. It is with this in mind that new members to CAP’s content subcommittee hoped to infuse new energy and purpose into this function.
At the outset, the absence of a systemic method for pitching story ideas to KQED’s content producers and journalists was a flaw that new members of the content subcommittee wanted to rectify. Rather than simply forward random ideas to KQED staff via e-mail, CAP has incorporated Google docs as a tool to regularly alert and update KQED’s news department of breaking news, events, or concerns within Bay Area communities. This collaborative document-sharing process allows everyone within CAP and KQED News to review, comment, and share various story ideas.
A second and potentially more directed and impactful role for CAP in connecting community with KQED is the development of the Breakfast of Legends — opportunities for KQED journalists to meet face to face with community leaders and influencers to engage in open discussions about critical issues affecting the broader Bay Area community. The concept, initially spearheaded by CAP member Jacqueline Martinez Garcel, President of the Latino Community Foundation, came out of a briefing with KQED staff on elements of KQED’s strategic plan. What intrigued Ms. Garcel was the plan’s focus on audience:
KQED walked us through the plan. One of the things they emphasized was wanting to have their ear to the ground, growing the market from which they are drawing stories, and identifying and understanding the next generation of listeners. In California, Latinos are a plurality — we’re 39 percent of the population. I said to myself, how can we create opportunities for our community partners to learn about KQED and the breadth and depth of their reporting? How do we ensure that they know that KQED is trying to put out stories that reflect what is happening right now? How do we make sure that reporters who are trying to find resources, data, and stories, are connected to these frontline leaders? That is where the idea of Breakfast with Legends came from. — Jacqueline Martinez-Garcel
Garcel and other CAP members approached Holly Kernan with the idea of convening an informal meeting between KQED journalists and Bay Area community leaders to discuss immigration. After a few months of planning, the meeting was held in San Francisco at the Greenlining Institute in June 2017. In addition to KQED journalists, approximately 50 community leaders from diverse Bay Area organizations addressing immigration issues were in attendance, including representatives from five different organizations serving multiple audiences comprising Latino, Asian, and Muslim constituencies. These included a Latino social services organization, and two organizations that work directly on legal issues with immigrants and ICE detention, including Fathers and Families of San Joaquin, Street Level Health Project in Oakland, and Services and Immigration Rights and Education Network (SIREN) in San Jose.
The journalists and community leaders in attendance felt that the meeting was unique, informative, meaningful, and consciousness-raising.
The meeting was extremely productive and an excellent use of our time. We learned a lot about the work the community leaders were doing and the way that they approached the work. It was a very informative, impactful, and emotional gathering, the kind of thing that otherwise we wouldn’t have access to. — Holly Kernan
The meeting went beyond my expectations. I figured it was going to be a dialogue for our community partners and the reporters, but the reporters went deep really fast, asking real, substantive questions. They weren’t shying away from controversial issues like undocumented immigration, even the words that reporters were using to describe immigration and how to address some of these issues. There was a real desire to listen and learn on both sides. They showed up willing to listen and engage with the audience and the panelists. It was an authentic engagement. — Jacqueline Martinez Garcel
Both the reporters and community leaders are eager to continue their conversations. Many community representatives were unfamiliar with KQED’s coverage of immigration issues and asked to be alerted to any past or future stories on immigration that affects their specific region. CAP and KQED are actively considering other topics for future meetings between reporters and community leaders.
Nominating New Leaders
CAP also serves as a fertile source for future leadership. There are now direct connections between CAP and the KQED Board of Directors. CAP members are approved by KQED’s board, a procedure that provides the board a direct link to CAP processes and activities. CAP has a permanent seat on the committee itself, with input on board member selection. Members of CAP have presented at board meetings and retreats. Because CAP members are so much more involved and familiar with KQED operations than in previous years, the body has served as a “feeder” for the KQED board itself. At least five former CAP chairs, including current board member Brian Cheu, have served on the KQED board. Unlike other new board members, who may take up to two years to fully understand KQED operations, CAP members who come onto the KQED board can hit the ground running.
Creating a Legacy
As KQED embarks on its new strategic plan this fall, connecting with the community in these uncertain times will become increasingly important, as will the role of CAP. To continue to grow its audience in a manner that is agile and responsive to community needs, KQED will continue to rely on CAP to provide opportunities for dialogue and interaction to deepen the organization’s understanding of important community issues and concerns.
What encourages me, both as a CAP member and as someone who really wants to create these bridges, is that we can do this with the confidence that it’s going to work, because people are willing to make it work. Having sat in KQED board meetings, it is a testament to the internal leadership that it comes from the top down. The board is really committed to this. Having been a part of other community advisory groups, that is not always the case. — Jacqueline Martinez-Garcel
