Triple S closure – more comment

radioinfo has had further comment on last week’s story about Triple S FM Canberra closing down.

The original item was contributed by Terry Giesecke , a presenter/announcer at Triple S from the start in 1986 to about 1993. Before that he did volunteer work with 2XX and has recently come back to community radio as a voluntary presenter on Artsound FM.

Here is more from another volunteer involved with the station, Stuart John:

As one of the last volunteers at Triple S, I would like to comment on the
excellent article regarding the stations current off-air status.

As a volunteer who began while the racing was still the major part of the
station, the time for volunteers who were interested in sport was limited to
Kevin Woolfe’s breakfast program on weekday mornings. Dragging oneself out
of bed at 5 or six in the morning was always difficult, but ultimately
rewarding, as this led to the chance to drag oneself out of bed on a Sunday
morning to present a show over summer 2001-02.

When the racing stopped, so did the money, and with it the paid staff.
Those of the staff, volunteer and paid, who were sport rather than racing
looked forward to the prospect of presenting radio about their favourite
sports.

Unfortunately though, this enthusiasm for sport was largely for one’s own
sport, rather than sport in general. While getting people with program
ideas and requests for live commentaries wasn’t hard, what was hard was
getting people to fill general shifts, such as weekends. Weekends after
racing were always fun, because they generally contained a live broadcast of
some game somewhere, the chance to play music and generally hone announcer
skills that may yet come in handy down the track.

The addition of the Smooth Jazz format, run by Terence Gaynon, brought
excitement to the station. With a core of staff and volunteers, it was felt
we could turn the station around, although this ended up not being the case.

Initially during the Canberra bushfires we only had the BBC running, as
there was no one available to panel that afternoon. After the alert went
out and sporting matches finished, Jim Paterson and I broadcast until about
11 that night, showing again that we were an asset to the community.

I would like to place on record my thanks and appreciation to Jim and Kevin,
who both have given all volunteers the help they needed, and advice when it
was needed as well (all the time!).

It saddens me to see the place possibly going down, and when I hear about
how it was during the late 80’s/early 90’s, all I can hope is that what we
did since July 2002 was up to those standards.

And a critical comment from Jason Nightingale, a contributor to the Forum:

The “Final Siren for Triple S” story is an absolute disgrace – these people obtained a community radio licence and have ceased transmission because a major sponsor decides to pull out!!!

As the story reads, Triple S sold it’s soul to a commercial business partnership with ACTTAB and hasn’t covered their arse by involving themselves in other community contribution scemes. I wish the ACTTAB the best of luck with their narrowcast licence.

Triple S should turn the transmitter back on and take a long hard look at themselves. It is embarrassing that a community licence holder [takes the same actions as] mismanaged corporate criminals like HIH and onetel. The ABA and CBAA should take the Triple S licence and tear it up. [We should be discussing] the obligations licences holders have in the areas of commercial, community and narrowcast braodcasting.