Format change a blow to Aspen Public Radio community

I am very disturbed by the changes made by the radio staff at KAJX/KCJX to remove local music programming and replace it with syndicated talk programs such as “Fresh Air” and international news that you can stream elsewhere. The presenters of Jazz from Aspen (I am a regular listener of Stu’s and Jeannie’s programs) are an amazing group of volunteers and community members. I also was saddened when the Sunday morning “Pass the Mustard Bluegrass” was curtailed last year. I am happy it found a spot at KDNK.

BBC is on every night. “Fresh Air” is already programmed for early evenings and on weekends. To learn we are losing our music programming for more programming of Fresh Air makes no sense to me. There are other examples such as “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” weekly episodes that are repeated over the weekend.

I did intend to complete the 2019 radio listener survey. It focused too much on delivery formats and was going to take me an hour or more to complete. I don’t remember being asked to rank which programming I preferred. I was saddened when Krista Tibbet’s “On Being” program was removed. I wrote to the station expressing my disappointment and did get a reply but not a satisfactory response of why it was dropped.

Do we really have to accept this as the final decision? No, not if we decide to withhold contributions during 2020 fund raising. The soul of Aspen Public Radio is being ripped out and KAJX will soon become a very generic radio station on the path it is pursuing.

Thanks to Maddie Vincent of The Aspen Times for her in-depth reporting of this community loss.

Emily Miller

Glenwood Springs