Good Practice, Good News for Storm Season

Travel has reduced our posting frequency lately, and we're still checking in from a distance. We'll break the string of non-posts today by linking to the hurricane preparedness stories in the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin and their good advice to get ready for the season.

The prediction of 72 dead from a category 4 storm striking Oahu is a sober reminder of the serious hurt hurricanes can inflict on our islands. That kind of storm ferocity also calls into question some of the communications channels being proposed to aid citizens during such a disaster. E.G., let's just assume that cell phone towers will be blown away, as will text messaging as a way to communicate emergency information.

Now would be a good time for the Governor's Comprehensive Communications Review Committee to publish an update on the communications enhancements it presumablly has overseen during the past seven months since the committee was formed. A good start would be to disclose how many radio stations have added backup generation since Earthquake Sunday.

Oahu’s Primary Crisis Response Station Is Failing To Manage Its Own Self-Made Emergency

KSSK’s management is giving us a classic example of how not to react when the going gets tough. By not returning phone calls – which seems to be the standard operating procedure down at Clear Channel Communications – management is making things worse.

But the papers are spelling everybody’s name correctly, so it’s all good publicity, right? Ratings undoubtedly are higher than they were before Larry Price’s “blue-eye” comment, and as we’ve already heard from management, ratings are what’s important.

But speaking of ratings, the crown appears to have slipped slightly. The Star-Bulletin reports Cox Radio’s KRTR has moved ahead of KSSK in a “key demographic” group, the 25-to-54-year-old audience.

A Matter of Trust

KSSK is the station we’re supposed to turn to during our next island-wide crisis, when communication to the public becomes critical. Trouble is, the public is now killing the messengers for their lack of professionalism.

What are we to make of that?

KSSK’s Price Steps in It – Suggesting That ‘Infallibility’ Isn’t One of the Station’s Assets

The only reason to wade into the KSSK/Larry Price flap is to point out the obvious: Nobody and no organization is beyond reproach. Larry Price’s unfortunate dialogue with Senator Hooser that prompted a pseudo-apology was proof once again that the only way off a pedestal is down. (Read the Price-Hooser conversation here.)

[5/7 Update: The Advertiser's "Breaking News" section today has one of the strangest apologies you'll hear or read. What Larry Price gives as an apology to Senator Hooser, sidekick Michael Perry takes away with his "You don't have to apologize" rant. There's not much room up there on that pedestal, so maybe Perry's just too close to "get it" -- which is what Hooser seems to think based on his afternoon response to KSSK's weird apology.]

KSSK’s personalities have been up there so long that it’s hard to think of them as mortal – subject to the same flaws that afflict us all. But they’re only human, and this latest evidence of their mortality may make our earlier criticism of their performance in October’s Earthquake Sunday emergency more believable.

CHORE takes no pleasure in watching the mighty tumble. We only hope this experience also makes the radio station humble and convinces KSSK’s management that ratings aren’t necessarily the measure of their performance.

We all will rely on KSSK to be there in our next crisis as one of the primary emergency communications stations. All we want is clear-headed thinking and professionalism from KSSK’s on-air personalities, who presumably will be rolled out as the “face” of our next emergency response.

A taste of humble pie may be what it takes to improve KSSK's performance.

Half-Measures Are Inadequate in Emergency; YouTube & My Space Should Be Mandatory

The University of Hawaii tested its new mass telephoning system yesterday, and administrators are assessing how this and other channels can alert the mass campus audience in an emergency.

Some say text messaging would be the best way to reach students in an emergency – evidence of an ardent love affair with technology that seems as hot as ever.

If technology is the answer, why stop with text messaging? Why not use every conceivable high-tech medium to reach the young adult audience?

Let’s make YouTube and My Space mandatory. Everyone should be required to check for updates on YouTube and My Space at least once every 30 minutes just in case there’s an emergency. Website traffic can be monitored, and violators of this public-spirited policy can expect to be fired or expelled.

Not such a good idea? Here’s another one: Use radio.

Why is radio missing from the discussion? Are UH administrators not mentioning this virtually ubiquitous channel to reporters? Are officials talking about radio but reporters aren’t listening?

CHORE made this point a couple weeks ago. Neither the Advertiser story then nor today’s story mentioned KTUH, the on-campus station that presumably should be a key communications link during a campus emergency.

Old, Old, Old School

Radio enthralled the great-grandparents of students in school today. It’s not just old school; it’s old, old, old school – so old that maybe even administrators don’t give it a second thought.

But if a multi-channel approach is the objective, they simply can’t ignore their own on-campus radio station. Old-school radio is still around because it still works for enough people. Computers and cell phone technology are great; we wouldn’t want to be without them. But we especially wouldn’t want to be without radio in an emergency.

That’s a lesson the new school has let to learn, but it shouldn't have to wait. The high-tech solutions being evaulated presumably will take months or longer to implement. I just checked, and KTUH is up and operating right now at 90.3 FM.

If UH administrators intend to interrupt programming in an emergency, the UH community needs to know that now!