Meet the Speakers: Impact for All: Critical Insights for Small Stations
Small community and public radio stations serve communities with great needs but don’t have access to the same resources as large station peers. In this presentation and panel discussion, get more insight into the unique trends and challenges experienced by small stations, learn about potential opportunities for increased growth and local impact, and hear from your community radio peers about their direct experience with Impact for All, a grant-funded initiative for small stations that provides customized station insight and actionable plans for future growth. Led by Steve Holmes of Public Media Company and Ashley Krest of KVNF and Tami Graham of KSUT.
Steve Holmes is a managing director at Public Media Company, a national nonprofit consulting firm dedicated to increasing the impact of public media organizations. Steve has extensive experience working in partnership with public and independent media leaders to provide new insights and develop strategies that help ensure public media organizations play a relevant and growing role in their communities. Prior to joining Public Media Company, Steve was Senior Director, Strategy & Insight at PBS and, in his native U.K., helped launch and grow new services and businesses around the world for Royal Mail. He holds an MBA from Duke University.
Ashley Krest was named the general manager of KVNF in January 2020. Ashley has worked at KVNF for the past 7 years, once as the Business and Events Manager. Since becoming the GM she has taken the station through the Covid19 Pandemic, which started 2 months into her position, and managed an almost entirely new staff that transformed into a great team. She serves as Vice President of the Rocky Mountain Community Radio coalition. Before joining the staff, she was an active volunteer at KVNF for two decades, serving as a DJ, and member of the program committee, and is still a show host of the Feel Good Friday morning music mix as DJ AKA.
Tami Graham has been KSUT’s Executive Director since 2016. She successfully led a $2.5M capital campaign that resulted in KSUT moving into a new 5,000 sq. foot home in 2020. Under her tenure, a new Tribal Media Center was created, which offers training and storytelling opportunities to Native American and Indigenous community members and a local news department has been developed and is now serving the news desert of the region. Tami won Woman of the Year in 1996 for her leadership of KSUT Community Radio at Ft. Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. She’s a fifth-generation Coloradoan and lives with her partner and lots of farm animals in Mancos, Colorado at the foot of Mesa Verde National Park.
