We’re nearly midway through the fiscal year without federal funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), and our community has generously stepped up for an emergency funding campaign and annual fall fund drive. As we head into the second half of the fiscal year, we’re rolling out some organizational and programming changes to better align operations and content with current staffing levels and revenue.
Staff reorganization
After more than 40 years in radio and 23 years at WGLT hosting numerous music programs, All Things Considered and Morning Edition, Jon Norton will retire at the end of January. More on his farewell will be announced in the new year.
Until we can better forecast our annual expenses and stabilize revenue streams without federal funding, we are leaving two full-time journalism positions vacant. With those vacancies and a retirement on the horizon, members of the programming and content teams will be moving to the following new roles to improve operations and news production:
- Interim Content Director: Ryan Denham.
- Deputy News Director: Lauren Warnecke.
- Digital Content Director: Emily Bollinger.
Eric Stock remains news director, Charlie Schlenker remains senior reporter, and Joe Deacon remains a reporter for sister station WCBU in Peoria and WGLT. They are supported by Illinois State University Graduate Assistant Ben Howell, part-time correspondents, and paid student interns.
Programming changes
As our audience grows and evolves, we want WGLT to sound more local on-air during prime listening times. Our most popular national shows, Morning Edition and All Things Considered, will now have up to 13 minutes of local news each hour.
Listener habits continue to change, and individual news stories and newscasts have the most ears. Instead of asking people to listen to Sound Ideas for 30 minutes at 5 p.m. each weekday (what we call “appointment listening”), Sound Ideas will now air as individual stories throughout Morning Edition and All Things Considered to meet listeners where they are at.
For our primarily digital listening audience, local news stories will be shared via the Sound Ideas podcast feed.
The Leadoff, our morning news podcast, will end in December. Digital listeners should subscribe to the Sound Ideas podcast and the WGLT Newscasts podcast for local news feeds that will be updated several times each weekday.
After adding BBC Newshour at 2 p.m. to a very positive audience response last year, we will add the morning Newshour at 9 a.m. each weekday followed by 1A at 10 a.m. and Here & Now at noon.
The 21st Show departs the weekday schedule. (Follow the podcast to listen at your convenience.)
Special thanks to underwriters Bloomington Normal Audiology and Central Illinois Regional Airport for their longtime support of local programming which helps to make award-winning news available to everyone in our community for free.
Looking forward
WGLT will celebrate its 60th anniversary in 2026. As we prepare to mark this milestone and look to the future, serving the public media mission that is free from editorial interference and commercial owners focused on a profit remains our north star. And we must continue to build a sustainable financial future for public media in Bloomington-Normal.
If you have comments or questions for the WGLT staff, please email WGLT@IllinoisState.edu.
