2 stations give Carty a radio haven

7/3/2006

As the merciless, on-air pounding of Carty Finkbeiner continued last week on WSPD-AM (1370), two radio stations provided Toledo s mayor with a safe haven.

He appeared on morning-drive shows on WTWR-FM (98.3) and WCWA-AM (1230).

WSPD has banned the mayor from appearing as a guest on the station until he makes a public apology to morning host Fred LeFebvre. Finkbeiner accused LeFebvre of telling lies and being too negative.

The mayor is not going to apologize, said Brian Schwartz, the mayor s executive assistant. He feels very strongly about that.

Pardon morning-show hosts Johny D. (WTWR) and Troy Neff (WCWA) for snickering at WSPD.

How dumb is it for a news/talk station to ban the mayor? Johny D. asked.

Neff doesn t understand why WSPD s local talk shows have become so negative.

Carty every day for two weeks? It s enough already, Neff said. Nobody wants to hear that downer stuff all the time.

Neff admitted he arranged an interview with Finkbeiner to, as he put it, stick it to WSPD program director Brian Wilson. Neff is still miffed that Wilson prohibited Bob Frantz from making a one-time appearance on the WCWA morning show last fall. (Wilson abruptly removed Frantz as WSPD s morning host in November, and appearing on sister station WCWA would have given Frantz a chance to say good-bye to Toledo listeners.)

Wilson declined comment, but Frantz, now at Cleveland s WTAM-AM (1100), said that Troy is absolutely right about the tale of sister-station suppression.

The interview with Finkbeiner is my way of evening up the score with Wilson, Neff said.

Jeremy Baumhower, executive producer of the WTWR morning show, formerly had the same position at WSPD. He, too, is perplexed by WSPD s hard-line stance.

When I was with WSPD, we couldn t have him on enough, Baumhower said. Tom Cruise or Carty Finkbeiner? You go with Carty Finkbeiner every time.

Johny D. and Neff say they would like to have the mayor as a regular guest on their respective morning shows.

With no apology forthcoming from the mayor, WSPD has gone the grade-school route mocking him through the use of soundbites. (Do you think WSPD alumni Art Barrie, Jack Mitchell, and Paul W. Smith would have been so petty?)

All the mocking soundbites do is show that WSPD can dish it out but can t take it.

TRANSITION: Jerry Anderson has taken over as co-anchor of the 11 p.m. newscast on WTOL-TV, Channel 11, leaving the departing Terry Thill with a reduced on-air role. Thill, who is leaving the station in August, is still a co-anchor at 6 p.m.; Anderson will eventually assume that role.

Meanwhile, WTOL news director Mitch Jacob is interviewing candidates to succeed Anderson as co-anchor of the morning newscast. Dan Bumpus is filling the role on an interim basis.

POLITICS: Former WSPD news director Tom Watkins has been named communications director for Democrat Ted Stickland s gubernatorial campaign in Toledo and Lucas County.

It could be a temporary arrangement. Watkins said it s agreed that if he lands a full-time job, he can walk away.