CKUA, one of the most beloved radio stations in Alberta and perhaps Canada is in dire straits.Inflation, the same thing that is choking you and your family as it strives to survive, has hit the station.In what President & CEO Marc Carnes describes as a perfect storm, it must raise $3 million by September, or shut its doors.The good news is, it launched its annual spring fundraiser on Friday, and the response has been astonishing, says Carnes, reached on the phone in between his hectic schedule.So far it has raised nearly $650,000 toward the immediate $740,000 goal, and it's only three days into the ten-day fundraiser."Thousands and thousands and thousands of people are stepping up" to save CKUA said Carnes."I mean that's the thing. We're not a medium, we're an emotional connection with people who care about the same thing."Arguably, the donor-funded station is an Alberta institution first, a broadcaster second. How else can you describe the massive flood of support?Support that cannot and should not be ignored. "We're the connective tissue," says Carnes. "We're the ones that connect arts organizations together. We're the ones that connect artists with audiences across the province.""If you're an artist, if you're a painter in Peace River and we do an interview with you, you're getting exposure to the entire province and global listeners. That doesn't happen anywhere else."Trust me, I know that. When I was working in Bangkok for Nation Multimedia as editor of Myanmar Eleven, CKUA kept me connected to Alberta and the best music on the planet."Being unique is awesome, but being unique is also a challenge," Carnes admits."I mean, we're not immune to inflation. If everybody's dealing with a 15 or 20 percent inflationary increase in their household budgets, so are we.""So that's the one challenge. And then the second challenge is we own the Alberta Hotel in downtown Edmonton and half of it's commercial real estate," Carnes says.."You only have to walk around downtown anywhere in the world and see all the for-lease signs to realize that commercial real estate's in a real bind right now."About 18 months ago, the entire building was spoken for. Last summer, it was half empty. CKUA's primary tenant who had a good chunk of the building became insolvent.All of a sudden, the broadcaster — just more than three years shy of its 100th anniversary — saw all of its revenues disappear while costs keep rising, including the cost of borrowing.Meanwhile, the province of Alberta is refusing to ride to the rescue.Minister of the Arts, Tanya Fir, has said the funds requested by CKUA would go primarily towards debt servicing."Alberta’s government does not provide funds for debt servicing," she said in the legislature.However, that door is not necessarily closed, said Carnes."Minister Fir has been really great to work with. Her team's been great to work with and supportive, so we don't consider that door closed at all, and we continue to talk with them," Carnes says."And I think there's a couple of things that we want to keep reminding the province. They've invested in more arts and cultural organizations this year, who serve the same audiences and the same artists and the same communities that we do across Alberta.""Well, we are the single biggest promoter of Alberta's unique cultural identity and I think it would be a shame for that not to not be a part of the mandate."What about the Feds, I ask, fearful that the CRTC and Ottawa have never recognized CKUA for the amazing Alberta institution it really is."It's been a challenge," he says. "When we started preaching at Ottawa, when we saw what was happening, we approached them and they said, 'Well, our interest is in the CBC, so don't talk to us.' ""And then of course, they turn around a couple of months later and they start doling out hundreds of millions of dollars to private media in their time of need.""So they had the ability to change their funding priorities. But for whatever reason, they're not willing to extend a little bit further for Alberta's broadcasting.".One of those who did benefit was Bell Media, granted $40 million in regulatory relief, despite breaking its promise to invest in local news.In fact, it cut 4,800 jobs, ending multiple television newscasts and selling off 45 of its 103 radio stations.To make things worse, the cultural funding to Alberta is 50% per capita less than every other province, says Carnes."So this isn't anything new, but considering they fund the CBC and we're the original blueprint for CBC, you'd think they would care a little bit about making sure that that legacy lives on.""Especially the heritage component of what we are to the country."According to CKUA stats, the business model is still solid — the station has seen audience growth of more than 10% over five years and steady revenue from fundraising and advertising, bucking industry trends.Its deejays — people such as Allison Brock, Roy Forbes, Baba Singh, Lionel Rault and Terry David Mulligan — have become household names.I myself am a monthly donor..I ask Carnes if there are other options to make things work."Absolutely. So the funding, we did the same sort of approach with the Feds as we did with the province, which is, help us get out of this debt," Carnes said."And when we realized that went nowhere, we went back to the province, and we asked for the $2 million to kind of get us where we needed to go.""And then we did a similar ask of the Feds. The message was, "If you can get us this money, we are building a centennial fundraising campaign in the background.""You become the lead investment in our centennial campaign and then we go to our listeners and we multiply this many times over with donations. So we even offered both governments the opportunity to be the hero in starting us to get onto a solid foot.""We're not asking for special treatment, from either the province or the Feds. We're asking for a fair deal," he added."So that we have some sustainability going into our second century."What happens now?"So we blow through this 775, we bump up the goal to a million, and we keep pushing," says Carnes, undaunted in his cause."Because again, that's the message we need to send to the world. Not only do people just come to the base level of need for CKUA, but they believe in it so much that they want it to go further."Carnes also related a typical CKUA Alberta story — the kind of story we all have, me included."We had a listener send an email and just sort of told his history. He discovered CKUA, he discovered artists.""He was at a concert where he met his eventual wife because the artist he discovered on CKUA and they met at the concert because she also loves CKUA.""And then years on, they walked down the aisle (to) a song they discovered on CKUA."I personally call on Minister Fir and the government of Danielle Smith, to find a way around this "debt servicing" issue, find a way, to help CKUA survive this crisis, and go forward.To lose CKUA would be a devastating blow to our province, its people, its culture, everything it stands for.Albertans are stepping up, in the thousands — does that not mean anything to you?Do the right thing — CKUA is our cultural lifeblood, and once it's gone, it's gone.
