The Austin city council passed a proclamation today to recognize KOOP radio's 16 years of public service broadcasting in Austin. KOOP delivers an eclectic mix of music and public affairs programming, all created and run by station volunteers.
Kim McCarson is the station's executive director, one of its few paid positions. She says KOOP is the only cooperatively run station in the US.
"The volunteers actually organize and they run quite a bit of the functions of the station," McCarson told KUT News. "They do everything from cleaning the station to recording underwriting announcements, PSAs. They produce their own radio shows. We don't have a program officer or program director. Instead we do that by committee."
The station will celebrate its official "Sweet 16" on January 13th at Antone's with Kelly Willis, Slaid Cleaves and Sara Hickman.
