WEKU has hired veteran radio manager Craig Kopp as news director. Kopp will start his new role March 8. WEKU Director and General Manager Mike Savage said this hiring is significant as the station has not had a News Director since the sudden death of Content Manager John Hingsbergen in November, 2017.
"Craig Kopp was clearly the best candidate for this key position," said Savage. "He brings significant editorial and journalistic experience that this station needs to better serve our central and eastern Kentucky audience."
Kopp spent much of his broadcast career as news director of Cincinnati-based WEBN, talk radio host and producer at WKRC-AM and News Director of WNKU public radio at Northern Kentucky University.
The station is the source for news in the area. That shows me that people looking for news look to WEKU to deliver. It also shows me there’s a hunger for the kind of news WEKU is delivering and I would like to be a part of convincing more people to come on board,” Kopp said.
More recently, Kopp was General Manager of WMNF in Tampa, Florida and on-air host at WUSF. He also has taught interviewing and podcasting at the University of South Florida and the Poynter Institute.
“Journalism has always been fundamentally important to our functioning democracy. It’s even more important now that some challenge its veracity. You can shout ‘Fake News’ all you want but the facts remain the facts. And our job is to tell the facts,” Kopp said.
Kopp has also been a freelance film reviewer where he has recorded more than 10,000 interviews with actors, directors and producers.
Serving public radio listeners in the commonwealth for more than 50 years, WEKU operates nine radio stations in central and eastern Kentucky as well as a classical channel streaming online at weku.org and the WEKU mobile app.