| Alan S. Chartock |
| Born |
July 25, 1941 (1941-07-25) (age 67) |
| Occupation |
CEO, WAMC |
| Spouse(s) |
Roselle Chartock |
Alan Seth Chartock (born July 25, 1941 in New York City) is the president and chief executive officer (since 1981) of WAMC/Northeast Public Radio, a National Public Radio affiliate. He is also a Professor Emeritus of political science and communications, at the State University of New York (SUNY) and executive publisher and project director for the Legislative Gazette, a weekly, student-run newspaper covering New York State government that began in 1978 as a joint project between SUNY New Paltz and SUNY Albany. The Gazette under Chartock (and Glenn Doty, a former managing editor for the Times Herald-Record), helped to train hundreds of prospective journalists, many of whom took up journalism as a career.
Chartock hosts the weekly Capitol Connection series, heard on public radio stations around New York. The program, for almost twelve years, highlighted interviews with Governor Mario Cuomo and now continues with conversations with state political leaders. His syndicated column on politics appears in newspapers throughout New York state, and a second column, I Publius, runs in the Berkshire Eagle newspaper each Saturday.
Contents
- 1 Background
- 2 Radio personality
- 3 Awards
- 4 Views of WAMC news and political commentary
- 4.1 Chartock’s Political views
- 4.2 Criticism of Chartock’s Programming
- 4.3 Support for Chartock’s programming
- 5 See also
- 6 References
- 7 External links
|
Background
Prior to being hired by SUNY, Chartock worked in the state legislature for Manfred Ohrenstein, a powerful Manhattan Democrat. Chartock is a graduate of Hunter College (BA ‘63), received his MA from American University and Ph.D. from New York University. Chartock is married to Roselle K. Chartock, an author and professor of education at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams. They reside in Great Barrington, Massachusetts and have two grown children, Sarah and Jonas Chartock. Chartock’s identical twin, Dr. Lewis C. Chartock, is president and CEO of MERS/Missouri Goodwill Industries.
Radio personality
Chartock appears on many of WAMC’s radio programs:
- He is host of The Capitol Connection, a weekly program of interviews with New York State politicians.
- He appears each week on The Media Project, a show in which he and other local journalism professionals discuss topical media issues.
- He regularly hosts the call-in talk show Vox Pop (especially on “Medical Mondays”).
- He holds the title of Political Observer at WAMC. In this capacity, Chartock can be heard on news programs including The Legislative Gazette, Midday Magazine, and Northeast Report.
- He hosts the “Congressional Corner,” a daily interview segment of The RoundTable.
- He hosts the morning portions of WAMC’s regular fund drives.
Chartock increased his on-air presence after retiring from his university teaching duties several years ago.
Awards
Chartock has won numerous awards at SUNY, including the Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching and the SUNY Council of University Affairs and Development Award for Educational achievement. He was one of the first recipients of the SUNY Award for Excellence. In 2007, Chartock was chosen to receive the 2006 Alumni Association Award for Distinguished Teacher from the SUNY New Paltz Alumni Association.
He is the recipient of an Honorary Doctorate for public service from the Sage Colleges and an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Western New England College.
Views of WAMC news and political commentary
Chartock’s Political views
Chartock says he is concerned about governmental restrictions on free speech. He is dismayed by what he calls the proliferation of corporate run radio stations, which he believes express extreme right-wing views without giving opposing viewpoints.
According to Gadi Dechter of CityPaper.com, Chartock “publishes a blog on WAMC’s web site that has recently featured sharp attacks on the Republican Party, the Bush administration, and “neocons” in general.”
Criticism of Chartock’s Programming
Blogger/columnist Bill Shein’s satirical ‘radio drama’ entitled “”Fund Drive”". offers two critiques of Chartock and WAMC. One fictive caller asks, “Why does WAMC air the same content on 12 stations that cover all or part of seven states? I don’t want local news from Burlington, Vermont or other places hundreds of miles away. Isn’t that what Clear Channel does?” A second caller asks why there aren’t more diverse voices on WAMC, to which the (fictional) Chartock replies “Look, we offer many different voices on programs like ‘The Media Project,’ which I host, as well as ‘The Capitol Connection,’ which I host, and ‘The Legislative Gazette,’ which includes my commentary. Not to mention ‘Congressional Corner,’ which I host. And as political and media commentator for ‘The Roundtable,’ I often suggest that media should have more voices.”
Support for Chartock’s programming
Stephen Yasko, manager of WTMD (89.7 FM), an NPR member station in Towson, MD which plays mostly adult-alternative music, contends that any quality-control challenges which might be created by NPR’s decentralized nature are outweighed by the advantage of unique local programming.
“Public radio stations reflect the values and texture of the communities they serve,” says Yasko, who has also worked in the NPR member services department. “If NPR or any national organization had too much control or input into every station’s local personality, then you would lose the very thing that makes us what we are. So if Alan Chartock is what Albany and upstate New York created and what works for them, that’s a beautiful thing, no matter what some outsiders might say.”
Under Chartock’s leadership, WAMC has grown into a network of fourteen stations serving portions of seven New England and Middle Atlantic States, bringing news, information and cultural programming to what WAMC reports is an audience of nearly 400,000 monthly listeners (though that figure is not officially certified by Arbitron nor by any other audience ratings service). The station’s most recent fund drive (June 2008) raised over $700,000 in just under a week. According to on-the-air comments by Wanda Fischer (host of WAMC’s popular Saturday night folk music program “Hudson River Sampler”), it was the first time in twelve years that the fund drive had to be extended until Saturday in order to reach its goal.
See also
References
- ^ MERS Missouri Goodwill Industries, Executive Staff, updated February 8, 2007. Retrieved February 16, 2007.
- ^ Alan Chartock, The Daily Freeman, The long view on “security”, 08/01/2005. Retrieved February 16, 2007.
- ^ Alan Chartock - Blog, Save public radio from government censors, June 20, 2005. Retrieved February 16, 2007.
- ^ a b “Locally Grown by Gadi Dechter, 7/13/2005.”.
- Books written by Chartock
- Chartock, Alan S. (1995). Me and Mario Cuomo: conversations in candor. New York: Barricade Books. ISBN 1-56980-062-6.
- Chartock, Alan S. (1974). The Midtown Project. New York: (Publisher unknown). (ISBN unknown).
- Chartock, Alan S. (1970). Strengthening the Wisconsin Legislature (An Eagleton study and report). New Jersey: Published for the Eagleton Institute of Politics by Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0-8135-0612-3.
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