Posted by huh? on January 08, 2008 at 18:57:16:
[From Feder]
Only four months after he was hired to push buttons as a lowly board operator, LaMont Watts is the man calling the programming shots at urban news/talk WVON-AM (1690).
Melody Spann-Cooper, CEO of owner Midway Broadcasting, has named Watts interim program director of WVON.
Watts previously was program director of the City Colleges of Chicago's WKKC-FM (89.3). At WVON, he'll work with editorial manager Keisha Chavers.
"The two of them are excited about providing the programming staff with the necessary support so that we can operate at 100 percent," Spann-Cooper told employees. "I am expecting 100 percent cooperation as these two dynamic leaders settle in, and as I seek a permanent and long-term solution for our very special product."
The vacancy was created by the resignation of Coz Carson, who left after six months as program director to host mornings at WWRL-AM in New York.
Although Spann-Cooper said she learned of his resignation when he announced it on the air Dec. 24, Carson disputed reports that he failed to give her advance notice. He sent an e-mail note to her two hours earlier, he said.
"I have far too much respect for the industry that has fed me and my family for some 33 years to commit a bush-league act such as resigning on the air," Carson said. "It serves no useful purpose for me to perpetrate such a stupid stunt. Anyone proffering this nonsense is seriously vindictive, toxic and, in the end, self-destructive."