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JPR achieves its fund-raising goals By BILL VARBLE That sound you hear on Jefferson Public Radio is music and news - again. The public radio station on the campus of Southern Oregon University ended its fall pledge drive Tuesday night in an upbeat mode, hitting its goals for all three of its broadcast services. The Rhythm and News service had a goal of $55,000 and raised $55,200. The Classics and News service had the same goal and finished with $55,060. The News and Information service hit its goal of $20,000 exactly. Rhythm and News went over the top a little less than two hours before deadline. That was the easy part. The Classics service hit its mark only after raising a whopping $15,000 on the last day of a drive that began eight days earlier. News and Information also lagged, remaining almost $1,000 short of its mark at 9 Tuesday night. "It's hard to pledge much after that time," JPR Executive Director Ron Kramer says. In the last hour, the money came in. "It came in with something like 30 seconds to spare," Kramer says. "I swear, it's under a special star or something." The station gained 960 new members during the eight-day drive. The new-member goal was 900. JPR officials saw no sign of any impact from the slowing economy or worries about terrorism. "We were concerned," Kramer says. "If something happened we would have gone to continuous coverage and stopped the drive. Everybody's captive of these events." Instead, some public stations around the country have reported stronger pledge activity than normal, Kramer says. "We'd have to say that, too." Last fall, the goals of the classics and rhythm services were $45,000. The news and information goal was $10,000. Kramer says a 10-year JPR member in Redding, Calif., pledged $1,000 instead of her usual $100 and explained that it was because National Public Radio's coverage of the terrorism attacks of Sept. 11 and the events in their wake was so important to her. Lane County, where JPR opened its KRVM service in cooperation with the Lane County School District in July, was a new source of pledges and underwriting support. KRVM is basically a tower through which JPR offers almost the same programming it offers Southern Oregon. Kramer says it now helps support the three other services. Reach reporter Bill Varble at 776-4478 or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.