Public radio station president announces retirement
Frank Lanzone led KCBX for 45 years
– President and General Manager of KCBX Central Coast Public Radio Frank Lanzone has announced his retirement after more than four decades leading the station.
Frank Lanzone announced his retirement Feb. 3 after 45 years with the public radio station, which serves the Central Coast. Lanzone has held the role of president and general manager since April 1980. KCBX was founded in 1975 by Steve Urbani and Steve Burrell.
Lanzone will continue serving as executive director of the Live Oak Music Festival, which is currently preparing for its 38th annual event.
During his tenure, Lanzone guided the station through multiple periods of transition related to changes in federal funding, including the recent elimination of federal funding for public media and the closure of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
In his first year at the station, Lanzone increased fundraising pledge drive goals and expanded long-standing fundraising efforts. Those efforts included big band concerts, an annual public auction at Mission Plaza, an art auction held in a private home, and an afternoon wine tasting event that later expanded into the KCBX Central Coast Wine Classic, which ran from 1985 through 2003. In 1989, Lanzone and a team of volunteers hosted the first Live Oak Music Festival.
In 1981, Lanzone and Urbani, a station co-founder and board chair, oversaw the installation of five translators serving Cambria, Cayucos, Avila Beach, Shell Beach, Santa Ynez, and Santa Barbara, expanding the station’s broadcast reach. Lanzone later established the station’s newsroom in 2014.
“Since joining KCBX in 1980, Frank has built upon our humble beginnings and made the station a strong, successful community asset,” Urbani said. “His ability to establish a news department is a tribute to his management and fiscal abilities. Even more, Frank has become one of my very best friends.”
Lanzone said his interest in radio began at an early age and developed further while he was a student at the College of San Mateo.
“During my college years, I watched my classmates all head for commercial jobs in San Francisco, but I never left public radio,” Lanzone said. “In fact, my first job in public radio in 1970 – the same year NPR was incorporated – was made possible by the very first CPB grant available to stations. Today, the satisfaction of being part of an amazing team of people is as strong as it was 45 years ago.”
Assistant General Manager Chris McBride will assume the role of president and general manager and lead the station into its next phase.
KCBX Central Coast Public Radio is a non-commercial public radio station serving listeners in Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and southern Monterey counties. The station’s funding comes primarily from individual listeners, local corporate underwriters, and proceeds from the Live Oak Music Festival.
