SEQUIM – Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, the Carpenters and some 50 unpaid workers have fired up a musical transit bus, a comfortable vehicle that roams through and around Sequim.
The bus is called KSQM, Sequim’s homegrown nonprofit radio station, and it’s ready for refueling.
KSQM 91.5 FM began broadcasting music of the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s last December. Before long, it mixed in scores of community-service announcements, weather reports, traffic updates — and the voices of such local announcers as Dorothy Zapata, who hosts the “Doo-Wop Drive-In” Saturday nights at 7 p.m., and Sequim Police Chief Robert Spinks, who plays oldies on “The Five-O Show” Thursday and Friday nights from 7 to 10 p.m.
This week, the station is adding another piece to its programming: testimonials from service-club members, city officials, representatives of local nonprofits and others, all asking more people to board the bus.
KSQM’s pledge drive, a nine-day campaign which began Saturday, is an effort to make a dent in its $64,000 in annual operating costs.
The on-air drive will familiar to public-radio listeners, but unlike many metropolitan stations, KSQM isn’t stating a goal in dollars; nor does it have paid staffers pitching for pledges on the air.
“We didn’t dare set a goal because we don’t know what the community is capable of,” said Tama Bankston, who as volunteer coordinator manages the dozens who host radio shows or perform other tasks to keep KSQM humming.
So far, the fundraising is in overdrive: donations are totaling an average $1,000 per day, with checks arriving from across the Northwest.
Listeners who tune in the old-fashioned way — or pick up the live stream at www.KSQMFM.com — are mailing and calling in contributions, or transmitting them via the station’s Web site. Just on Monday, a Sedro-Woolley supporter’s $200 gift came in, said volunteer publicist Diane Reaves; it was followed by $500 from a fan in Sequim.
KSQM’s staff, meanwhile, is a varied bunch. Tama and her husband Jeff Bankston, the station’s community-news director, work unpaid alongside people such as Elisa Malkasian, 14, a front-office volunteer, and Bob Massey, the octogenarian who hosts 21 hours of music radio each week.
All year the Bankstons help people from nonprofit groups around the north Peninsula record announcements about their fundraisers and free events, from the Sequim Education Foundation’s student film festival in April to the Rotary Club salmon bake in August.
Dick Hughes, a member of both Rotary and the education foundation, said those events enjoyed larger turnouts this year thanks to KSQM.
Attendance at the salmon bake jumped 300 percent this year, he added, after local media, including the radio station and the Peninsula Daily News, promoted it.
Hughes stopped in at KSQM on Friday to record a testimonial to that effect, and his words are on the air during the pledge drive along with those from other community members. And throughout the drive, KSQM will continue broadcasting its blend of vintage music 24 hours a day.
During 14 to 18 of those hours, local volunteers serve as live announcers, playing songs and community service messages — and accepting requests like the romantic one Don Hall of Sequim called in on a recent night.
Hall phoned Spinks during “The Five-O Show,” to ask for “Because of You,” a Mario Lanza classic he wanted his wife, June, to hear.
Instead of Lanza, the Halls got Tony Bennett’s version.
And “I got hugs and kisses,” from June, Hall reported.
“It works,” Hall said. “I’ve been married 53 years.”
Signal, live stream
KSQM’s signal covers much of the Dungeness Valley, and due to the north Peninsula’s topography, it reaches Victoria well, but not so much Port Angeles.
Thanks to the online presence at www.KSQMFM.com, however, Jeff Bankston said he hears from listeners in hundreds of cities around the world.
The station is also part of the emergency broadcast system, so in the event of extreme weather or a disaster, it’s equipped to air alerts and advisories of where to go for help and information.
KSQM has a generator to keep it on the air through an extended power outage, Jeff Bankston added.
But the most important part of working here, for the Bankstons and other KSQM volunteers, is providing a connection between people and their community. Those announcements of local events, Jeff said, spur residents to re-engage in civic life.
And all the while, the music transports listeners to a sweet moment in time, when swing, doo-wop, Broadway show tunes and crooners like Bennett and Sinatra filled the airwaves.
“People have gotten to know us,” added Reaves. “They’re saying, ‘This is my music.'”
During the fundraising drive, KSQM’s volunteers aren’t asking for particular amounts. “Everybody who donates is keeping us going,” Jeff Bankston said.
“It’s their station.”
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.