NPR's 'Day to Day' leaves hole in my radio-listening heart

This is the last week of life for National Public Radio's "Day to Day," the news program anchored at various times by Madeleine Brand, Alex Cohen and Alex Chadwick, that followed "All Things Considered" on KPCC-FM (89.3) and provided a more featurish, West Coast take on the news, counter to the very D.C./N.Y.C slant of the rest of NPR.

The show was run out of NPR West in Culver City, had plenty of local staffers ... and is being cut due to lack of funding in this lousy economy.

Yep, this is the NPR show I listen to most often, and I'm very sorry to see it go.

I always use NPR News, and especially "Day to Day" as an example to print journalists of how to form a bond with your audience — and how while being on radio in any form will certainly help you do this, the way NPR showcases its personalities (and personality) is especially well-suited to creating and nurturing just such a bond.

So now radio news is suffering the same fate as print journalism, namely being body slammed in a bad economy.

From what I understand, Madeleine Brand and Alex Cohen are both being cut from NPR, but they are only a few among many being laid off. I'm sorry for all of them.

It's hard to see the show end, too. Over the past few weeks, they've been playing quite a few old (or you might say "vintage") interviews. I don't get the feeling it's a "best of" or "tribute," but just a way of filling time without having to produce anything new.

I don't begin to know what's up with NPR's finances. The word out there is that an increasing reliance on corporate underwriting in recent years hasn't played well at all in the current economy.

I still love NPR but I'm none too happy about the end of "Day to Day" and NPR's semi-retreat from the West Coast.