KMOJ FM
The Peoples Station
“The Peoples Station” Celebrating the Life of Gerald Levert
Jul 13th
(July 13, 1966 – November 10, 2006) was an American R&B singer. Gerald Levert sang with his brother, Sean Levert, and friend Marc Gordon in the R&B trio LeVert. He was also a part of LSG, an R&B supergroup comprising Keith Sweat, Johnny Gill, and Levert. His father, Eddie Levert, is the lead singer of the 1970s soul group The O’Jays. Join us today as we celebrate the life of the sensational Gerald Levert.
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Visit From The Freedom School
Jul 1st
Back Row: Craig Rice, Big Sy, Kendal, Ed Front Row: Gloria, Tiffany, Darche, NavVie.
NavVie Filming Kendal & Big Sy
KMOJ back in North Minneapolis
Jun 29th
MINNEAPOLIS — The hip hop and R&B sounds of KMOJ-FM have for three decades been a mainstay of Minneapolis radio. But, what is new, is the station’s studio in a rehabbed building along West Broadway, long known as a center of crime and of poverty.
“It’s been a big boost for us,” said KMOJ General Manager Kelvin Quarles. “It’s good for us to be in North Minneapolis, because we can help change some of the negative perceptions over here, and that’s what our goal is.”
It’s also the goal of the people who helped KMOJ come back to the Northside, a group called Catalyst Community Partners. Most of its members had six figure salaries at some of the city’s biggest corporations, and are now using their experience to rebuild North Minneapolis to the thriving neighborhood it once was.
“This is really special to bring those skills right on home to a community I really love and care about,” said Sue Wollan Fan, a former Accenture and Best Buy executive who is now Catalyst’s President.
Here’s how they’re doing it: Catalyst, which is totally nonprofit, buys vacant and abandoned buildings along West Broadway and hires contractors—many of them minority–to remodel them. Then a business leases the building, and eventually buys it, so people in the neighborhood are involved in the change, and invested in seeing these businesses succeed.
A 24 hour child care center was Catalyst’s first project six years ago, and it’s since developed a cafe, playground, commercial kitchen and a historic church, all now thriving through the unique partnership between Catalyst and the people who live here.
“If you just sort of have a lot of band aids in place,” Wollan Fan said, “You never really see the kind of change that’s going to be lasting and then self sustaining.”
Several businesses already are, and KMOJ hopes it will soon be another. And while more tenants come to West Broadway the most remarkable thing moving in is hope.
“I think the glory days are coming back to North Minneapolis,” said Quarles. “And we’re excited to be part of it.”
“North Minneapolis needs people to embrace it,” said Wollan Fan.
(Copyright 2010 by KARE. All Rights Reserved.)
