KACE Fires Respected Talk-Show Hosts : Media: Format change by new owners ends nearly 10 years of community-oriented broadcasting by Isidra Person-Lynn and Mark Whitlock.

Longtime talk-show hosts Isidra Person-Lynn and Mark Whitlock were recently fired from KACE radio (103.9 FM), bringing nearly 10 years of their well-regarded community affairs broadcast to an unceremonious end.

Person-Lynn and Whitlock were dismissed by KACE officials July 15, just days after the station acquired its federal broadcasting license after being bought by Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises last year.

“Sunday Morning Live,” which had aired weekly from 8 to 10 a.m., had its last show July 9, featuring an interview with Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams.

Person-Lynn, formerly the station’s public affairs director as well as the show’s producer, said she was surprised by the abrupt decision. “It wasn’t expected,” she said. “I’ll miss it. I had been on the air for nine years, since 1986. It was good for us to be out there informing people.”

KACE General Manager Howard Neal said Person-Lynn and Whitlock were let go not because of the show’s quality, but because the new ownership is looking to take the show in a different direction.

“The program manager wants to give the show a much more magazine feel than what it had,” said Neal, who also oversees the two other Los Angeles stations bought by Cox: KOST (103.5 FM) and KFI (640 AM). “What Isidra did was good, but we want to hit different topics quicker, do more in-studio interviews and generally have a very fast-paced presentation.”

The “Sunday Morning Live” program was replaced by “Turning Point Live,” a newsmagazine program hosted by Kay Hixson and Patricia Means, publishers of the black magazine Turning Point.

“Sunday Morning Live” co-host Whitlock said that although some listeners did not like the show’s frequently controversial dialogue, “I thought the show was well received.

“There are a lot more things that could have been done,” added Whitlock, executive director of FAME Renaissance, the economic development arm of First A.M.E. Church. “It was exciting, creating points of contact with the community that can’t be manufactured or manipulated.”

Person-Lynn started “Sunday Morning Live” in 1986 with Whitlock as a forum for discussion of African American issues, from health crises to police brutality to male-female relationships.

Artists and writers, both nationally and locally known, stopped in for interviews. Although she frequently had celebrities such as singers Gladys Knight and James Brown as guests, Person-Lynn typically steered away from entertainment in favor of more socially conscious topics.

“I might have a celebrity on, but it was never about their latest album. It was more like, ‘So what are you doing about AIDS?’ ” she said.

“Sunday Morning’s” memorable moments include a live broadcast of Nelson Mandela’s release from prison in South Africa, an interview with Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and a program blowing the whistle on offensive rap lyrics, which led to KACE and other stations eliminating certain songs from their playlists.

With the Cox purchase last year, KACE underwent a format change, one of several in its history. It became “Soul Oldies” radio, playing R&B; hits of the 1960s and 1970s by artists such as Sam Cooke, the Temptations and Chaka Khan.

The change filled a void created when KGFJ (1230 AM) abandoned its longtime soul-oldies format and went to contemporary gospel. Since the change, Neal said, KACE’s ratings have picked up considerably, from a .4 share of the market to a 1.6 share. He declined to disclose “Sunday Morning’s” ratings, but said they were not a factor in the decision.

Cox Enterprises, which owns 26 radio and television stations nationwide, purchased KACE from owner and ex-football star Willie Davis, who is African American. The transaction left Los Angeles with only two black-owned radio stations, KGFJ and KJLH (102.3 FM).

The loss of “Sunday Morning” is troubling for the black community because there are no other shows like it on the air, said James Fugate, co-owner of Eso Won Books in Inglewood.

“I always liked the show,” he said. “Isidra always had a real feel for the community. She seemed to be well-informed. I liked Mark’s style, though he could be abrasive sometimes. Whenever somebody gets fired and gets replaced by somebody else real fast, I get a sick feeling in my stomach.”

Person-Lynn, who has no immediate plans to continue in radio, is disturbed by what she calls a trend of diminishing media outlets for African Americans.

“The window through which we can see our community is shrinking,” she said. “We only stopped the music for two hours every week, and we couldn’t get everybody in. There are so many issues, so many neighborhoods in L.A. that don’t get covered, we need everything we can get.”