KVEN Radio Show Hosts Jump to KTRO

The war for local radio ratings heated up this week as KTRO-AM (1520) staged a coup by coaxing a rival station’s popular morning show hosts and most of its news department to jump ship.

Dave Ciniero and Bob Adams, who have broadcast the “Dave & Bob Show” on KVEN-AM (1450) for 14 years, resigned Monday and plan to begin working for KTRO on Feb. 15. The station, which had Spanish-language programming until 1996, when it converted to an all-news format, plans to change its call letters to KVTA on that date.

In addition, Rich Gualano, news director, newscasters Doug Drigot and Alex Wilson, and weatherman Eric Wright have quit to work for the new station.

“We kicked the idea around of what would it take to do this and what would [Ciniero and Adams] need to make it work,” said Chip Ehrhardt, general manager of Gold Coast Broadcasting, which owns KTRO. He said negotiations began in August.

The only thing Ciniero and Adams asked for, Ehrhardt said, was that if they go, everybody goes.

“They had been working as a team for years and needed all the parts of the team to make it happen,” Ehrhardt said.

Ehrhardt declined to say how much Gold Coast agreed to pay the six new employees, but he said that luring the entire group made sense.

“To make the station happen, we could have looked to build it ourselves or just buy the franchise, and that’s essentially what we’ve done,” he said.

Steve Day, KVEN program director, said the rival news station made a shrewd hiring move.

“This is the smartest thing they’ve ever done, stealing our people,” said Day, adding that he holds no resentment against his departing employees.

“All of us get along real well and I’ll miss them terribly,” he said. “I hope they get exactly what they’ve wanted and I hope the best for them.”

Carl Haeberle, a former KVEN personality, began working for KTRO last spring, several weeks after his midday talk show on KVEN was canceled.