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WOUB Public Media’s general manager has resigned
By: David Forster
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ATHENS, Ohio (WOUB) — WOUB Public Media’s general manager has resigned following a 26-year career at the radio and television station that saw significant changes during his tenure.
Mark Brewer’s resignation comes five months after he was placed on administrative leave pending an internal investigation by Ohio University. This reporter was unable to confirm whether that investigation has ended and sources declined to disclose the nature of the investigation.
WOUB is housed at the university, which holds its broadcast licenses.
Steve Skidmore, WOUB’s chief technology officer, has been serving as interim general manager since Brewer was placed on leave in mid-October. He will continue in that role through the next year, Titsworth said.
It is unknown when or whether a permanent replacement will be hired. Titsworth is stepping down as dean at the end of this school year, and he said it will be up to the new dean to help make that decision.
“My intention is for the new dean to finalize a longer-term strategy in deciding how to proceed,” Titsworth said.
Brewer has spent his career in public media. He came to WOUB in July 1999 from a station in Minnesota. He served as director of television programming and outreach, chief content officer and chief operating officer before becoming general manager in 2016.
When Brewer joined WOUB, it had one analog television station and didn’t broadcast 24 hours a day. The station now offers multiple digital streams of television content that is also distributed through multiple apps.
Meanwhile, WOUB’s staff has shrunk by more than half, tasking the station’s leadership and staff to do more with less as it serves a 55-county region in southeast Ohio and portions of West Virginia and Kentucky.
Brewer noted in a story two years ago about his 25th anniversary with the station that the core of WOUB’s mission continues to be working with students and training the next generation of media professionals.
“Meeting them as they come in as recent high schoolers and watching them leave as college graduates to start a career in a media field that WOUB has prepared them to enter into is just an exciting thing to be a part of,” he said at the time.
Disclosure: Under WOUB’s protocol for reporting on itself, no executives reviewed this story before it was posted.