Philip Gracia was getting a haircut when a friend asked if he wanted to start a radio show.
Besides the fact that Gracia had no radio experience, he recalls saying, what would they even discuss?
This, the friend replied — what we talk about at the barber shop.
So in 2015, “Real Talk with Real Brothers” debuted on Frogtown Community Radio, which at the time was an online-only platform run by the Frogtown Neighborhood Association.
Ultimately, the show only lasted a few episodes, but within that time, Gracia had become all-in on local radio. He began hosting a weekly show called “The Midday Escape,” and in 2016, when the station got federal approval to begin broadcasting over the airwaves as WFNU-LP, Gracia was one of several volunteers who helped build the antenna.
In 2019, Gracia, Charles Moss Jr and Katey DeCelle, the station manager — who also all cohosted the show “Funk To Your Ears” — formally took over the station as a nonprofit called Frogtown Tuned-In, independent from the neighborhood association. Today, Gracia is president and CEO and DeCelle is executive director.
“We were energized by community,” Gracia said. “We wanted the community to have some ownership in it.”
The station broadcasts from the top of the Capitol Ridge building on Rondo Avenue, also home to the Radisson St. Paul hotel, and can be heard at 94.1 FM in about a five-mile radius or online at wfnu.org.
Low-power FM radio stations like WFNU, so called because they transmit a signal at a lower wattage than other commercial and community stations, are a somewhat recent development; the Federal Communications Commission first authorized low-power broadcasting in 2000 but most low-power stations, including WFNU, have only received licenses within the past decade or so. Currently, St. Paul appears to be home to two operational low-power stations, WFNU in Frogtown and WEQY on the East Side, which is operated by the local Center for Broadcast Journalism as Power 104.7.
Frogtown Tuned-In is powered by several dozen volunteer hosts that generally also produce their own shows, whether pre-recorded or broadcast live from the studio. Programming on the station includes both talk shows and music, and since most shows are weekly, every day is different, DeCelle said.
For example, on Thursdays, Karen J. Larson hosts the long-running community advocacy show “Living Loud with Karen J.” Conor O’Meara and Scott Applebaum go live most Friday mornings for “Conor’s Corner,” about sports and life with autism. Wesley Wright talks food systems and culture Saturdays on “The Un-Bougie Foodie,” and chef Lachelle Cunningham, who also leads Frogtown Farm and the Healthy Roots Institute, hosts “Community Roots” on Wednesdays.
And for many of the station’s volunteers, the premiere day of their show was also the first day they’d ever been on the radio, DeCelle said, which is “exactly what the station is there for.” Gracia and DeCelle provide technical training and support, so it doesn’t matter if someone starts out with no knowledge of working a soundboard, Gracia said — it’s more about their personality and connection to the neighborhood.
We’ve got their backs,” Gracia said. “And when they sit behind the mic, you can tell if they’ve got it or not. You can tell if they’ll be able to carry a conversation, be able to play music that’ll resonate with somebody; if they’re going to hang in there and do it for a period of time.”
This is the core of community radio, Gracia and DeCelle said: Amplifying the voices of people who have hyper-local stories to tell, but who might not otherwise have had the resources to reach an audience.
To that end, besides always considering proposals for new shows on the station, Frogtown Tuned-In also holds workshops for people with disabilities to learn radio skills and produce their own short radio pieces to air on the station. (The next workshop is scheduled for May 17, participation costs $20.) DeCelle and Gracia are also in the process of developing a news program that would produce original reporting focused on Frogtown and train community members as journalists.
“There are all these restaurants and businesses here that maybe people don’t want to visit because they’re not sure if it’ll be (their) cup of tea — but you just have to take the step,” DeCelle said. “Go into this business. Go into this theater. There’s an abundance of things happening here and great people, and I hope this station will be able to uplift them.”
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