‘It just won’t die’: CBS News Radio announces closure during uncertain times for media

Columbia Broadcasting System News Radio will shut down due to financial difficulties nearly a century after its first segment aired.

On March 20, CBS executives announced the company’s news radio division will cease operations just a year before its 100-year anniversary. A memo signed by Tom Cibrowski, CBS News’ president and executive editor, and Bari Weiss, CBS editor-in-chief, said all CBS News Radio services will be terminated this spring, including daily CBS newscasts aired on Pittsburgh’s local KDKA radio. 

CBS sold its local radio stations to Audacy in 2017. Affiliate stations like KDKA and Philadelphia’s KYW continued to air network newscasts along with independently-produced programs. As of May, CBS News’ 700 affiliate radio stations will no longer air CBS programs, however some have announced that they will continue airing non-CBS newscasts. 

Michael Spacciapolli, senior vice president and marketing manager of Audacy, said CBS’ Pittsburgh affiliate, KDKA radio, will continue broadcasting local, national and international news.

“Although we’re grateful for [CBS News Radio], looking forward, the decision is going to have little to no effect on KDKA,” Spacciapolli said.  

The closure will result in gaps in KDKA’s programming because the station currently broadcasts CBS at the top and bottom of the hour, according to Spacciapolli. To fill these gaps, Spacciapolli said KDKA plans to replace CBS newscasts with a similar KDKA-developed program or new national affiliate. 

“A lot of different network provider folks are very interested,” Spacciapolli said. “We are not at a place right now that I can say we prefer one over another. But the important thing is that listeners are not going to see much difference in terms of the content they are actually getting during those hours.”

The news of the shutdown comes after CBS News’ decision in December to cut two longtime radio programs — the “Weekend Roundup” and “World News Roundup Late Edition.” Weiss and Cibrowski’s memo attributed the decision to economic hardships in a changing media environment.

“While this was a necessary decision, it was not an easy one,” the memo said. “A shift in radio station programming strategies, coupled with challenging economic realities, has made it impossible to continue the service.” 

Terry O’Reilly, chief executive officer of Pittsburgh Community Broadcasting — the parent company of Pittsburgh’s WESA — said it was “sad” to hear CBS News Radio announce its closure due to financial struggles after its long history in the industry.

“The CBS radio division was sort of at the core of that company when the Columbia Broadcasting System came together,” O’Reilly said. “The broadcasting business, be it radio or television, is no longer as robust financially as it once was.”

As people increasingly obtain news from digital platforms, O’Reilly said the biggest challenge for radio providers today is learning how to reach their audience while competing with a variety of sources. 

“The future is far more than the traditional destination newscasts at the top of the hour,” O’Reilly said. “The 24-hour news and information service that we do on WESA — and that NPR does all over the United States — some people will still come to those, but people are increasingly expecting to be able to learn what’s going on in their world from the environment around them.”

Michaela Albers, junior film and media studies major, works as Pitt WPTS radio’s content assistant station manager and interned for KDKA in spring 2025. WPTS publishes content through multiple mediums, which Albers said is a necessary move for radio stations today to survive.

“Realistically, there’s a lot of aspects of radio that I feel like are dying and I think it just comes down to what stations can adapt and if they are willing to,” Albers said. “We’ve kind of broadened our horizons with how to connect with our audience while radio is still our main focus.”

Albers said she is concerned about the future of radio, but remains hopeful that younger generations can preserve it.

“Working in college radio, I do still see a lot of positives and [think] that it’s still very relevant,” Albers said. “I’m passionate about it, and I feel like there [are] a lot of people in our generation who [are] very passionate about keeping certain forms of media alive.”

Though media companies are increasingly closing and news “deserts” are becoming more common in the U.S., O’Reilly said radio remains a “very viable medium” for advertising and news. According to O’Reilly, radio’s death has been “imminent” for decades as new platforms have gained popularity, but he thinks it is unlikely to happen anytime soon.

“It just won’t die — because it’s a good idea,” O’Reilly said. “It’s built around the two things that human beings are so very, very good at — one of them is storytelling and one of them is an affinity for being told a story.”