Vijay Singh will be Vermont Public’s new CEO, the organization’s Board of Directors announced Friday.
Brendan Kinney has led Vermont Public on an interim basis since October, 2023, after the departure of Scott Finn.
Most recently, Singh was chief operating and content officer at CapRadio, a California NPR affiliate that serves Sacramento and much of the surrounding area.
Over the last few years, CapRadio has faced significant turmoil. Last August, it laid off 12% of its staff. This month, a forensic analysis found multiple instances where funds were misused and several conflicts of interest.
Singh says he started at CapRadio as a consultant in 2020. According to his LinkedIn profile, he took over as chief content and operating officer in May 2023, a position he held until January 2024.
He acknowledged his tenure overlapped with a difficult time for the public broadcaster, and said part of his job was to keep the station on the air and share information with staff, something he described as “helping to run the organization through chaos.”
Prior to his time at CapRadio, he led product development at KPCC, now known as LAist, an NPR member station in Los Angeles.
Singh, 39, said he is excited by the chance to move back to the Northeast, where he grew up.
His parents immigrated from Guyana to upstate New York in the ‘70s. They settled in Bloomingburg, a town of about a thousand people 30 miles southwest of Poughkeepsie. Singh said his immigrant parents and rural upbringing had a big impact on him.
“Growing up the son of Guyanese immigrants in upstate New York, my connection to the world was media and public media in particular,” he said in a phone interview. “So when thinking about the job to be done to serve people who need public media the most, it’s very personal for me.”
Singh studied film making at Ithaca College and began his career as a documentary filmmaker. At his core, he said he’s a storyteller.
“I'm obsessed with it. I am a story nerd," he said. "The way to communicate stories that have impact and for the people who need them most is one of the best things that public media can do.”
He said his experience making films, radio and other creative content will be key in his new position leading Vermont Public, which has grown significantly in recent years to 113 employees and an annual budget of nearly $20 million. In July 2021, Vermont Public Radio merged with Vermont PBS.
“I think when leading an organization of creative folks, it really helps to have done the work,” he said. “I've held almost every position in lots of different types of creative organizations, and so I understand the challenge that we're up against.”
Kerri Hoffman, CEO of the nonprofit media company PRX, is a member of the Vermont Public Board of Directors and was part of the search committee for the role. She said Singh was the board’s unanimous choice.
“He had worked for big organizations, for small organizations, for organizations in crisis, organizations that were doing well,” she said. “We actually felt like he was able to cross the terrain of challenges and opportunities that we face pretty adeptly, that he had enough tools in the toolbox.”
Hoffman added the board is excited to have a new leader who “has dabbled in enough places and then decided to take a risk on us too.”
Brendan Kinney, the interim CEO, said it’s imperative the station continues to expand its digital footprint and he said Singh’s experience and expertise will make him a great fit.
For our audience, we have to really meet people where they are. We have to understand not just how they are consuming our content, but what does their entire life look like.Vijay Singh, Vermont Public's incoming CEO
“What we know is a big part of our future is to grow a broader and more diverse audience in digital spaces,” said Kinney. “So while television and radio will always be a core part of our service, digital is where we need to expand to continue to serve more Vermonters and more people.” As an example he points to Vermont Public’s podcast “But Why,” which has a growing global audience.
Singh said another challenge will be confronting some of the skepticism around the news today and deep societal divisions.
“For our audience, we have to really meet people where they are,” he said. “We have to understand not just how they are consuming our content, but what does their entire life look like?”
He said he believes doing that will help rebuild some of the trust that’s been lost in the media.
Singh will be moving to Vermont with his wife, Amanda, and their two terriers. Amanda Singh works as an interior designer for an architectural firm in New York. The couple has not yet decided where they will live in Vermont. His first day on the job is Oct. 1.
Disclosure: This story was reported by senior Vermont Public reporter Nina Keck with support from Vermont Public’s executive editor of news, Brittany Patterson. It was edited by Amy Gorel, senior editor of digital news at WBUR. This story was not reviewed by Vermont Public’s communications team or leadership team before publication.
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