KP Whaley (General Manager)
KP has been involved in public and community broadcasting for more than a decade, and joined Asheville FM in 2017 after nearly four years as a senior talk producer at Wisconsin Public Radio. He started his radio career as a volunteer and then News and Public Affairs Director at WORT Community Radio in Madison, Wisconsin in 2005. Between those two gigs he has also worked in community television, community food cooperatives, and as the manager of MAIN-FM for a year. And once upon a time worked in the private sector in a variety of supervisory, management, and project management roles.
Esther Cartwright (Chair, Board of Directors)
A lover of music who has lived in Atlanta, Chapel Hill, New York and Memphis and enjoyed the diverse radio each had to offer. After working in the music industry, I moved to Asheville 13 years ago to work at the family business. From it’s very beginning my family and I have been supporters of AshevilleFM. Now both my husband and daughter are DJs and I am honored to serve on the board.
Erik Mattox (Vice-Chair, Board of Directors)
Originally from New York, Erik has made Asheville his home for over thirty years. An avid record collector and music researcher, he has remained a part of Asheville FM since its beginning. His show, The UnCola has been airing since September 2009 every Tuesday night, and he was also the host of The West Coast Breeze from 2015 to 2018. Along with serving as the Publicity and Promotions director in 2010, he joined the Board in 2011, serving a term as President while Asheville FM made the transition to its FM signal. Erik is very appreciative to be serving as a board member again. You can also follow him at his blog, Music In the Key Of E.
Hope Butterworth (Treasurer, Board of Directors)
Hope has spent the past 20 years in Asheville and is proud to call these mountains her home. She received a BA from the University of Virginia in African and African-American Studies, a Master’s Degree from the University of Chicago in Cultural Anthropology, and is currently working towards a degree in Accounting. Hope serves on the Boards of Francine Delany New School for Children, Asheville High School Booster Club, and the Kenilworth Residents’ Association. She is learning to play bluegrass banjo and enjoys thrift store shopping and discovering new music.
Elizabeth Garland (Secretary, Board of Directors)
Elizabeth Garland is the Director of Alumni Relations and Community Engagement and the Co-Director of Equity and Inclusion at Carolina Day School. She is the creator and host of Slay the Mic (Saturday evenings on Asheville FM), which is founded on the mission to celebrate culture, community, and creativity by amplifying voices.
In her role, as an administrator, educator, mentor, and radio host she aligns her passion for creating community, and encouraging active engagement as an advocate for culturally enriched resources. Prior to joining Carolina Day School in 2015, Elizabeth worked in the radio entertainment industry for iHeartMedia in San Francisco, CA, and Core Communications in Asheville, NC. She is a communications professional with a background of effective promotion of brands through marketing, media/public relations, communications and community-involvement channels. She has a wide variety of knowledge with fundraising and development, coordinating scalable events and projects, management, marketing, radio, entertainment, video production, photography, community engagement, leadership, equity, inclusion and belonging.
Elizabeth is certified by the Radio Advertising Bureau; she is a national SEED (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity) leader, a host and facilitator for the annual NAIS People of Color Conference, a production assistant for the annual BET Network Award show, and serves on the steering committee for the WNC Diversity Engagement Coalition.
Katie Fisher (At-large member, Board of Directors)
Katie was born in New Orleans, LA and grew up in Atlanta, GA. She earned a B.A. from UNC-Chapel Hill and majored in psychology (1992). After college, she moved to Austin, TX where she worked with visually impaired children at Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired for four years. The last 2 years of her time in Austin were spent enjoying great music. In late 1998, Katie moved to Asheville, NC and started law school at UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law in 1999. Upon graduation, she and her young family lived in Oaxaca, Mexico where she studied for the NC Bar exam and immersed herself in a Spanish language program. She was soon back in Asheville full-time and working as a staff attorney, then managing attorney, for the Mountain Violence Prevention Project at Pisgah Legal Services. After five years at Pisgah Legal, Katie went into private practice. In 2017, Katie joined the Van Winkle Law Firm, bringing a full practice with her and starting a family law section in one of Asheville’s oldest and largest law firms.
TL Allen (At-large member, Board of Directors)
TL Allen (best known as CousinTL) has been a part of Asheville’s community radio for over 11 years now. In 2009 TL volunteered to help rebrand the Mountain Area Information Network to M@in-FM. At WPVM, he produced and hosted the highly-rated Supa Dupa Show, a talk show that was syndicated through the Pacifica network in 24 cities and distributed as a podcast in 6 different platforms. He later produced, revised, and hosted Asheville New Radio (to be retitled Asheville NU Radio). From 2014 to the present, TL has been producing, engineering, and hosting the popular show, CousinTL’s Stank Free Radio on 103.3 Asheville FM.
Originally from Detroit, Michigan, TL grew up as a fan of the city’s unparalleled radio market. Not knowing how good he had it, TL would consume shows from different radio stations in all genres (talk and music alike), listening to diverse radio personalities. He studied radio and television production in high school and later studied art direction and commercial marketing in college and art school. After that he went on to be certified in graphic/web design and animation. During this period TL moonlighted as a “mid-act” comedian, touring with headliners in the Great Lakes region (Michigan, Indiana, and Canada) and later, the New York/New Jersey circuits.
Since 2002 TL has worked in consulting for operational workflows that became ISO certified in corporations such as Ford Motor Company and Goldman Sachs. He would go on to freelance at different media companies (USA networks, Lifetime, American Broadcasting Company [ABC], and FOX Sports) assisting with the conversion from analog to digital HD.
As a freelance graphic designer, TL has worked on and has appeared in printed advertisements, publicity materials, newspaper comics, and social media, having created designs not only for corporate companies but also “Mom & Pops.”
From 2002 to 2008, TL would volunteer at Symposia Bookstore (a community center and internet café/ show venue and discussion forum place that happened to sell used books) in Hoboken, New Jersey. TL helped to create the nonprofit’s mission, as the store became a major asset to the Hudson County community. TL. Allen was awarded the Symposia Award for Building Community in Hoboken. This allowed him to speak at many seminars and workshops sharing the achievements (events, discussion groups, technology sharing, and fundraisers) with other community outlets and nonprofits for their benefit.
CousinTL has been volunteering at Asheville FM since July 2014. Serving as a “self-proclaimed” older cousin, mentoring other volunteers on-air and off. In 2015, he became Asheville FM ‘s first production director. Then, TL served as an interim-program director to be named program director the following year. He continued to serve as an at-large member of the programming committee until January 2020. In 2016, with the encouragement of that year’s program committee, TL help developed an on-air “test the waters”-type opportunity for new volunteers. This experimental show is now known as The Sandbox Hour, and it has become a valuable part of the Asheville FM training protocol.
Jim Dougherty (At-large member, Board of Directors)
Jim spent his formative years listening to WMMS in Cleveland, Ohio, one of the most influential progressive rock stations in the country, in the early 70’s. His love for music was a constant companion while managing a career in the corporate world as an insurance agent and financial advisor, and raising a family. He also spent time as a licensed massage therapist and small business owner, and served on several nonprofit boards. Besides music, he loves baseball and travel. In 2014, he and his wife and four pets, moved to Asheville to enjoy retirement and take in the vibrant art and music scene. Jim became a volunteer DJ at Asheville FM in 2015 and his music show, Closer to the Edge, airs weekly.