A dispute that turned personal between WMAQ-Ch. 5 president and general manager Larry Wert and Clear Channel Communications has spilled over into the courtroom.
Wert, who spent 10 years with properties that were acquired by Clear Channel, is suing the radio giant for breach of contract for refusing to let him cash out nearly $800,000 in stock options he had been granted.
The suit pits the high-profile Wert against the conglomerate over what some consider to be a fairly minor sum of money for Clear Channel. The suggestion that the dispute may be personal stems from long-standing competitive battles between executives at a time when radio companies were gobbling up each other.
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Wert declined to comment on Thursday.
Clear Channel couldn’t be reached.
In his suit in Cook County Circuit Court, Wert said that when he negotiated his resignation in 1998 with his friend and former boss, then chief operating officer Jimmy de Castro, he was able to hang on to his outstanding stock options for their full 10-year term. Not so, says Clear Channel, which claims de Castro didn’t follow company policy when he gave Wert the agreement.
De Castro, whose ties to Wert go back to the late 1980s when he hired him to run WLUP-FM 97.9, rode the wave of radio deregulation and rapid consolidation, buying stations before merging with then Chancellor Broadcasting, which was eventually bought by Clear Channel in 1999. De Castro resigned from Clear Channel in 2000.
Relying on his agreement with de Castro, Wert didn’t exercise stock options he received in 1994 and 1996. When he attempted to do so in 2002, Wert claims in the suit that Clear Channel refused, saying he was required to exercise them within three months of his resignation.
The 2-year-old dispute even prompted a letter from de Castro to Clear Channel president and chief operating officer Mark Mays, urging Mays to extend the termination date of the options. The letter suggested that Wert, in his position at Channel 5, remained important to Clear Channel.
“As you know, Larry was an exemplary employee, who joined NBC’s Channel 5 in Chicago, with which we had an important relationship,” de Castro wrote in 2003. “It was important to us then (and, I suspect, would be important to Clear Channel now) to keep good relations with Larry.”
Channel 5 has been an advertiser on Clear Channel’s radio stations in Chicago for several years.
Mays wrote back in July 2003, saying that de Castro’s approval of the extension on Wert’s options was against the company’s policies.
“It certainly would be good for Clear Channel’s personal relationship with a big advertiser if we had some proof of the same beyond your memory,” Mays wrote. “However, my attorneys tell me that even had you granted a verbal extension, that action would have been inappropriate and ineffective.”
Decision time? A window for WGN-Ch. 9 to match an offer from WBBM-Ch. 2 for Channel 9 morning anchor Roseanne Tellez appears to be closing.
It is unclear whether Channel 9 is willing to match or if Tellez is willing to stay. Sources at both stations believe that Tellez is ready to bolt.
Channel 2 chief Joe Ahern, who has been throwing money at anchors and reporters to woo known talent from other stations, wants to pair Tellez with former Channel 9 alum Randy Salerno in mornings. Tellez didn’t return phone calls, and Channel 2 executives wouldn’t comment. If Tellez goes, look for Channel 9 morning traffic reporter/anchor Robin Baumgarten to get the anchor chair next to Larry Potash in the mornings. Julie Unruh, who Tribune Broadcasting brass consider an up-and-comer, would likely get the traffic spot.
Report due: Look for former Sun-Times circulation directors Mark Hornung and Stephen Hastings to take most of the blame for manipulating single-copy sales when a report on the matter is delivered in coming days to the board of the paper’s owner, Hollinger International Inc.
Hornung, who most recently was publisher of the Daily Southtown and had been circulation director at the Sun-Times for years, and Hastings, the Sun-Times’ most recent circulation director, stepped down earlier this summer as a result of the scandal. The report is expected to detail how a cash fund was set up to pay distributors to dump returned newspapers.
Taking into account both the overstatement and the loss of readers because of a price hike in April, the Sun-Times’ single-copy circulation has declined 23 percent.