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$2.00/SEPTEMBER 17 - 23, 2012
VOL. 33, NO. 36
As iron ore dips, Cliffs’ stock price follows suit
Indians bid radio deal, and WTAM has a fight 92.3 mounts strong challenge for flagship
Shares still well below peak despite rallying
BY JOEL HAMMOND jmhammond@crain.com
The Cleveland Indians have offered for bid the rights to their flagship radio broadcasts, and WKRK-FM, 92.3, better known locally as The Fan, is mounting a stern challenge for them to the incumbent, WTAMAM, 1100. Multiple sources told Crain’s Cleveland Business that WKRK, owned by CBS Radio, is the front-runner to obtain the rights; WTAM’s latest two-year contract is up after the current season. CBS Radio Cleveland general manager Tom Herschel, who oversees both WKRK and other CBS Cleveland properties including WNCX-FM, 98.5, said in a phone interview from Chicago last Wednesday, Sept. 12, that The Fan “loves the Indians, and would love to have them on our airways.” “We’re a sports radio station,” Mr. Herschel said. “Why wouldn’t we want to be a part of the conversation? But truly, no decision has been made.” WTAM program director Ray Davis did not return a call from Crain’s. Indians senior director of communications Curtis Danburg said no decision is imminent. See RADIO Page 25
INSIDE
2012 Health Care Directory
some time because of outmigration and the standard patron of the arts getting older or dying off,” said Kathleen Cerveny, director of institutional learning and arts initiatives at the foundation. “The foundation believes the arts are critical to Cleveland’s standing as a cultured cosmopolitan area.” The foundation recently doled out $15,000 grants to three organizations, including one to the contemporary art museum, to support the experimental engagement initiatives. Additional $15,000 grants could be awarded in the coming months, Ms. Cerveny said, with larger ones slated for next year to support the programs that show the most promise. “We wanted to give organizations some support for taking time to examine what their options might be,” she said.
Live by the ore, die by the ore — and, lately, Cleveland-based Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. has been getting killed by low iron ore prices. Help might be on the way, though, in the form of Chinese stimulus spending that could push demand up for iron ore worldwide. In the meantime, the producer of iron ore and metallurgical coal maintains it is well positioned to wait for ore prices to rise, with $1.6 billion in liquidity on its balance sheets to hold it over while the hatches are battened down tight. “Being a commodity company, our share price is definitely closely correlated to the products we sell, which (are) iron ore and coal,” Cliffs INSIDE: spokeswoman Pat Tracking Persico said. “But prices of we do continue to iron ore believe that the and Cliffs’ fundamentals supstock. porting Cliffs’ longPage 14 term strategy are intact and anything affecting pricing is not for the long term.” In 2011, Cliffs’ stock was riding the coattails of iron ore prices, with its price climbing to more than $99 a share in July of that year as ore was trading at near-record prices of about $180 per ton. Since then, however, the price of ore has plunged. Ore prices were below $90 per ton in early September, though by last Wednesday, Sept. 12, they again topped $100 per ton. Cliffs’ stock slid with the decline in ore prices and fell below $34 a share for a brief period on Sept. 4 before rebounding to about $46 last Friday — though even that price was nearly 54% off the July 2011 high. Even so, Cliffs’ stock boasts a yield of more than 6% — something most money market investors or bank
See ARTS Page 25
See STOCK Page 9
JANET CENTURY
The new home of the Museum of Contemporary Art in University Circle. The museum has received money from the Cleveland Foundation to create strategies to draw and keep younger audiences.
Cleveland Foundation cash helping arts think ahead Grants aimed at assisting groups establish more youthful audience By TIMOTHY MAGAW tmagaw@crain.com
The sleek and somewhat unusual steel structure of the $32 million Museum of Contemporary Art near University Circle likely will attract thousands of arts- Cerveny hungry Clevelanders when it opens its doors to the public in early October. But keeping those patrons and attracting new ones once the allure of the new building fades is an altogether different challenge — one faced by arts organizations of all sizes in the region. As such, the Cleveland Foundation is pumping some money — risk capital, if you will — into a handful of local arts groups to come up with creative ways to cultivate new and younger audiences to keep those institutions vital for years to come. “The reality is that audiences in Cleveland have been shrinking for
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A comprehensive guide to the region’s health care providers. PAGE H-1 PLUS: ■ Avon-based ShurTech Brands expands into unconventional branding for its signature Duck Tape. PAGE 3
By DAN SHINGLER dshingler@crain.com
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