Maintaining the Health Care Safety Net

Lincoln, NE, 2000

Few things can rival media in terms of altering people's perceptions and changing the world's reality. Community radio in particular has maintained localism can dramatically affect the lives of people who are largely ignored by other media.

KZUM's mission is to increase cultural and ethnic awareness, and is recognized as a leader in the community in terms of innovative methods of addressing language and cultural barriers. Any inability to communicate with others can be frustrating, but for the non-English-speaking person in need of health care, the inability to communicate can be not only frustrating but lethal.

KZUM is the only station in the market that has developed specialty programming specifically designed to meet the needs and demands of the community with pertinent, locally produced foreign-language programming. During the course of this project, KZUM added four additional foreign-language programs—Bosnian, Russian, Chinese and Arabic—in addition to the Spanish and Vietnamese programs already being produced.

Information was provided to the non-English speaking segments of the population regarding Communities Helping Immigrants and Refugees Program (CHIRP), which focuses on the availability of translation services to non-English-speaking people residing in Lancaster County. In addition, booklets were published in six languages, and distributed to various entities and offered to new non-English-speaking residents of Lincoln and Lancaster County, Nebraska.

Understanding the racial and ethnic makeup of the community is critical for professionals engaged in public and private health care services. KZUM is dedicated to educating all citizens about the need to maintain our health care safety net. This is especially important in Lancaster County, which is the 14th-largest per capita resettlement community in the United States for immigrants and refugees.

This synergistic community project, in conjunction with the Lincoln Interfaith Council, showed a positive, dramatic and lasting effect on the people of Lincoln and Lancaster County.

Contact Information

KZUM-FM
Dick Noble, General Manager
Tel: 402-474-5086

Lincoln Interfaith Council
Rev. Dr. Norman Leach, Executive Director
Tel: 402-474-3017

Awards:

KZUM Round Two
Special Recognition Award
— The Nebraska Mexican American Commission

Additional Funding: KZUM received $27,660 from the Nebraska Excellence in Health Care grant, for program continuation.