After serving a two-day suspension without pay for making racially insensitive remarks toward Asian-Americans on the air, DJ “Lucas”, whose real name is Josh Garber, has been back on the airwaves for over a week on WTWR-FM 98.3.
This is despite pressure from the Bowling Green based Asian Communities Union calling for his dismissal.
As reported in a Toledo Blade article last Tuesday, station program director Brent Carey was fired as a result of the incident and Garber read an on-air apology his first night back.
At the time of press, however, no comment was available from Theresa Mah, who helped organize the petition calling for Garber’s dismissal. She is a former ethnic studies professor at Bowling Green State University and new faculty member at the Center for the study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago.
Since then, Mah has told the BG News how she feels about the actions taken.
“I’m pleased that he’s made an on-air apology, although I would very much like an MP3 file of the broadcast so that I can hear it myself. I hope that he uses his two-day suspension without pay to think hard about his actions rather than brag about the disciplinary action against him, as he has done in the past,” she said.
“Obviously, [the ACU] would have liked either more suspension time or his actual dismissal because of the seriousness of his actions. But we can be satisfied with what we’ve got if Cumulus [the parent company that owns WTWR-FM] will also stick to their word about intensive monitoring and the possibility of further discussions with us about the Asian-American community’s role in that monitoring process,” she said
“I spoke with [Cumulus Executive Vice President] John Dickey several weeks ago, and he told me that Lucas would be required to apologize on the air and take a suspension without pay. He also promised close monitoring that would result in dismissal if something similar were to take place again. He also said that the company would recommend that [Garber] be sent to diversity training,” she said.
Mah said further attempts to contact Dickey have been met with silence, so she has enlisted the help of the Toledo Board of Community Relations to further contact him about setting up an advisory board.
“We are accepting the apology and the relatively lenient suspension with the hope that we can work toward more long-term solutions such as an advisory board on diversity issues and diversity training that is required and not just ‘recommended,'” she said.
Garber, Dickey, Carey and market manager Chris Taylor where all unavailable for comment.
