Milwaukee, WI
Radio Milwaukee Names Jordan Lee As Executive Director
For Jordan Lee, it’s all about the music. Plain and simple.
After serving in an interim role since January, Lee is taking over as the executive director of Radio Milwaukee (WYMS-88.9 FM) – the station’s third in a little more than three years.
“It’s back to basics,” he said. “Our mission is pretty clear. We use music to bring people together. We had some leadership that was trying to use other tools to do that. I’m just going to focus on music. That’s what we’re known for. That’s what we’re good at.”
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Music has been at the core of Lee’s professional journey.
“I came from the Milwaukee music scene myself,” Lee told Milwaukee Magazine. “It’s inherently a part of where my vision goes. I’m taking a look at how we can improve the existing programs we have. I have no new programming initiatives at all right now. Probably won’t. But there’s a lot of room for improvement and a lot of opportunity to increase the impact in what we’re already doing. I feel we lost a little bit of time these past couple years by trying to do new things that quite frankly I didn’t hear people from Milwaukee asking for.”
Lee specifically pointed to Radio Milwaukee’s effort to move into news.
“That was a mistake,” Lee said. “I feel strongly that we need to be focused on storytelling in music. We have great news with stations like WUWM and WHAD. We recently partnered with Kristin Brey (WTMJ radio host and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist). Let’s let those people do that great work. We want to be focused on music.”
Lee replaces Maxie C. Jackson III, who took over the top leadership role at Radio Milwaukee in September 2022 after a stint a New England Public Media. Before Jackson was Kevin Sucher, who resigned in January 2022 after less than two years on the job.
A native of Kenosha, Lee said he “grew up culturally” in Milwaukee, performing as what he described as a First Stage Children’s Theater “brat” and then doing gigs as a musician at venues like The Rave and the old Globe East concert hall. He moved to the city at age 17 and currently resides in Bay View.
Lee most recently served as senior director of programming and has spent more than 15 years across two stints at Radio Milwaukee, including serving in various leadership roles.
Lee first joined Radio Milwaukee in 2008, a year after it launched, as a morning show host and, three years later, moved to assistant program director before becoming program director and station director. In January 2022, he joined Paragon, for which he had previously served as a consultant, in a full-time role. He returned to Radio Milwaukee in November 2023.
“I’ve known Jordan going back a number of years through the various roles he’s played in the organization,” Radio Milwaukee board chairman Al Orr said in an interview. “I once had an opportunity to see him speak at a donor event. His ability to articulate the mission, vision, promise and opportunity of Radio Milwaukee really struck me. He spoke from the heart without prepared notes. He displayed a natural leadership style that night. If you look at all the experiences he’s had as a convener in the community and his industry experience both with this organization and with his consulting stint, he’s developed this mix of credibility and commitment and natural leadership. That’s what we all felt was really important as we move into this important new period for Radio Milwaukee.”
Orr said that Lee rose above all other candidates when it came to selecting the next executive director, and he stood out in his interim role. Lee’s promotion to the executive director role will provide important stability for the organization, he added.
“He has a really unique way of leveraging relationships, and his path to this place has positioned him and equipped him in a way that none of the others who recently proceeded him were,” said Orr. “They didn’t have that mix. I feel like this is an opportunity for us to find some long-term leadership in the role.”
Lee’s on-the-job accomplishments at Radio Milwaukee include serving as a catalyst for creating and launching HYFIN, an urban alternative station dedicated to celebrating and supporting Black music and culture. In addition, he led strategic planning, supported the implementation of new and innovative programming and developed and implemented community engagement strategies.
“Music is a tool that is much older than any of the communication styles we have,” Lee said. “It’s also a tool that we can wield for good. That’s been our mission from the get-go.”
To that end, Lee stressed the importance of cultural advocacy through music. “That’s going to be the solution to some of our city’s consistent divisions,” he said. “People are really excited about sharing other cultural experiences. Look at what’s happening in food when people here have an opportunity to try something that is different.”
Among the initiatives that Lee plans to foster is “continuing to push the envelope on artists we feel are strongly representing the new sounds of what we want people to pay attention to.”
“We also really want to double down on our local efforts,” he said. “We’ve really been doing a lot of experiments throughout the years of trying to find impactful ways to create a better platform for Milwaukee musicians. There’s a lot of ground that we can still solidify in those spaces.”
Lee said he’s also actively restructuring the executive leadership of the organization to “ensure that we don’t lose track in the future.” He’s setting the framework to create a trio of leaders at the top of the organization with himself as executive director, Tarik Moody as senior director of strategy and innovation, and the hiring of a deputy executive director.
“Tarik is one of the few staff members who’s been around longer than me,” Lee said. “He really knows where we’ve been, and his reputation in Milwaukee as being a strategist and a technology innovator is rock-solid. He’s going to keep us aware of what’s going on with disruptions, technology changes and economic waves of change.”
The deputy executive director will serve as a chief financial officer of sorts, he said.
“That person is going to make sure that we’re making good financial decisions around programming and execution of ideas,” Lee explained. “With me focused on culture and mission, Tarik focused on technology and my new deputy focused on finance, those are really the main pillars that we’ve always expected the executive director to be good at, which has left me wondering if there are unicorns out there who are good at all of those things.”
The deputy executive director will have to possess certain attributes to join the Radio Milwaukee leadership team, Lee said. “We’re going to be really focused on someone who knows Milwaukee but specifically the nonprofit business sector in Milwaukee and understands how the funding ecosystems work around here.”
The restructuring was essential for Lee in agreeing to move into the executive director role.
“I came back because I wanted to invest my energy into this thing that I care so much about,” Lee said. “That’s the same reason I’m restructuring the leadership team. We really need to future-proof this company because to me, it’s a really important part of the fabric of Milwaukee.”
Along those lines, Radio Milwaukee also announced the promotions of two other key organizational leaders – Element Everest-Blanks as program director of HYFIN and Kenny Perez as program director of 88Nine.
“These promotions represent the strength and stability of Radio Milwaukee’s leadership, as well as our dedication to reflecting the diversity and pride of our city,” Lee said. “It’s been since day one that we’ve wanted to be a rainbow coalition of culture and sound. We’ve really wanted to be a place where you think you only like one thing, but then you come over here and you learn that you like a lot of things. You just need to have a chance to get exposed to them.”
Once a deputy executive director is in place, Lee wants to grow Radio Milwaukee’s staff. “We really want to do more by investing more in what we’re doing.”
MILWAUKEE — As Venezuela continues to recover from devastating earthquakes, support from Milwaukee’s “United for Venezuela Emergency Relief Campaign” is soon heading to the disaster-stricken country.
The basement of Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church is filled to the brim with donations ticketed for Venezuela, the culmunation of a week of community generosity.
From food to clothing and toys, the outpouring has been remarkable said Father Norberto Sandoval, who is from Venezuela and serves as associate pastor of Blessed Sacrament.
“This [has been] overwhelming,” said Sandoval. “I mean, if you can see [the basement], you were able to get in on Monday. Now we [are not] able to walk.”
(Spectrum News 1/Blake Dietz)
Aura Escobar, who is also from Venezuela, has been doing whatever she can to help her home country, including packing donations. She described the support from friends, coworkers, and strangers as something special to witness.
“In my Venmo, I had three thousand dollars in less than 24 hours,” Escobar said. “And I was able to buy stuff to donate. It’s been amazing. It’s very heartwarming to have so many people that care about Venezuela.”
Due to limited storage capacity and the logistical planning required to transport the supplies to those who need them most, organizers have decided to stop accepting donations after Friday afternoon.
“We have more than a thousand boxes right now. We are expecting two semi-trucks either to move [Friday] in the afternoon or tomorrow,” Sandoval said.
(Spectrum News 1/Blake Dietz)
He acknowledged that corruption in times of trauma is a long-standing concern in Venezuela. For that reason, the trucks will take the local donations to Miami, where a Venezuelan organization he fully trusts will handle the final distribution.
“We have already the person and it’s going to be [done] free. It’s going to be directly to a group of religious groups in Venezuela. So, in that way people will get the donations,” he said.
Sandoval and other organizers are putting out one final plea for volunteers to help load the semi-trucks on Friday and Saturday.
Video circulating this week shows masked federal agents in Milwaukee arresting people. City leaders say the face coverings violate a city ordinance — but whether federal agents are required to follow local ordinances is a legal question that may ultimately be decided by a federal judge.
RELATED | Father with no criminal record detained by ICE on Milwaukee’s south side, family says
Local attorney Russell Jones said the answer depends on the specific ordinance and what federal authorities are doing.
“The issue becomes whether or not the local ordinances interfere with the operations of the federal officers acting under federal law. If it does, federal law will supersede it. Right, it’s the supremacy clause of the Constitution. If it doesn’t interfere with their operations, then typically they will follow those ordinances. So that’s really the question: do the ordinances interfere with the legitimate operations of the federal agency?” Jones explained.
For the past week, masked federal agents have been seen in Wisconsin arresting people they say are in the country illegally.
Watch: Do federal agents have to follow Milwaukee’s face covering and park ordinances?
Do federal agents have to follow Milwaukee’s face covering and park ordinances?
Galo Suarez described one encounter.
“They broke our side window, and they told us that if we didn’t comply, we would face several heavy consequences,” Suarez said.
Images have also surfaced of what appear to be federal agents in Milwaukee County parks.
Federal agents wearing masks and being in county parks, according to city and county leaders, are against local ordinances.
Milwaukee’s city ordinance prohibits law enforcement officers from wearing face coverings. A Milwaukee County ordinance prohibits any law enforcement agency from using a park as a staging area without a permit.
When asked whether a resolution to the legal question was possible now, Jones said it likely falls to the courts.
“That’s a question that eventually probably some federal judge will answer,” Jones said.
Before the city’s face covering ordinance was passed, City Attorney Evan Goyke wrote in a memo that “it is legal and enforceable.”
Enforcement of the ordinance would fall to Milwaukee Police, who earlier this week said they have “requested a formal written legal opinion from the city attorney’s office regarding the ordinance’s applicability and enforceability.” TMJ4 News reached out to Goyke on this and is waiting to hear back.
ICE has already stated it “will not abide by unconstitutional bans,” noting that “ICE officers wear face coverings for one reason: to protect themselves and their families from real-world threats including agitators.”
Jones said the practical challenge of enforcing a local ordinance against federal officers adds another layer of complexity.
“Enforcing a local ordinance right is typically done with an arrest or issuing a ticket, and certainly arresting ICE officers would interfere with their operations,” Jones added. “Ultimately, a federal judge will decide if these ordinances interfere with federal operations, and if they do, they will be superseded by federal law, and if they don’t, then ICE would likely have to follow them.”
This story was reported on-air by Jenna Rae and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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A hospital bed. That was the only thing that could stop Dominique Paul Noth from doing a review.
An ice storm tried a couple of years ago, coming to Milwaukee the same night as a dance recital. It failed. When he could no longer drive and gave up his license, one of his children would take him, or he’d Uber to a performance. That was his level of dedication.
Then, one month before his passing, Noth, stuck in a hospital bed and hooked up to an oxygen tank, acquiesced, calling his editor to inform him he would not be able to review Agatha Christie’s “And Then There Were None.” For the first time in his 60 years as an arts critic in Milwaukee, the show would go on without him.
“He was not happy about it,” his son Vincent said.
“It’s something I don’t think I’ve ever seen him do before,” added Paul, the third oldest Noth’s nine children.
Noth, who influenced Milwaukee’s discussion of culture and the arts for close to six decades, died on June 26 at 84 years old. He had advanced chronic obstructive pulmonary disease complicated by heart failure.
Conceived while his parents were escaping the Nazis in France, Noth was born in New York in 1942. He moved to Milwaukee as a teenager and went to Marquette University, where he fell in love with the arts.
Noth graduated in 1963, and worked in New York for three years before being hired by the Milwaukee Journal, where he worked in a variety of positions for three decades. Starting as a copy editor, he soon made a switch to news writing before becoming a film and drama critic.
He kept rising, becoming an arts and senior features editor, working on the publication’s beloved Green Sheet in the 1970’s. Noth stayed at the newspaper long enough to serve as the first online news producer for the merged Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
In the 1970’s and 80’s, he also taught a film course at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. After leaving the Journal Sentinel, he served as editor-in-chief of The Milwaukee Labor Press for a decade before becoming a contributing theater and culture critic for Urban Milwaukee.
Noth’s writing earned numerous honors, including nine gold medals from The Milwaukee Press Club for Best Critic. Never afraid to ruffle feathers with searing reviews, Noth said “the force fizzled” in “Star Wars: Return of the Jedi.” He even briefly got himself banned from reviewing a Skylight Theater show in 1974 because of past rhetoric.
“He approached Milwaukee as if it was New York, L.A., Chicago,” said Jeannie Gaffigan, Noth’s oldest daughter. “He really always believed in Milwaukee, and always believed in the arts in Milwaukee.”
His access to subjects often set him apart. Once, when Cary Grant was getting into a taxi to go to the airport, Noth followed the actor into the cab to secure an exclusive interview. He also got a one-on-one with Steven Spielberg by talking his way past security after the filmmaker spurned other media.
Noth juggled working tirelessly with raising a family, and often involved them in his jobs. He would take his children to exclusive, private screenings and even more exclusive interviews. His kids attended his UWM classes, and sat in the Milwaukee Journal offices while he typed his reviews.
He also loved to cook and bake, making everything from scratch.
“I have no idea how he did as much as he did,” son Paul said. “He was able to accomplish a lot.”
Even though his body was not fit to leave the hospital, Noth was able to give his family one final gift before he died. Surrounded by all his kids and many grandkids, Noth went around the room and gave a personalized goodbye to everybody.
“It’s a great blessing,” Paul said, “but it’s also a very emotional, devastating time.”
Noth told them even though he could no longer continue to make the world a better place, he trusted each and every one of them to carry on that legacy.
In that vein, his family established the Dominique Paul Noth Memorial Fund, which is now accepting donations. The fund, according to its website, will be used to support charitable causes that enrich the greater Milwaukee community, foster creativity and education, and strengthen civic life.
A celebration of life for Noth will begin at 2 p.m. on August 2 at Turner Hall, followed by a memorial tribute at 4 p.m.
Jack Albright can be reached at JAlbright@usatodayco.com.
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