Dead Air

Given the current bottom-line focus in the nonprofit world, it’s perhaps not surprising that the ’HYY board — comprised largely of local business people and lawyers — has rewarded Marrazzo so handsomely. The very existence of a website like Charity Navigator provides hard evidence that potential donors are looking for information on an organization’s “efficiencies” — how much pocket change do they spend to raise each dollar? — before plunking down their hard-earned bucks. In this competitive climate, nonprofits thrive based not on the public service they provide, but on fiscal judgment.

That doesn’t take the sting out of Marrazzo’s salary for his employees. Sources at ’HYY complained that they’ve received three percent raises while Marrazzo’s pay jumped from $264,234 in fiscal ’98 to his current salary of $430,786, including a recent $66,000 raise. Producers at successful shows like Radio Times earn less than $50,000 per year, and even award-winning reporters at the station earn less than $40,000 per year.

During a long conversation about his salary, Marrazzo noted that he could make a lot more money in private industry, that he continues at ’HYY because the job allows him to be of service, and that in the past year he donated more than $75,000 back into the company’s coffers — a considerable sum. He knows that some will criticize him for donating the money back rather than declining a raise, which is yet another subject that reveals the cultural divide Marrazzo straddles: between the for-profit world he comes from and the nonprofit public broadcasting company he’s currently steering. 

According to a 2005 study by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, hundreds of nonprofit leaders declined raises between 1998 and 2003. In Philadelphia, William Dwyer III of the Boy Scouts of America took no pay raises for four years straight while the organization suffered layoffs. Regardless, both Jerry Sweeney, ’HYY’s new board chair, and Molly Dickinson Shepard, the previous chair, say they aren’t rethinking Marrazzo’s salary.

“The board determined Bill’s compensation based on a variety of factors,” says Dickinson Shepard, CEO of The Leader’s Edge, which offers personalized coaching to women executives. “We had to think outside the normal boundaries because of Bill’s talents and experience. … His raises have been determined by a very specific set of metrics, which he has met — things like increasing audience share, converting to digital technology and bringing the budget into line.”

And as for declining a raise?

“C’mon,” she replies. “Who ever declines a raise?”