In the past week, podcast listeners to this show have come from across the US, Canada, Austria, the UK, and Spain. If you’re one of our far-flung podcast listeners, "Hello!"

If you live in New Orleans, you might hear us on WWNO. In which case you will have probably heard, as part of the local news, reporters from The Gulf States Newsroom.

The Gulf States Newsroom is an NPR-driven news-gathering collaboration of WWNO, WRKF in Baton Rouge, and NPR stations in Alabama and Mississippi. It was launched in 2020, by NPR and the Corporation For Public Broadcasting. In 2025, the Corporation For Public Broadcasting was de-funded by Congress and no longer exists.

Those same budget cuts ate into the financial viability of all public broadcasting outlets – including the member stations of the Gulf States Newsroom - forcing them to scramble to come up with strategies to stay funded.

You can’t accuse the Deep South of being ahead of the game in much, but in the case of The Gulf States Newsroom, back in 2022 they’d hired Marci Schramm as their Director of Development, an HR term that roughly translates to, “The person we all depend on to go out and find money to fund this thing.”

Marci’s background included 9 years as Executive Director of New Orleans’ French Quarter Festival – the years that saw its most explosive growth – and that’s when we first met her here on Out to Lunch, in 2016.

Today, Marci ensures the Gulf States Newsroom continues to run at full capacity as it earns numerous prestigious Edward R Murrow Awards for journalism.

When you watch the news on TV, you’re quite often looking at film of people in life and death situations in other countries, and sometimes in other cities in the US. If you live in New Orleans, you’ve probably had the unnerving experience of relying on this kind of news footage to assess the risk to your own life at the hands of a hurricane or flood.

It’s essential here to have a TV news station you can trust. It’s too late for a news outlet to earn that kind of trust the day before a storm blows into town and for that reason, despite our reputation as “The City That Care Forgot,” we take local news reporting seriously in New Orleans.

WWL TV is one of the oldest television stations in the South. Tod Smith began working there as a production assistant in 1980 while he was a student at Loyola University – which at that time owned WWL. Tod graduated from college, worked for a while for Shell Oil, went back to TV and was Sales Manager at WWL in the 1990’s, then went into management at stations in Arizona and Virginia before coming back home to take over as General Manager of WWL TV in 2012. He’s still the station’s General Manager today.

People will tell you they’re a cat person or a dog person. They’re mountain people or beach people. And then there are NPR listeners and – believe it or not - people who have never-even-one-time listened to public radio.You can’t hate those folks – they don’t know what they’re missing. But we NPR listeners absolutely know what we’d be missing if public radio went away.

So, we’re all exceptionally grateful to Marci Schramm for everything she does every day to keep public radio news on the air. And with a legacy that includes Nash Roberts, Garland Robinette, Eric Paulsen, Sally Ann Roberts, Angela Hill, Hap Glaudi, and Morgus the Magnificent, WWL-TV is a part of the history of modern New Orleans. As General Manager of the station, Tod Smith is a part of that history now too.

Out to Lunch was recorded live over lunch at Columns in Uptown New Orleans. You can find photos from this show by Jill Lafleur at itsneworleans.com.

In the past week, podcast listeners to this show have come from across the US, Canada, Austria, the UK, and Spain. If you&rsquo;re one of our far-flung podcast listeners, "Hello!"
If you live in New Orleans, you might hear us on WWNO. In which case you will have probably heard, as part of the local news, reporters from&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wwno.org/gulf-states-newsroom">The Gulf States Newsroom.</a>
The Gulf States Newsroom is an NPR-driven news-gathering collaboration of WWNO, WRKF in Baton Rouge, and NPR stations in Alabama and Mississippi. It was launched in 2020, by NPR and the Corporation For Public Broadcasting. In 2025, the Corporation For Public Broadcasting was de-funded by Congress and no longer exists.
Those same budget cuts ate into the financial viability of all public broadcasting outlets &ndash; including the member stations of the Gulf States Newsroom - forcing them to scramble to come up with strategies to stay funded.
You can&rsquo;t accuse the Deep South of being ahead of the game in much, but in the case of The Gulf States Newsroom, back in 2022 they&rsquo;d hired Marci Schramm as their Director of Development,&nbsp;an HR term that roughly translates to, &ldquo;The person we all depend on to go out and find money to fund this thing.&rdquo;
Marci&rsquo;s background included 9 years as Executive Director of New Orleans&rsquo; French Quarter Festival &ndash; the years that saw its most explosive growth &ndash; and that&rsquo;s when we first met her <a href="https://itsneworleans.com/2016/01/07/free-culture-out-to-lunch-its-new-orleans/">here on Out to Lunch, in 2016</a>.
Today, Marci ensures the Gulf States Newsroom continues to run at full capacity as it earns numerous prestigious Edward R Murrow Awards for journalism.
When you watch the news on TV, you&rsquo;re quite often looking at film of people in life and death situations in other countries, and sometimes in other cities in the US. If&nbsp;you live in New Orleans, you&rsquo;ve probably had the unnerving experience of relying on this kind of news footage to assess the risk to your own life at the hands of a hurricane or flood.
It&rsquo;s essential here to have a TV news station you can trust. It&rsquo;s too late for a news outlet to earn that kind of trust the day before a storm blows into town and for that reason, despite our reputation as &ldquo;The City That Care Forgot,&rdquo; we take local news reporting seriously in New Orleans.
<a href="https://www.wwltv.com/">WWL TV</a> is one of the oldest television stations in the South. Tod Smith began working there as a production assistant in 1980 while he was a student at Loyola University &ndash; which at that time owned WWL. Tod graduated from college, worked for a while for Shell Oil, went back to TV and was Sales Manager at WWL in the 1990&rsquo;s, then went into management at stations in Arizona and Virginia before coming back home to take over as General Manager of WWL TV in 2012. He&rsquo;s still the station&rsquo;s General Manager today.
People will tell you they&rsquo;re a cat person or a dog person. They&rsquo;re mountain people or beach people. And then there are NPR listeners and &ndash; believe it or not - people who have never-even-one-time listened to public radio.You can&rsquo;t hate those folks &ndash; they don&rsquo;t know what they&rsquo;re missing. But we NPR listeners absolutely know what we&rsquo;d be missing if public radio went away.
So, we&rsquo;re all exceptionally grateful to Marci Schramm for everything she does every day to keep public radio news on the air.&nbsp;And with a legacy that includes Nash Roberts, Garland Robinette, Eric Paulsen, Sally Ann Roberts, Angela Hill, Hap Glaudi, and Morgus the Magnificent, WWL-TV is a part of the history of modern New Orleans. As General Manager of the station, Tod Smith is a part of that history now too.
Out to Lunch was recorded live over lunch at <a href="https://thecolumns.com/">Columns in Uptown New Orleans</a>. You can find photos from this show by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.lafleurphoto.com/">Jill Lafleur</a> at <a href="https://pod.fo/e/4bc8a5">itsneworleans.com</a>.

OUT TO LUNCH finds economist and Tulane finance professor Peter Ricchiuti conducting business New Orleans style: over lunch at Columns in Uptown New Olreans. In his 15th year in the host seat, Ricchiuti’s learned but uniquely NOLA informal perspective has established Out to Lunch as the voice of Crescent City business. You can also hear the show on WWNO 89.9FM.

OUT TO LUNCH finds economist and Tulane finance professor Peter Ricchiuti conducting business New Orleans style: over lunch at Columns in Uptown New Olreans. In his 15th year in the host seat, Ricchiuti&rsquo;s learned but uniquely NOLA informal perspective has established Out to Lunch as the voice of Crescent City business. You can also hear the show on WWNO 89.9FM.

Tulane finance professor Peter Ricchiuti conducting business New Orleans style: over lunch at Commander's Palace restaurant.

It's New Orleans: Out to Lunch

OUT TO LUNCH finds the country's most entertaining finance professor Peter Ricchiuti conducting business New Orleans style: over lunch. Each week Peter invites guests from the New Orleans business world to join him for a midday bite. CEO's, startups, managers, musicians, biomed needle-movers, tech success stories and entrepreneurs of all stripes put aside the elevator pitch and talking points and actually enjoy themselves. It's business, New Orleans style. 
You can also hear the show on WWNO 89.9FM.

OUT TO LUNCH finds the country's most entertaining finance professor <a href="https://freeman.tulane.edu/faculty-research/finance/peter-ricchiuti">Peter Ricchiuti </a>conducting business New Orleans style: over lunch. Each week Peter invites guests from the New Orleans business world to join him for a midday bite. CEO's, startups, managers, musicians, biomed needle-movers, tech success stories and entrepreneurs of all stripes put aside the elevator pitch and talking points and actually enjoy themselves. It's business, New Orleans style. You can also hear the show on <a href="https://www.wwno.org/show/out-to-lunch">WWNO 89.9FM</a>.