steve rivers hall of fame inductee 2016

Steve Rivers

The late Steve Rivers was a legendary programmer of such stations as WXKS-FM/Boston, KIIS-FM/Los Angeles, KMEL/San Francisco and stations in Jacksonville, Providence, Phoenix and Seattle.  He came to Boston in 1989 as Program Director of WZOU, a Top 40 station that had struggled in the ratings.  Within two years, Rivers took WZOU from “worst to first,” capturing the #1 spot in the Arbitron ratings.  Massachusetts Broadcasters Hall of Fame inductee Richie Balsbaugh then hired Rivers to cross the street to program KISS 108, replacing another Hall of Fame inductee Sunny Joe White.  Rivers then quickly took KISS to #1 and oversaw the building of Jam’n 94.5 on the old WZOU frequency.  In 1996 he became corporate program director for AM/FM (now iHeartRadio), taking New York City’s WKTU from worst to first in six months. He consulted for CBS and many stations internationally and then became SVP/Programming for CBS Radio. He died in 2012.