In one of the busiest, most high-pressure newsrooms in the country, mental health isn’t just a talking point – it’s built into the daily routine. For decades, Audacy 1010 WINS VP of News Ben Mevorach has helped shape a newsroom culture rooted in balance, resilience, and emotional honesty.
From September 11 to COVID-19 and beyond, Mevorach has witnessed the toll breaking news can take on broadcasters. But he’s also made it his mission to ensure that joy, connection, and community are never absent, even on the hardest days. Now he talks about that process and the long-term fruits of that labor with Radio Ink.
Radio Ink: You’ve been with 1010 WINS through some of New York’s most defining and devastating moments. As a journalist, when did it become clear to you that mental health needed to be prioritized in the newsroom? Was there a specific moment or experience that shifted your thinking?
Ben Mevorach: Yeah, so I started there as a freelance reporter covering Long Island, then became a freelance city reporter, and eventually a full-time reporter. During that time, I had my personal exposure to some of life’s most incredibly sad tragedies. When you’re working in the largest city in America, these things just seem to happen with too great a frequency.
And I lived, as most people in this business do, that sort of split-personality life. One side is that you have to keep it together when you’re covering massive death, destruction, and awful, sad news. But if you’re paying attention beyond that, you also get to see incredible glimmers of resilience and hope. People turn the tragedies that affected them directly into positive change.
That’s the balance reporters in particular have to struggle with all the time. Because if you don’t, and you just let the tragedy occupy the narrative in your head, it becomes a very difficult place to survive and have a career in.
9/11 was, for me, the defining moment. At that point, I was the News Director of the radio station, but on that day, my boss put me back out into the field. So I was both reporting and directing the staff. We had friends and relatives in those two towers. We had a reporter who was running for his life as one of the towers came down. I was covered in ash by the end of the day.
The impact was profound. Every newsroom has a certain buzz, even during terrible times. But there was just this silence. You just stood there, trying to make sense of everything that was happening. It deeply affected me. Even to this day, if you bring it up in the newsroom, it still carries a weight.
But even on that day, while I was down there, reporting, I noticed a firefighter sitting on the back of an EMT truck, covered in ash. And a shop owner came out of his store with a bottle of water and a rag, and started wiping down the firefighter’s face. That moment stayed with me. It was important for me to include it in our reporting because while we were all feeling hopeless, here was a sign of humanity, of hope. That moment told me we have to do something proactively every day going forward.
Radio Ink: So, what initiatives did you start to take after?
Ben Mevorach: One of the things that’s so important in terms of the conversation is taking a look at everything we’re doing and asking: is there a way to do it that creates a positive feeling in the newsroom?
All of these things slowly start to shape your thinking about how to keep morale up. Even when tragedy is happening, what are we doing on a daily basis that helps reinforce that sense of positivity and the feeling that we can talk to each other, we can lean on each other?
Because reporters and anchors and people in this business—editors too—are notorious for not sharing their feelings. They don’t want to talk about it. They either think it’s something they’re not supposed to do or that it’s a sign of weakness. Reporters and anchors are supposed to be tough – because that’s what we do. We cover tragedy every day.
So I look for ways in the newsroom to create every opportunity for people to engage with each other, talk to each other, and look for those hopeful things, even when things are down.
Radio Ink: We’ve talked with experts during this series who outline the importance of simple, everyday care. I’ve heard that you all have some unique practices, like stretch breaks and Dance Tuesdays. How did those start?
Ben Mevorach: Yeah! So every Tuesday morning, we have one of the members of the morning team pick the song, and at eight o’clock on the button, I blast it, and we just start dancing. Some people would call it wiggling – but we’re trying.
The people who work every Tuesday look forward to it, but what’s fascinating is the people – we have a lot of freelancers – who might be working their first Tuesday morning shift. And the conversation is always about, “You know what we do at 8 o’clock, right? We dance.” “What do you mean you dance? This is an all-news station.” “No, no, no – just trust us.” It sounds crazy. But that person gets to pick the song, and we blast it.
And the laughter is just incredible. We have a sales department that’s in the back part of the building, and they always creep up to look. And we know what we’re facing that day. It’s not to pretend that horrible things don’t have to be covered, but it gives us a chance to exhale and take a moment.
You mentioned the exercise, too. Our editor for the afternoon team, Sweetina Kakar, brought in a very small treadmill, and she walks on it while she’s doing her work. So she does a stretching period with the staff who work in the afternoons. In the beginning, maybe one person stood up and nobody else did. But now, they all stand up, and they all laugh, and they stretch, and they poke fun at each other.
And it just relieves that tension, which is something, by the way, we can’t escape, right?
Just look for those simple, everyday things to do. If you’re looking for them, you will find them.
Radio Ink: Through this series, we’ve also talked about radio’s duty to serve the mental health needs of the audiences we serve – and how that often turns into a two-way street. Can you share an example of a time when serving your audience’s emotional needs also had a powerful effect on your staff?
Ben Mevorach: One of the strongest examples I can give you is during COVID-19, when our entire city was struggling. The whole nation was, but New York in particular. People were working from home and separated and mental health was really being challenged. It was a very difficult time.
I sat there with my staff and said, “What can we do?” We came up with the idea: there have got to be people getting married, even though they can’t be together with friends and family at a catering hall or something. And sure enough, through conversations, we found an ER nurse who was getting married to her fiancé. She hadn’t seen him in over a month, and they were getting married outdoors in the backyard with just immediate family.
I asked them, “Can we broadcast that live? Would you let us do that?” And they understood exactly why I was asking. They understood the pain that was going on in the city. And they said, “Sure.” And we did it. We masked up, we gloved up, we sent our equipment and our reporter, and we broadcast the entire wedding on the radio.
Five years later, people still come up to me and say, “That wedding during COVID was just the most awesome thing.” It was such an uplifting moment. And it was for the staff as well. They thought I was crazy, but it was uplifting for them, too.
Radio Ink: For those joining 1010 WINS, there are undoubtedly serious expectations that come along with the station’s reputation. With decades of focus on mental health, how do those who aren’t necessarily used to operating with this level of emotional awareness respond to that culture?
Ben Mevorach: I think people buy into this at various levels. I mean, what is WINS? 1010 WINS is the voice of the city of New York. And so it has a job to do, it has a reputation, it is engaged in as many neighborhoods and people’s lives as it possibly can be. And we never stray from that.
But I think even the people who may not be 100% in on what I’m trying to do get it, even if they maybe didn’t get it in the beginning. Change is hard for everybody, and I’ve instituted more change than any local newsroom in the country. And I’ve made mistakes along the way. But I think people see the success, so they support it.
I had a young woman who worked for us for over a year. And when she was leaving, I did an exit interview. You know, what can we do better? What did you like? Where did we miss?
And she said, “You know, I never said this before, but you want to know why I decided to come work here after the interview? Because when I was in the interview and you were talking about what’s expected and that it’s a demanding environment, what struck me the most was the amount of chatter and laughter I heard in the newsroom while I was being interviewed in the office. I want to be a journalist, and it’s all serious, but because of that, this is the place I want to work.”
That was such a winning endorsement for me that it is working. It is now part of the WINS newsroom DNA to have that balance where people are having fun and laughing.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Find Mental Health Awareness Month coverage in the May issue of Radio Ink Magazine – out now.
