Monday, February 7, 2011

Controversial Outdoor Board Gets Revised

A controversial board in Orlando pulled down by Clear Channel Outdoor as "in bad taste" is getting revised.  The campaign was also placed on CBS owned boards and they reportedly remain in place.

The board for Shannon Burke, whose daily talk show airs on  810 AM WEUS got attention after a local TV station and The Orlando Sentinel reported the imagery because of Burke's recent past.

The Sentinel reported Burke was fired two years ago (when he was employed by Clear Channel Radio's 104.1 WTKS) after he got drunk and flew into a rage because his dog had sneaked out of the yard. He pulled a handgun, shot his wife's dog, and the same bullet grazed the side of his wife's head. After first ordering him out of the house, she forgave him, took him back and helped him avoid a prison term.

He pleaded no contest to animal cruelty and opening fire in a building and served six months in the Seminole County Jail. He also was ordered into alcohol rehab, to get treatment for bi-polar disorder and to give up his guns.

The article alsl reported whole ordeal, he said, had moved Burke closer to God and helped revive his marriage. Shortly after his release from jail, his marriage failed and the couple separated.

On Wednesday, Clear Channel put up a billboard that shows Burke holding a microphone as if it were a gun, with smoke drifting from its tip.


"Listen or else," it says.

On Thursday the billboard came down. On the air at WEUS, Burke accused Clear Channel broadcasters of trying to marginalize him, according to The Sentinel. They do not want a former employee taking away listeners and using a company billboard to do it, Burke said.

On Superbowl Sunday, revised artwork appeared on the front sports page of The Sentinel.


As for the CC Outdoor campaign, Burke says new artwork is coming.  According to Burker, "I am actually doing a photo shoot for a Clear Channel board. It's me, hair combed over, in a cardigan sweater, in a grassy park with puppies all over me!"

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