Glouco prosecutor takes radio show on the road

Courier-Post, Spring 2000

By GENE VERNACCHIO
Courier-Post Staff

WOODBURY

With palm trees swaying in the ocean breeze behind him, Gloucester County’s top law enforcement official is ready to talk victims' rights with locals tonight from 1,200 miles away.

Gloucester County Prosecutor Andrew Yurick will broadcast his weekly radio program — Crime, Courts and the Law — live between 5 and 6 p.m. from Miami, where he is attending the weekend National Organization of Victim Advocacy conference.

“I’m looking forward to it. It should be fun,” said Yurick, whose guests will be the president and executive director of NOVA as well as the national president of Mothers Against Drunk Drivers.

Yurick’s program is heard every Thursday on Rowan University’s radio station, 89.7 WGLS-FM. The WGLS signal reaches a 35-mile radius of Glassboro and can be heard via the Internet at http://wgls.rowan.edu.

His Miami broadcast will be a first for him outside the studio — but not his last.

“We’re actually planning to do another one from the Battleship New Jersey to talk about veterans’ issues and things like that,” Yurick said.

He has been doing his radio show for 2½ years now, having started his broadcast on WWJNC-AM 1360 before moving to Rowan just over a year ago.

“He really comes across well on the radio,” said Fran Hogan, general manager of WGLS. “He’s very warm and friendly. He comes across much like he is in person, a real likable guy.”

Hogan said Yurick also shows extraordinary commitment to his broadcasts.

“It’s a hell of a commitment, it really is, for a guy who is not getting paid to do this every week. He has to book guests and make sure they show up,” Hogan said.

For Yurick, broadcasting has become sort of a secondary career. He also regularly hosts issue-oriented forums aired on local cable public access channels.

With so much of his time devoted behind the microphone and in front of a television camera, the Woodbury resident said he might have a future career in media.

“I’d like to (work in media), but it’s not something I’m planning,” Yurick said. “I particularly like radio; television is much harder work. You have to pay a lot more attention to things like how you look, how you sit, and how you move. On the radio, you can lay back and be yourself.”