Safer Wales brought Radio Cardiff under it’s umbrella in 2019 – the Radio Station was moved into a new Studio in Meanwhile House in 2021. 

Prior to 2019 Radio Cardiff was part of VCS the Voluntary Community Service. 

VCS was founded in 1964 and was the first registered Volunteer Bureau in the UK  It ceased that role in 2016 following a Welsh Government policy change to integrate volunteering into County Voluntary Councils (C3SC in Cardiff).

The Charity continued beyond this and absorbed Radio Cardiff later in 2016, developing volunteering opportunities to support the community radio service for beneficiaries of VCS projects.

Radio Cardiff launched in 2007, originally funded & overseen by Cardiff Council’s Communities First programme. In 2008 that funding was cut and the station briefly went off air before coming back as an entirely volunteer-run operation.

In 2016 the operating company was in crisis and station was facing closure, at which point VCS was asked to take over the licence. Radio Cardiff Limited (RCL) – the original operating company – wound up in 2017, it was a private company limited by shares and so was not eligible for a lot of funding
sources. (The two Directors of RCL were John Lenney & Ian Gallivan).

Radio Cardiff was preceded by a series of short-term licence stations based in Butetown dating back to 1992 – namely Dock of The Bay Radio; Tiger Bay FM; Bay FM and Beats FM.

VOLUNTEERS

At its height in 2017-18 there were 120 registered volunteers involved in the radio. Over a third of those were supported volunteers through VCS’s Pave The Way and Release projects. Radio Cardiff still exists thanks to the sterling efforts of all the voluntary contributions; across the presenters of shows, the news team, and show scheduling.

PREMISES

In 2021 Radio Cardiff relocated to within Meanwhile house, taking over a new Studio and a training studio room.

Prior to this VCS moved into the containers in October 2018, and the work to convert one of them into studios was done entirely by volunteers. 

● The security measures to gain access – and especially to open the container doors – were onerous for some volunteers

Thanks to Jeremy Rees for most of this information.