KILI-FM broadcasts across the airwaves of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, but the radio station, which celebrates its 25th birthday this year, is a lifeline for the Lakota people who live there.

"Ninety percent of the homes that you walk into on the reservation, you'll hear KILI radio playing," said Melanie Janis, KILI's general manager. "It's almost like the lifeline of the reservation."

In a place where few people have Internet service in their homes or access to 24-7 cable television, the little radio station transmits across a big reservation from a remote bluff in the tiny village of Porcupine. Often, it is the only way residents on the 3,470 square-mile reservation get their information.

Ever since disc jockey Calvin Two Lance spoke his first bilingual broadcast in both English and Lakota on Feb. 25, 1983, KILI has been telling its listeners about taco sales and tribal council meetings, about lost pets and Lakota language classes, about weather forecasts and school closings. Mixed in among its eclectic music programming - from country/western to powwow drums - is the sort of community journalism that captures daily life on the reservation. People tune in to KILI to follow their favorite high school basketball teams or to catch a free ride to a funeral.

In an era of media consolidation, KILI is an anomaly. It broadcasts 24 hours a day, and 20 of those hours are live, local programming, mostly by a cadre of community DJs who are paid $10 to do a four-hour show.

"From 6 a.m. to 2 a.m., we have a person here. From 2 a.m. to 6 a.m., she cruises by herself," said Janis, who always refers to KILI - whose call letters in Lakota translate to "awesome" or "extraordinary" - in the feminine.

Proof that KILI is important to all the reservation communities came during the 11 months that it was off the air in 2006 and 2007, when a lightning strike destroyed its transmitter.

"Life was just not the same," Janis said. "Everywhere I went, people asked, 'When are you going to be back on?' Attendance was low at events around the reservation. People didn't know what was going."

A combination of state and federal grants paid for a new 100,000-watt transmitter, allowing people as far away as Rapid City to listen on the FM dial at 88.7. KILI's signal on 90.1 travels east as far as Mission and Rosebud, north to Interstate 90 and south into the Nebraska Panhandle.

Like most of its small staff, Janis is also an on-air DJ, plus any other job that needs to be done. "Some days, I'm the janitor," she said.

For a nonprofit, independent radio station with an annual operating budget of about $150,000, there's never enough money to pay all the bills or replace faulty equipment. Unlike many Native American radio stations, KILI is not paid for by the tribal government it covers. Janis is proud of that independence - and determined to keep it that way.

"It's always a struggle. Sometimes, we can't even rub two nickels together, but we're still here," she said. "Even with all the struggles we've been through, I see us being here a long, long time."

Janis and Mary White Face share a talk show. "They call us the M&Ms. We tease each other quite a bit. That's kind of Indian humor," she said. "There's so much tragedy on the reservation, … but there's been so many funny times on the radio that it's hard to pick just one."

High schools, Oglala Lakota College and many community groups, such as the economic development organization Lakota Funds, also host hourly programs every week.

"Through the 'Lakota Funds Hour' every Monday from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m., we reach people in all walks of life across the Oglala Nation," said Dowell Casselli Smith, director of Lakota Funds. "The phones really start ringing when Jennifer Richards or David White Bull goes on the air. Through the years, KILI has not only been a resource but also an inspiration, showing the huge difference in the everyday life of the reservation that can be made by a focused and dedicated organization and staff."

Tom Casey, KILI's director of development, began as a volunteer DJ in 1985. Casey, who is not Lakota, said KILI celebrates Lakota culture, language and community in all of its programming. Lakota speakers are still common on KILI, including a Lakota language storytelling hour and a language class hosted by Oglala Lakota College.

Casey does double duty as sports announcer, and he has broadcast more memorable basketball games than he can count. He was at the microphone when Pine Ridge High School beat Lennox for the state championship in 1987 and when the late Sue Anne Big Crow made a buzzer-beating basket to win the State A 1987 girls basketball state championship against Milbank.

"I'm always hoping or cheering for overtime, every game, because it's so intense, and that makes for great radio," he said.

This year, he broadcast a regional championship game between St. Thomas More High School and Red Cloud High School at the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center. "There were 7,000 people at that game. It was fantastic to broadcast that."

But Casey is just as likely to do live broadcasts from local Little League games as state championships.

"That's what we do. We celebrate Lakota life, and we touch people's lives."

Contact Mary Garrigan at 394-8424 or mary.garrigan@rapidcityjournal.com