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A community radio station in Chicago that provides a unique opportunity for young bilingual Latinos to get free training in radio runs the risk of disappearing for lack of funds.

Radio Arte de Chicago, which began broadcasting 14 years ago in the Latino neighborhood of Little Village, "is a sinking ship," one of the young volunteers that work on its programming said.

Under notice that the funds that keep it going have dried up, and that the financial crisis could seriously affect even the National Museum of Art that has been its owner since 1997, WRTE-FM (90.5) urgently needs to be rescued.

"We need a plan to avoid losing the license and to keep the station on the air," said Jatziry García, one of the volunteers who asked for an urgent meeting with the museum's founder and president, Carlos Tortolero, "in order to know exactly where we are and what we can do."

A solution appears remote since Tortolero announced this week that the cost of maintaining Radio Arte's operations and the building housing its studios was "unsustainable." READ MORE