December 3, 2001
High Court to Hear Tower Case
By SCOTT FYBUSH
*NEW HAMPSHIRE's highest court will
hear the case of a broadcaster's long-running attempt to put
a new AM station on the air.
The New Hampshire Supreme Court agreed this week to accept
Bob Vinikoor's appeal of a lower court ruling that upheld the
city of Hanover's decision not to allow Vinikoor to build three
towers for WQTH (720 Hanover). The city's zoning laws limit towers
to 45 feet in areas where they're permitted at all, and city
lawyers point to the controversial Cross-Field Antenna (tested
in Egypt, but not approved by the FCC or conclusively even demonstrated
to work) to show that the rule doesn't prohibit new AM towers
completely.
Vinikoor, who owns WNTK (1020 Newport/99.7 New London) and
WNBX (1480 Springfield VT), says that's just what the rule does,
and he's asking the court to rule that the city can't keep him
from building his station. If it's built, by the way, WQTH will
be the most powerful station in New Hampshire, with a 50 kW daytime
signal.
Vinikoor is looking for anyone interested in filing an amicus
("friend of the court") brief in his support; if you're
interested, contact us here at NERW and we'll put you together
with his attorney.
*Up
in MAINE, Rob Gardiner announced this week that he'll
leave his post as president of Maine Public Broadcasting sometime
next year. Gardiner has led the statewide network since 1988,
weathering controversies that included the format shift on Maine
Public Radio from classical to news/talk-intensive.
In a memo to employees obtained by NERW, Gardiner says his
plans after leaving MPBC in a year or so include "a long
vacation,...time with my family, and enjoy[ing] some months with
few schedule demands or responsibilities that would keep me awake
in the middle of the night." No replacement has been named
yet.
*Elsewhere in the Pine Tree State, WTHT (107.5 Lewiston) has
filed its application to boost power to 100 kW. The increase
was made possible by the FCC's ruling last year downgrading 107.5
in West Rutland, Vermont (for which no license has been issued,
anyway) from class C3 to A. WTHT won't change its transmitter
site when it increases its power from 91 kW.
Clear Channel changed formats at WRKD (1450 Rockland) over
the weekend, dropping the news-talk that's been airing there
in favor of sports. Local morning host Don Shields stays on board
for the 6-8 AM weekday shift, with more local sports coverage
promised in the future. Clear Channel believes talk listeners
in the mid-coast area are well enough served by its FM news-talkers,
WCME (96.7 Boothbay Harbor) and WVOM (103.9 Howland).
From the Christmas music front: WKCG (101.3 Augusta) and WGUY
(102.1 Dexter) both made the flip, and we hear WGUY might not
go back to its oldies format after the holidays. WABI (910 Bangor)
is also doing the holiday thing, but that's because the Westwood
One standards format it uses has gone all-Christmas.
(The same "format change" applies at WFEA 1370 Manchester
NH, WXKS 1430 Everett-Boston, WNLC 98.7 East Lyme CT and WAVZ
New Haven CT, among others!)
*A few Radio People on the Move in MASSACHUSETTS:
Michelle Williams has landed another music director job after
losing hers at WJMN (94.5 Boston). We don't think she'll find
much of a playlist overlap at the new gig, at Greater Media AAA
outlet WBOS (92.9 Brookline).
Meanwhile, former
WBMX (98.5 Boston) midday guy Joe Cortese (he's still on the
hot AC outlet with his Friday night 80's show) takes on a new
role at Infinity sister station WODS (103.3 Boston), as assistant
PD and production/imaging director. It sounds as though Cortese
will be handling a lot of the day-to-day duties at Oldies 103
for PD Greg Strassell, at least until both stations move into
their new home in the old WSBK-TV studios next year.
"Calling All Sports" has a new station to call home.
The long-running Sunday sports gabfest has been on WBZ (1030)
on and off for more than three decades, most recently with host
and producer Norm Resha buying the time for the show. As of this
past weekend, though, "CAS" is on the FM dial, from
4-7 PM Sundays on WTKK (96.9).
CNet Radio landed in Boston on Saturday afternoon (Dec. 1),
replacing "Amor 890" and Spanish romantica music on
WBPS (890 Dedham). Still missing: a legal ID ("WBPS Boston"
doesn't cut it)...
More Christmas music: in addition to the satellite format
going all-holidays at WXKS (1430 Everett), the folks at WNBP
(1450 Newburyport) checked in to say they're doing the ho-ho-ho
tunes as well.
*A change of command in CONNECTICUT:
Kirk Varner has been named news director at WTNH (Channel 8)
in New Haven. The Nutmeg State news veteran (WFSB and ESPN, among
others) has spent the last few years with Time Warner as head
of the company's local all-news operations (which would make
him your editor's ex-boss's-boss's-boss's-boss, if you follow
the chain of command up that far!)
Varner starts the new gig at WTNH on January 7.
*We'll jump over
to NEW JERSEY next, as Nassau and Multicultural Broadcasting
flip their holdings along the Delaware River.
Here's how it works: Nassau picks up WVPO (840 Stroudsburg
PA) and WSBG (93.5 Stroudsburg PA), which the company used to
own before selling them to Multicultural, along with WJHR (1040
Flemington NJ), which Multicultural bought a couple of years
ago.
Multicultural gets sports WTTM (1680 Princeton NJ) and business-talk
WHWH (1350 Princeton NJ), one of Nassau's original stations.
But before any format-change rumors get started: Nassau's been
operating the Multicultural stations under an LMA all along,
and will continue to LMA WHWH, so very little will change for
listeners.
*We'll start NEW YORK way out on the
East End of Long Island, where WFTU (1570 Riverhead) began its
own programming under new owner Five Towns College just before
Thanksgiving. Listeners out that way are reporting automated
oldies at 1570 for the moment, with a rather deep playlist of
obscure fifties and sixties tunes (watch out, WLNG!)
Meanwhile, on the
other end of the Island, the student-run CHR format at WNYG (1440
Babylon) is history.
Arthur Liu's Multicultural Broadcasting had been running the
station as a free school to train future DJs, making for an interesting
signal to tune in - but the lure of leased time was apparently
too strong, and so the station has gone to an all-Chinese format.
In New York City, WBBR (1130) is edging back to being exclusively
business news after a flirtation with general news. Any connection
to WBBR's founder getting a new job as mayor, we wonder?
Kids in and around Albany will have a new signal to check
out. We don't yet know the purchase price, but Disney/ABC is
picking up WGNA (1460 Albany) from Regent Broadcasting to make
it the latest Radio Disney outlet in upstate New York. The station
has been simulcasting country giant WGNA-FM (107.7 Albany) for
the last decade or so, but its 5 kW day, 1 kW night signal is
one of the better AMs in the market, surprisingly enough, so
it's been due for something more.
(From the irony files: ABC, before being bought by Disney,
was swallowed by the former Capital Cities Communications, which
drew its name from...Albany, where the company got its start
with WROW all those decades ago.)
Way up north, New York Educational Broadcasters and Christian
Ministries have settled their conflicting applications for 90.9
near Plattsburgh. Christian Ministries (the WGLY folks from Vermont)
gets the CP, for 3 kW at 310 meters AAT from Terry Mountain southeast
of Plattsburgh. The new station, which will be licensed to Schuyler
Falls, should have a decent signal over Plattsburgh and an adequate
one over Burlington as well.
Syracuse TV viewers
are mourning one of the market's legendary anchors. Ron Curtis,
who began his career in the Salt City as a high school student
at the old WFBL, became an anchor at WHEN-TV (Channel 5) in 1966,
staying with the station (now WTVH) until his retirement almost
exactly a year ago. Curtis died Thursday (Nov. 29) at the age
of 74.
Hip-hop fans in Syracuse may soon get a stronger signal: Clear
Channel has been granted an on-channel booster for WPHR (106.9
Auburn), to operate from downtown Syracuse. The new booster will
operate with 1740 watts, vertical only, with a directional antenna
aimed south at Syracuse's inner city.
A much earlier era of popular music in Syracuse is being remembered
at a new tribute Web site. Check out http://www.members.tripod.com/wolf1490
for the start of what looks like a fun remembrance of the old
WOLF (1490), the little 250-watt pipsqueak that topped the Syracuse
ratings in the sixties.
Here in Rochester, WBBF-FM (93.3 Fairport) received its license
to cover this week for its transmitter move; the new signal is
getting out much better in Monroe County than the old Avon-licensed
facility ever did.
Cable viewers in Rochester will finally get full-time service
from the local UPN affiliate after the first of the year. WBGT-LP
(Channel 40) has been leasing prime-time hours on Time Warner's
channel 98 for the last few months; starting January 1, the LPTV
will lease the entire day on channel 18 to extend its reach to
cable viewers throughout the area.
(One other Rochester note: our Fox affiliate, WUHF Channel
31, lost a good chunk of its viewers this week. The CRTC gave
cable companies in Halifax, N.S. and St. John, N.B. permission
to switch to a satellite feed of Boston's WFXT for Fox service.
We wonder how this will affect WUHF's tendency to sell several
half-hours in the middle of the afternoon for Canadian infomercials!)
In Buffalo, WTSS (Star 102.5) is the latest convert to the
all-holiday format. The Entercom station joins a few other late
additions to the roster in the Empire State, including Citadel's
WLTI (105.9) in Syracuse and (on nights, weekends and lunch hours
only) Barnstable's WKJY (98.3 Hempstead LI).
Radio People on the Move: Ray Marks moves up from news director
to operations manager at Jamestown's WJTN/WWSE, reports Carl
Gorney in his latest WNY/Southern Ontario update; over in Elmira,
afternoon guy Joe Munroe is promoted to PD at Sabre's WNGZ (104.9
Montour Falls), while crosstown WPHD (94.7 Tioga PA) adds the
Greaseman show in morning drive.
(WPHD, by the way, has moved in with sister station WCDW at
the latter's new digs above a credit union at 495 Court Street
in Binghamton. And although WCDW has completed its city of license
swap with WKGB 92.5, it's still ID'ing with the old Conklin NY
instead of the new Susquehanna PA. WKGB's covering all its bases
with a "Conklin-Susquehanna-Binghamton" legal from
its new site atop the WINT 680 site on Binghamton's Windy Hill
Road.)
And we'll leave New York with a pirate: listeners across the
East have been hearing Jewish programming on 1710 kHz, with an
ID of "Lubavitcher Radio." We'd be surprised, indeed,
if this didn't have something to do with the powerful Lubavitcher
community of Hasidic Jews, headquartered in the Crown Heights
neighborhood of Brooklyn.
*Radio listeners
in the State College area of PENNSYLVANIA have two new
formats to check out this week.
After being dark for a bit, the 98.7 facility that used to
be WLTS Mill Hall has re-emerged as WOJZ Pleasant Gap, with a
smooth jazz format from a new transmitter site on Trcziyulny
Mountain just north of Bellefonte. Meanwhile, the 94.5 facility
in State College that had been WFGI, country "Froggy"
(in a partial simulcast with WFGY Altoona) has gone AC under
the WLTS calls. Both stations signed on at midnight, November
26, we're told.
Down in Pittsburgh, PAX television is finally coming to viewers'
TV screens, but only if they have AT&T Broadband cable. The
netlet has been trying for years to get a broadcast outlet in
the Steel City (and still hopes to end up on WQEX-TV if it can
be sold successfully), but in the meantime it's signed a cable
carriage deal to start in January.
Out in the suburbs, we hear WLSW (103.9 Scottdale) isn't being
sold to Cumulus after all, but the station does have an application
in to move much closer to Pittsburgh. The new site, with 6 kW
at 100 meters (down from 238 meters, but up from 320 watts!)
would be on Mickanin Road southwest of Irwin.
Over in Philadelphia, meanwhile, WXTU (92.5) has added Blair
Garner's syndicated "After MidNite" to its schedule,
from midnight to 6 AM weekdays.
Out in Roxborough, we're told WCAU-TV (Channel 10) has begun
work on its new DTV tower, which will add the tallest stick yet
to that city's already imposing tower farm.
*To CANADA, finally: While we wait
for the big fireworks next week at the CRTC's Hamilton hearings
for the last new TV facility in Toronto (those begin Monday,
and we'll have an update in the next issue), we can tell you
that Maritime Broadcasting System wants to buy CJRW (102.1 Summerside
PEI). MBS already owns two of the province's other commercial
stations, CFCY and CHLQ-FM in Charlottetown, and operates the
only other one, CHTN 720 in Charlottetown.
In Kingston, Ontario, CFMK (96.3) wants to lower its power,
from 50 kW to 14 kW; we're guessing an antenna height increase
is involved as well.
And Mark Elliott's "People Helping People" show,
one of the only call-in shows out there for those recovering
from drug and alcohol addictions, is back on the air in Toronto.
After stints on CFYI there and on CKLW in Windsor, Elliott can
now be heard Saturday nights on CFRB (1010).
*We'll be tied up for the next
few days getting the Tower Site 2002 Calendar all ready
to be shipped out to everyone who's ordered one.
If you haven't sent in your order yet...just wait until you
see what you're missing! Click here
to see a sample of the pages that await you in this full-color,
8.5-by-11 inch, glossy calendar.
Historic dates in our region's radio legacy, photos of some
of North America's finest towers, and a convenient hole for hanging
- it's all here, and you can still get one. Just send a check
or money order for $15 (NYS residents add $1.20 sales tax; US$20
to Canadian addresses) to Scott Fybush, 92 Bonnie Brae Ave.,
Rochester NY 14618, and we'll get one in the mail to you.
Order by December 10 and your calendar will be in the first
shipment from the printer, in plenty of time for holiday delivery.
You won't regret it!
NorthEast Radio Watch is made possible by the generous
contributions of our regular readers. If you enjoy NERW, please
click here to
learn how you can help make continued publication possible. NERW
is copyright
2001 by Scott Fybush. |