August 25 & September 1, 2008

Atlantic Coast, Nassau Shake Up Maine

• MAINE
• NEW HAMPSHIRE
• MASSACHUSETTS
• VERMONT
• RHODE ISLAND
• CONNECTICUT
• NEW YORK
• NEW JERSEY
• PENNSYLVANIA
• CANADA
• CLASSIFIEDS
• FROM THE ARCHIVES

MONDAY AFTERNOON UPDATE: Big news from CANADA - Toronto's CKFM (99.9) ended its stunting at 4 PM by flipping to "Virgin Radio," as Astral Media inaugurated a licensing agreement with Virgin that puts the international brand and a top-40 format on the former "Mix 99.9," with Mad Dog and Billie remaining in mornings and the inescapable Ryan Seacrest later on in the day. Much more on this change next week.

*This column almost came to you with a MAINE dateline this week, as we contemplated spending a few days before the Labor Day weekend visiting friends and colleagues in the Pine Tree State. We stayed home instead (though we're heading to Pittsburgh in a few days for the National Radio Club convention, hence this double issue - we'll be back Sept. 8 unless there's major breaking news in the meantime), but if we'd made the drive, we'd have been there just ahead of some big format shuffles.

Last week, NERW broke the story of a major rearrangement of Atlantic Coast Radio's Portland-market signals, and this week we can fill in all the blanks - and tell you about some changes down the road at the Nassau stations, too, not to mention a big change up in Bangor.

First, Atlantic Coast: As we reported last week, it's the end of the line for "Red Hot 95.9." That station - WRED (95.9 Saco) - will become half of a new Atlantic Coast sports station in the market, as owner J.J. Jeffrey affiliates with Boston's WEEI and puts its sports programming on 95.9 and on WJJB-FM (95.5 Topsham), which had been half of the locally-programmed "Big Jab" sports signal.

The Big Jab will stay in the market on a stronger signal, replacing talk on what's now WLOB-FM (96.3 Gray) and remaining on WJJB (1440 Westbrook). And the talk programming will stay in place, too, but only on WLOB (1310 Portland).

Those changes will all take place Sept. 1, and there will be new calls, too - 96.3 will become WJJB-FM, 95.5 will be WTEI and 95.9 will be WPEI.

(A quick bit of NERW analysis before we move on: whether or not you believe the rumor that WEEI owner Entercom forced Atlantic Coast's hand by threatening to move the valuable Red Sox radio rights elsewhere in the market, Jeffrey ends up with an interesting competitive position in southern Maine. While he won't have a total sports monopoly in the market - Nassau's WLVP 870/WLAM 1470 are fulltime ESPN Radio, and the Portland Sea Dogs are heard on Saga's WBAE 1490 - Jeffrey will now have outlets offering both local sports talk and the Boston-centric WEEI product, not a bad hand to play if the goal is to deliver a young male audience.)

NERW readers with longish memories will by now have noted that the initial announcement of a New England-wide WEEI network last winter included numerous Nassau stations, WLVP/WLAM among them. As WEEI relaunches its regional network plans, Nassau is still absent - but there is now a Bangor affiliate. September 1 will also bring the WEEI network to Blueberry Broadcasting's WABI (910 Bangor) and WWBX (97.1 Bangor), replacing talk on the AM side and top 40 "B97" on the FM. That's a pretty big signal for WEEI, and even if the WEEI network is being handled separately from the Red Sox rights, we have to wonder how much longer Stephen King will be able to hang on to the Sox over at WZON (620).

And returning to the Portland/southern Maine end of things, there's a format shuffle coming from Nassau, too: In October, it will move classical "W-Bach" from its present homes on WBQW (106.3 Scarborough) and WBQQ (99.3 Kennebunk) to what's now "Bone" classic rocker WHXQ (104.7 Kennebunkport). The 106.3 frequency will flip to "The Bone," simulcasting with WHXR (106.7 North Windham) to blanket the Portland market, at the expense of York County; 99.3 will flip to "Wolf" country, simulcasting Nassau's WTHT (99.9 Auburn) to improve the Wolf's coverage of the full Portland market, where Nassau's apparently looking at sagging ratings for Saga's country giant, WPOR (101.9 Portland), and seeing vulnerability. (There are no changes planned - at least not yet - for the northern outposts of the "W-Bach" network, WBQX 106.9 Thomaston and WBQI 107.7 Bar Harbor.)

There's a call change at EMF's "Air 1" outlet: WCYI (93.9 Lewiston) becomes WARX.

There's a translator swap in southern Maine: W277AM (103.3 Biddeford) is going to Bible Broadcasting Network (which will use it to relay WYFP 91.9 Harpswell), in exchange for two translators in Mississippi and Indiana.

And on top of all that radio news, there's TV news from Maine, too: because of "significant equipment problems associated with its analog equipment" (it can't get parts for its aging Comark transmitter, and a deteriorating klystron tube is forcing the station to chug along at 70% of licensed power), Portland CW affiliate WPXT (Channel 51) has been granted FCC permission to shut down its analog transmitter on Sept. 18. Its sister station, My Network TV affiliate WPME (Channel 35), received FCC permission to turn its analog signal off on August 21, allowing the station to complete its DTV antenna work before the Maine winters hit. Both stations are seen by most viewers on cable and satellite, anyway, and WPXT-DT (Channel 43) and WPME-DT (Channel 28) are both on the air.

*In NEW HAMPSHIRE, Nassau is complying with the FCC's order to immediately end its JSA with Vox's WWHK (102.3 Concord), leaving Vox without the "Hawk" classic rock simulcast that WWHK has been using for the last few years. For now, we understand that 102.3 continues to carry a rock format, but entirely automated, with only a legal ID playing each hour.

What's next for 102.3? NERW readers may recall that WWHK - and erstwhile Lakes Region simulcast partner WWHQ (101.5 Meredith) - were on Nassau's list of stations to join the WEEI network before that deal fell apart last winter. With Nassau now out of the picture, could Vox put 102.3 back into play as a WEEI outlet?

In the meantime, WEEI is adding another station in the Granite State. Great Eastern Radio (whose ownership interlocks with Vox) announced last week that it's getting ready to put silent WTSM (93.5 Springfield VT) back on the air from a new city of license - Swanzey, New Hampshire - and with new calls, WEEY-FM, bringing the WEEI network into the Keene market.

Entercom's press release noted that the new additions will put WEEI in 12 of the 17 Arbitron-rated markets in New England, with the most conspicuous absences being Hartford, Burlington/Plattsburgh and the Upper Valley area. Ironically, that last market is where Great Eastern had been parking the WEEY calls; it applied for (but never implemented) a call change at talker WTSL (1400 Hanover) a few months back. Could WEEI still find a home in the Upper Valley? Stay tuned...

*The RHODE ISLAND ratings scandal took another interesting turn late last week, as news emerged that the six questionable diaries in the Providence spring Arbitron book were filled out by Kristen DePetro of East Greenwich, wife of WPRO (630)/WEAN (99.7) morning talker John DePetro.

Going into the weekend, DePetro and his bosses at Citadel closed ranks, with DePetro saying that he was unaware of the fraudulent diaries, which reportedly listed hundreds of hours of WPRO listening by nonexistent listeners in the prime 25-34 demographic. WPRO management issued a statement saying they were "profoundly disappointed" in Mrs. DePetro.

Will the story end there? It's standard procedure, after all, for Arbitron to ask potential diary recipients whether they, or anyone in their household, are employed in the media - and standard for most broadcast companies' employee handbooks to include stern warnings about ratings tampering. (Indeed, it's a firing offense at most of the companies we're familiar with, often driven home by big posters in cafeterias and employee lounges reminding workers of the dangers of ratings interference.)

In the meantime, the Providence TV stations, the newspapers and WPRO's competition kept the story very much alive, with Jim Corwin, VP/GM of Clear Channel talker WHJJ (a former DePetro employer) issuing the requisite "We are shocked and disappointed at today’s news that fraudulent ratings diaries have come from the home of an on-air personality at WPRO" statement.

There's a new permanent midday host at NEW YORK's WPLJ (95.5): Jeff Miles takes the spot formerly occupied by Race Taylor, who's now doing afternoons. Miles comes to New York from Citadel's Dallas operations, where he's been morning show producer at KSCS (96.3 Fort Worth) and host of ABC Radio's "Cruz in the 80s."

In the Hudson Valley, unbuilt WJGK (1200 Highland) is being transferred, but it's all within the family: Joergen Klebe's Sunrise Broadcasting sells the construction permit to Hawkeye Communications, controlled by Klebe's wife Irmingard, for $10. The WJGK construction permit was due to expire Sept. 29, but the transfer to Hawkeye should allow for an 18-month extension under new FCC rules that allow small businesses additional time to build newly-acquired CPs.

In Albany, a bit of history came down recently: we're told WAMC has finally taken the big "WABY" letters down from the tower of its AM 1400 signal, which once bore those storied calls. Today, that tower on Braintree Street, right next to I-90, carries not only WAMC (1400) but also WUAM (900 Watervliet).

Over at Albany Broadcasting, Nik Rivers is out as PD at WZMR (104.9 Altamont); his departure from "The Edge" means morning guy Darwin adds music director duties, Mike the Enforcer shifts from nights to afternoon drive and becomes assistant PD, and Boomer moves from weekends to nights.

Upstate, we have this update on the move of Finger Lakes Radio Group's WFLR-FM (95.9 Dundee) to the Ithaca market, as a class A on 95.5 licensed to Odessa: with Dundee translator W245BL (96.9) now on the air and simulcasting WFLR-FM, listeners in the area are being told that "WFLR is moving to 96.9," effective Sept. 1. What will actually play out next weekend, as best we can piece it together, will be WFLR-FM going silent on 95.9 to make its Odessa move - and 96.9 translating WFLR (1570 Dundee), which will flip from its present news-talk format (as part of the Finger Lakes News Network) to the country format now heard on WFLR-FM.

In Syracuse, public broadcaster WCNY is trying some innovative programming on its digital multiplex channels on both radio and TV. On WCNY-DT (Channel 25), they've transformed their 24-3 subchannel from a delayed rebroadcast of the main PBS service to "Cinema 24," a 24-hour service full of classic movies. And on WCNY-FM (91.3), they're playing 50s and 60s oldies on their HD2 subchannel, complete with voicetracks from veteran central New York morning man Bill Baker ("Awake with Bake"), as well as Jack Mindy, Captain John Smith and Pete (McElvaine) McKay. Every night at 11, "WCNY-HD2" is resurrecting an old WOLF (1490) feature, too, presenting "The Sandman Serenade" with Joe McDonough. We're looking forward to checking out WCNY's digital display if we can make it over to the New York State Fair later this week...

And there's good news and bad news from our friends over at WCJW (1140 Warsaw). The good? A power increase to 250 watts on FM translator W279BO (103.7 Warsaw) is giving "CJ Country" greater reach on FM. We heard it clearly Saturday night while watching a Muckdogs baseball game in Batavia, as CJ was carrying a night NASCAR race that it never would have been able to carry in its entirety as a daytime-only AM facility.

The bad news actually came from WBTA's Muckdogs broadcast, as the announcer noted the death on Saturday evening of WCJW news director and mid-morning personality Jenny Snow, who collapsed while doing volunteer work for the Perry Fire Department. Morning man Steve Weber will be serving as acting news director, while owner Lloyd Lane will handle mornings until a replacement for Snow can be hired.

*As we noted up above, NERW's spending Labor Day weekend in western PENNSYLVANIA at the National Radio Club convention, and we'll have a format change to listen to while we're there.

Renda's WPTT (1360 McKeesport) is trading its talk format for business talk, and that means the departure of one of the station's fixtures, Lynn Cullen. She'll do a final week of shows on WPTT this week, wrapping up on August 29, just a day before the station flips to its new format and new calls of WMNY. (Those calls were last seen in NERW-land a few years ago at the Buffalo AM signal that's now WBBF.)

Meanwhile, construction is finally underway on a new tower site for Renda's other AM in the Pittsburgh market, WJAS (1320). NERW readers may recall that WJAS lost its current site near the mouth of the Squirrel Hill tunnel after its landlord sold the property to the city of Pittsburgh, apparently ignoring a "right-of-first-refusal" clause in Renda's lease. Renda ended up going to court, filing a suit that was settled when the city's Urban Renewal Authority sold WJAS a new piece of land north of downtown.

While WJAS is building, WPXI (Channel 11) is tearing down. Now that the Cox-owned NBC affiliate is in its new home on the city's North Side, wrecking crews were hard at work last week demolishing most of WPXI's former studio building on Rising Main Avenue, just north of downtown. Only the original 1950s-era core of the building, still home to WPXI's transmitters, will be saved; while WPXI had planned to move its tower to the new studio site, the neighbors objected, and so the transmitters will stay put at the old location.

In Harrisburg, Cumulus has flipped WTCY (1400) to ESPN sports, returning the station to its original callsign, WHGB. But it's not the end of the line for the "Touch" urban AC format that WTCY was carrying - it's alive and well on WNNK-HD2 (104.1), and being heard by most of the market via translator W237DE (95.3 Harrisburg). Can a translator carry an FM station's HD2 signal? Cumulus believes it's on solid ground with the FCC here, and we've heard nothing from the Commission to contradict that. Meanwhile at WNNK's main channel, middayer Kelly Iris departs for Grand Rapids and the PD chair at Clear Channel's WOOD-FM (105.7).

There's a station sale up along the New York/Pennsylvania border: Cary Simpson's Farm and Home Broadcasting is selling WQRM (106.3 Smethport) to Colonial Broadcasting, which already owns WLYC (1050 Williamsport) and WLMI (103.9 Kane). Pittsburgh's Ray Rosenblum brokered the $290,000 deal - and we'd expect WQRM to change formats, since it's now simulcasting "Sam" adult hits with Simpson's WFRM-FM (96.7 Coudersport).

Over near the Ohio/Pennsylvania border, WKQW (1120 Oil City) has flipped from "Wildcatter Country" to oldies, as "11Q."

In Philadelphia, WPEN (950) will be without afternoon host Jody Macdonald for a while. "Jody Mac" is having heart surgery today, and we join the rest of the radio community in hoping for a quick and full recovery. Michael Bradley is filling in for Macdonald while he's recuperating.

And there's an analog TV signal leaving the air early in that area, too: WTVE (Channel 51) in Reading tells the FCC that the $40,000 klystron tube in its transmitter is "expected to fail completely in the near future," so it's asking the FCC for expedited permission to go silent on September 30, "or at the earliest possible date." WTVE-DT (Channel 25) is experimenting with "distributed transmission," using eight DTV transmitters scattered from Maryland to New Jersey to extend the reach of its digital signal.

*In MASSACHUSETTS, DJ Pup Dawg is the new music director at WJMN (94.5), filling the gap left by Gee Spin's departure for the APD/MD post at sister station WWPR in New York. Pup Dawg has been part of Jam'n's morning show for the last few years. Meanwhile, sister station WXKS-FM (107.9 Medford) will be looking for a new night jock as Jackson Blue departs "Kiss 108" for afternoons at Clear Channel's "Kiss" in Dallas (KHKS 106.1 Denton).

*In VERMONT, there's a new morning show to replace the long-running "Corm and the Coach" at "Champ" WCPV (101.3 Essex NY)/WCVR (102.1 Randolph). "Rich and Mary's Morning Mess" pairs Mary Cenci, who'd been doing afternoons at the station, with Rich Haskell, who returns to the station he programmed from 1997-2000. Steve Cormier retains his operations manager title as he moves to middays, and former morning show producer Carolyn moves to afternoons to replace Cenci.

In Rutland, veteran sportscaster Jack Healey has left WSYB (1380), ending a career there that began in 1971. (He left in 1975 for now-defunct competitor WHWB, but returned in 1982.) Healey is heading for the world of webcasting, joining the crew at NortheastSports.net to do play-by-play for Castleton State University. Healey is also leaving his play-by-play gig as the voice of UVM hockey, a job that helped him win the "Vermont Sportscaster of the Year" award 18 times and landed him in the Vermont Broadcasting Hall of Fame.

*The AM-to-FM drumbeat continues up in CANADA, where the latest batch of CRTC applications finds CJOY (1460 Guelph ON), CIGM (790 Sudbury ON) and CFDR (780 Dartmouth/Halifax NS) all applying for FM moves.

Corus' CJOY application - for 95.7, with 30 kW DA/176' - is part of a package of more than a dozen applications to be considered by the CRTC at a hearing October 20 in Cambridge, Ontario. There are also three applications for new signals on 101.5 in Guelph - Blackburn Radio wants a classic rock/new rock station, Durham Radio proposes a "new distinctive rock" format and Frank Torres wants an all-blues station.

Down the road in London, the CRTC will consider nine applications for new stations: on 98.1, Torres wants a blues station; Evanov proposes a "youth contemporary" format; Rogers proposes a hit radio station with "an on-demand, on air and on-line local radio experience;" CTV proposes a "modern hit" format; Durham Radio proposes a "pop/oldies" format and Blackburn proposes a AA format. Blackburn also submitted an alternate proposal to use 91.1, where United Christian Broadcasters proposes a religious station. Sound of Faith Broadcasting proposes a religious signal on 99.9, and in nearby St. Thomas, My Broadcasting proposes a "gold-based AC" format on 94.1.

Up in Sudbury, CIGM's move to FM - made possible by the swap that sends CIGM to Newcap and CFDR in Nova Scotia to Rogers - would find the 50,000-watt AM 790 facility moving to 93.5, with 100 kW/667'. At CFDR, which had previously been granted a move to 88.9 with 21 kW, the new application from Rogers would instead move the 50,000-watt AM 780 signal to 92.9, with 100 kW/643' DA.

In Saguenay (zone La Baie), Quebec, Carl Gilbert has found a frequency for his new FM station; it will operate on 105.5 with 6 kW DA.

In Nova Scotia, Wayne Harrett's "Seaside FM" (CFEP Eastern Passage) has been granted a frequency change that will, at long last, allow the station to boost power from 50 watts to 1.3 kW to better cover Metro Halifax. CFEP initially planned to upgrade on its current frequency, 94.7, but after interference complaints from CKWM (94.9 Kentville), it settled on 105.9 instead.

In northern New Brunswick, the CBC has applied to move Radio One transmitter CBZW Woodstock from 91.9 to 95.3, getting it out of the way of Radio-Canada's soon-to-debut CBAF-FM-21 (91.7 Bon Accord).

In Toronto, former CHUM-FM morning co-host Rick Hodge, until recently one-third of "Roger, Rick and Marilyn," has moved across town (OK, a couple of blocks up Yonge Street) to CFRB (1010), where he'll join Bill Carroll in mornings and host a Sunday-night comedy show. As for CHUM itself, word is that when the sale of its venerable 1331 Yonge St. headquarters is complete, the stations - and their famed neon sign - will move downtown to 250 Richmond St. W., just around the corner from the soon-to-be-former CITYtv building at 299 Queen St. W.

CTVglobemedia has finished rebranding the "A Channel" stations it took over as part of its purchase of CHUM Ltd.

The stations in Ottawa (CHRO), Barrie (CKVR), London (CFPL-TV), Wingham (CKNX-TV), Windsor (CHWI) and Victoria, BC (CIVI) have all been reborn as simply "A," with a new website at Atv.ca, and they now have a sister station in the Maritimes, as the former Atlantic Satellite Network, sister to CTV's ATV stations in Halifax, Sydney, Saint John and Moncton, has been reborn under the "A" banner as well.

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