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October 1, 2002
 WKNJ:
RIP
By SCOTT FYBUSH
*It was supposed to be NEW JERSEY's
newest radio station, but 14 years after its first construction
permit was granted, WKNJ (550 Lakewood) has become radio history
- without ever broadcasting so much as a station ID.
When the FCC cancelled Steven Wendell's construction permit
and deleted the call letters last week, it ended a story that
began back in 1988, when Wendell originally proposed a station
in the north Jersey community, just south of the New York state
line. Neighbors of the proposed site on the New Jersey side of
the line fought the construction, and when the FCC began cracking
down on long-unbuilt CPs a few years ago, Wendell tried another
tack to get his station built.
Changing the community of license to Harriman NY, Wendell
modified the CP to specify 250 watts, daytime only, from the
existing site of WRKL (910 New City), on US 202 in Pomona, Rockland
County. But while WRKL rebuilt its site, adding two towers for
night use, WKNJ remained unbuilt. The FCC said last winter that
it would cancel the CP (which had been renewed most recently
in December 1998), but Wendell appealed, telling the commission
this year that he had been unable to build WKNJ because engineers
in the New York area had been too busy with the World Trade Center
recovery. The FCC didn't buy it, noting that Wendell made no
effort to hire engineers from outside the area, and WKNJ is now
officially gone.
(The back politics here: WKNJ's existence would have made
the upgrade of WLIE, on 540 in Islip, impossible; while the Long
Island station pushed to have WKNJ taken off life support, Wendell
filed for another 540 facility, this time in Jaffrey,
N.H. That application is still pending...)
*Elsewhere in the Garden State, we're sorry to report the
passing of Howard Green, who died Sunday (Sept. 29) in Atlantic
City. Green was best known as the owner of WMGM-TV (Channel 40)
in Atlantic City, which he bought in 1977 (when it was WCMC-TV),
as well as for assembling a cluster of radio stations that included
WOND (1400), WUSS (1490), WONZ (1580 Hammonton), WTKU (98.3)
and WMGM-FM (103.7). In addition to the South Jersey stations,
Green put WENY-TV (Channel 36) in Elmira on the air in 1969,
and once owned WJAB in Portland, Maine and WMMB in Melbourne,
Florida. Green was 72.
 *It seems the folks
in suburban Philly don't care for Hoosier humor; WTHK (94.5 Trenton)
has pulled the Indianapolis-based Bob & Tom show off morning
drive, replacing it with the "Free Beer and Hot Wings Show"
from its sister "Hawk" station, WCHR-FM (105.7 Manahawkin).
Over on the Jersey Shore, WRAT (95.9 Point Pleasant) promoted
PD/morning guy Carl Craft to operations manager.
*We'll start our NEW YORK report this
week down in the tri-state area, as well, with some management
shuffling at the Pamal cluster in the Hudson Valley that brings
Jane Bartsch in from Pensacola (where she was market manager
at the Cumulus group) to be VP/GM of WHUD (100.7 Peekskill),
WSPK (104.7 Poughkeepsie) and WLNA/WBNR (1420 Peekskill/1260
Beacon). Pamal also promoted Stacy Rogers from VP/sales to VP/GM
of its Albany cluster, while naming executive VP Jake Russell
as director of operations.
We have a lineup to report for new Binghamton talker WYOS
(1360), thanks to several alert readers down that way: the Citadel
station kicks off the day with Doug Stephan (5-9 AM), followed
by Glenn Beck (9-noon), Bill O'Reilly (noon-2), an hour of Dr.
Dean Edell, Laura Schlessinger (3-6 PM), Jim Cramer (6-7 PM),
Tom Martino (7-10 PM), Laura Ingraham (10 PM-midnight) and America
Overnight.
 Here at NERW, we
pride ourselves on being thorough when it comes to towers, so
we made it a point to detour from the SBE regional convention
at Turning Stone Casino last week (a well-attended event, by
the way) to check out the newest ones in the state, and you can
see the results in the photomontage at the right.
That's WFNY (1440 Gloversville), Michael Sleezer's new station,
with two towers just a half-mile or so from Gloversville's heritage
AM, WENT (1340) and its recently rebuilt stick. These towers
will soon be sending out 800 watts by day, 500 watts at night,
but despite reports of the station testing, there was nothing
on 1440 just yet as we photographed it. (What's more, we got
a flat tire!)
Rochester's first DTV signal made it to the air last week,
at least in testing mode. NBC affiliate WHEC-DT (Channel 58)
is running just 38 kW visual from Pinnacle Hill. Meanwhile, PBS
outlet WXXI-TV (Channel 21) has applied to move its DTV service
from channel 16 to channel 41 whenever it signs on; considering
the analog signal viewers east of Rochester already get on 16
from WPBS in Watertown, that's a good idea indeed...
 Speaking of Watertown,
its TV dial is getting a bit of a spin. UPN is gone from LPTVs
WLOT-LP (Channel 66) and WBQZ-LP (Channel 34), moved to a tape-delayed
schedule on LPTVs WNYF-LP (Channel 28, just granted Class A status
this week) and W28BC up in Massena. Meanwhile, cable viewers
who've gotten used to "WBWT," the cable-only signal
on channel 31, will need to adjust their dials: it's moving to
cable channel 14. (Just to confuse matters more, the Watertown
Daily Times, long an afternoon paper, moved to morning
publication on Wednesday!)
In Arcade, east of Buffalo, the religious LPFM to be on 100.3
now has a call, WNAR-LP, and a new transmitter site: it'll be
just south of the village of Arcade, practically touching the
Cattaraugus-Wyoming county line.
In Buffalo itself, a familiar voice is back on the air in
morning drive: Nicholas Picholas has rejoined Janet Snyder on
the WKSE (98.5 Niagara Falls) morning show after an absence of
two years, when he crossed the border to do mornings at "Energy
Radio" CING in Hamilton.
*An obituary to report in PENNSYLVANIA,
but the passing of Walter Annenberg ends a broadcast chapter
that extended far beyond the Keystone State. Annenberg's Triangle
Broadcasting group was best known for its ownership of WFIL AM-FM-TV
(now WFIL 560, WIOQ 102.1 and WPVI-TV 6) in Philadelphia, but
it also included WNHC AM-FM-TV (now WYBC 1340, WPLR 99.1 and
WTNH-TV 8) in New Haven, Connecticut, WNBF AM-FM-TV (now WNBF
1290, WAAL 99.1, WBNG-TV 12) in Binghamton, N.Y. and WFBG AM-FM-TV
(now WFBG 1290, WFGY 98.1 and WTAJ-TV 10) in Altoona, Pennsylvania,
among others.
Annenberg's print holdings included the Philadelphia Inquirer and
TV Guide, which he founded nationally in 1953. In later
years, he served as ambassador to the Court of St. James's. He
died Tuesday (Oct. 1) at his home in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania,
reportedly of pneumonia. Annenberg was 94.
*Bruce Bond is once again off the air in the Harrisburg market,
after a judge granted a restraining order at the request of Cumulus'
WNNK (104.1), which is trying to enforce a noncompete even after
pulling Bond off the afternoon shift last December. Bond returned
to the air in June on Citadel's WRKZ (102.3 Carlisle), and the
lawsuits began flying almost the same day. Bond's morning partner,
"Stretch" Raback, is doing the show solo for now...
Citadel flipped formats on two of its stations in the Scranton./Wilkes-Barre
market, dropping standards on WKJN (1440 Carbondale) and WAZL
(1490 Hazleton) and replacing them - again - with simulcasts
of news-talk WARM (590 Scranton).
In Allentown, WLEV (100.7) is looking for a new morning co-host;
Diane Grey is off to Flint, Michigan and WFBE (95.1), leaving
"Franceman" solo for the moment.
Moving west, we're pleased to report that WSAJ (1340 Grove
City) is back on the air, now that its unusual horizontal "cage"
antenna on the campus of Grove City College has been repaired.
WSAJ is a relic of an earlier day of radio: it runs just 100
watts during its few hours of weekly broadcasting (Sunday mornings
and two weeknights, for an hour at a time), keeping alive a license
that was first granted in 1921! (The college also runs fulltime
religious/classical outlet WSAJ-FM on 91.1).
Down in Pittsburgh, Dave LaBrozzi is promoted to one of Clear
Channel's new regional VP of programming posts, overseeing the
Clear Channel outlets in the Steel City and nearby Wheeling.
(He'd been OM for WWSW, WBGG and WJJJ, three of Clear Channel's
five Pittsburgh stations.)
Just across the state line in the Youngstown, Ohio market,
a piece of history went on the auction block last week. Regular
NERW reader (and station broker) Ray Rosenblum was there, and
he tells us WASN (1330 Campbell) fetched $175,000 from Stop 26-Riverbend,
which also owns nearby WGFT (1500 Youngstown). The station is
itself a bit of history: as WHOT, it was the big top-40
station in Youngstown in the sixties, with the DJs doing their
thing in a big plate-glass window in front of the building (where
the "WASN" calls are in the 1998 picture above.)
1330 was also a two-site operation; the five-tower night site
down in Boardman, Ohio is gone now, so the station will be effectively
a daytimer when it returns to the air. (It was last heard doing
talk under Dan Ott, before filing for bankruptcy and going up
for auction.)
And over in Alliance, WZKL (92.5) dropped its mish-mosh of
AC music on Friday to return to its top 40 heritage as "Q92."
Will the "WDJQ" calls come back too? We hear a call
change is pending there...and we're waiting to see what involvement
veteran CHR programmer Clarke Ingram will have; he helped sign
the station on, but was sidetracked by a family health situation
that forced him home to Pittsburgh over the weekend.
 *A
veteran MASSACHUSETTS TV meteorologist is looking for
work this week. Mark Rosenthal started at WCVB (Channel 5) in
Boston the year it signed on, 1972, as a high school intern,
and joined the station for real in 1988, most recently doing
weekends and filling in on weekdays. But when WCVB added Harvey
Leonard, the longtime channel 7 fixture, to its staff over the
summer (not long after hiring J.C. Monahan as an additional morning/fill-in
talent), that left one weatherman too many at 5 TV Place, with
Rosenthal the odd man out. No word yet on where he might land
next...
On the radio side of things, add "oldies" to the
format description of Bob Bittner's wonderfully eclectic WJIB
(740 Cambridge), which is picking up some of the 1955-1964 era
oldies that are in short supply on the "commercial"
oldies outlets like WODS. Next Sunday (Oct. 6), Bob will launch
"Solid Gold Sunday," playing the hits of the pre-Beatles
era (plus a few later ones that don't show up much on the air
these days) from 2 until 8 PM.
Ken Shelton's latest home on the Boston airwaves will be Greater
Media's WROR (105.7 Framingham), which has hired the Boston radio
vet (WBZ-FM, WCOZ, WBCN, WZLX, WBOS) for middays, where he'll
be followed by Tai and then Julie Devereaux, who moves to evenings
from afternoons at the reborn classic rocker.
 Congratulations to
Candy O'Terry; the WMJX (106.7) jock/APD has been named president
of the Boston/New England chapter of American Women in Radio
and Television!
Out in Springfield, Ron Osbourne makes the move up I-91 from
WPLR (99.1 New Haven), where he was doing weekends, to the night
shift at WAQY (102.1). We're also hearing (a bit late, as it
turns out) that Phil Dee has parted ways with WHYN (560). Dee,
who did afternoons in WHYN's music days, had been doing a Saturday
nights oldies show on the station, now a news-talker.
Down on the Rhode Island line, WARL (1320 Attleboro) is again
looking for a morning show. After signing a deal with rapper
Luther "Luke" Campbell of 2 Live Crew to do the show
via ISDN from Miami (and installing equipment down there, not
to mention buying Campbell a plane ticket to visit Providence
and promote the show), the new urban station says Campbell simply
disappeared when it was show time, leaving "Power 1320"
without a morning show. Meanwhile, "CAB Radio," the
syndicator affiliated with WARL parent ADD Media, has picked
up "Travel World," the Montreal-based show formerly
syndicated by the now-defunct Liberty Works, as its first national
offering.
*Speaking of RHODE ISLAND and Massachusetts,
we're hearing a Providence-market FM with a better signal towards
New Bedford will soon be moving its studios across the state
line and focusing its sales and marketing on New Bedford and
Fall River. Expect to "Z" more about this one soon...
One that's more than just a well-placed rumor: Jeff Ryan,
who does swing at WWBB (101.5) in Providence and WKSS (95.7)
in Hartford, is adding another leg to his commute: he's now doing
weekends way down in Trenton at WPST (97.5).
*Just one lone CONNECTICUT note: the
calls for the new experimental station on 107.5 in Avon will
be WC3XSH, as it tests whether LPFMs can coexist with full-power
stations (in this case, WCCC on 106.9) three channels away.
 *A call change
in VERMONT is promising bigger changes down the road:
WKDR (1390 Burlington) has applied to become WVAA; the website
of the former talker now says "changes coming soon,"
while the station itself was doing CNN Headline News over the
weekend, still using the WKDR calls. Stay tuned for more on this
one...
On the FM side, Mark Abuhazzab moves up from music director
to PD at "The Point" (WNCS 104.7 Montpelier and its
AAA sister stations), replacing the long-serving Jody Peterson.
*In NEW HAMPSHIRE, there's some federal
money on the way for public broadcasting: NH Public Radio will
get $47,000 to buy a new transmitter for WEVC (107.1 Gorham),
while New Hampshire Public Television gets $1.2 million to build
a new broadcast center in Keene and to build out the rest of
its digital TV network.
Cable viewers way up north won't be seeing
WMPX (Channel 23) from Waterville, MAINE; the Pax outlet
was denied cable carriage in Berlin and Lancaster, N.H., which
are some 75 miles from the WMPX transmitter at the far end of
the Portland market.
Congratulations to WRKD (1450 Rockland), which marked its
50th anniversary this week. Special programming includes a six-hour
look back on the station's history on the anniversary day, October
1.
*Up in CANADA, the CRTC is plenty
busy with the ongoing hearings on new radio licenses for Toronto;
in the meantime, the CBC has applied for a new outlet in Ville-Marie,
Quebec. With 15.9 kw on 89.1, the new Radio-Canada outlet would
relay the "premiere chaine" service from CHLM (90.7)
Rouyn-Noranda; we believe it would thus free CKVM (710 Ville-Marie)
from its status as one of the last privately-owned affiliates
of Radio-Canada in Quebec.
 The CBC also needs
a new host for the next season of "Hockey Night in Canada."
It was unable to reach agreement on a new contract with Ron MacLean,
who's hosted the Canadian institution with Don Cherry since 1987.
On the radio side, the CBC named Jane Chalmers, director of current
affairs for CBC-TV, to replace Alex France as vice president
of CBC Radio, effective November 1.
Sorry to report the passing of Hamilton's first TV newscaster.
Jack Burghardt started the news department at CHCH-TV (Channel
11), moving in 1971 to CFPL-TV (Channel 10) in London, where
he was the station's main news anchor for a decade. Burghardt
then moved into politics, serving as a member of parliament,
deputy mayor and mayoral candidate before retiring in 1994. Burghardt,
who died Saturday (Sept. 28), was 73.
Over in Fort Erie, CKEY (Wild 101.1) now has a PD: Phil Becker
moves up from WJFX (107.9) in Fort Wayne, Indiana, to helm the
new Buffalo-market urban CHR, effective October 28.
And CKKW (1090) in Kitchener has rehired Ross Poll to do mornings;
Poll left the station when it flipped from oldies to sports back
in May 2001, but now that "The Team" is gone and oldies
are back, so is Poll.
 *And
with the week's news out of the way, we can get down to business:
we're opening the ordering window for the Tower Site Calendar
2003.
If you liked last year's edition, you'll love this one: higher-quality
images (including Providence's WHJJ; Mount Mansfield, Vermont;
Buffalo's WBEN; KOMA in Oklahoma City; the legendary WSM, Nashville
and many more), more dates in radio history, a convenient hole
for hanging - and we'll even make sure all the dates fall on
the right days!
This year's calendar will go to press in late October, and
if you order now, you'll have yours in hand by mid-November,
in plenty of time for the holidays. And this year, you can order
with your Visa, MasterCard, Discover or American Express by using
the handy link below!
Better yet, here's an incentive to make your 2003 NERW subscription
pledge a little early: support NERW/fybush.com at the $60 level
or higher, and you'll get this lovely calendar for free!
How can you go wrong? (Click here
to visit our Support page, where you can make your NERW contribution
with a major credit card...)
You can also order by mail; just send a check for $16
per calendar (NYS residents add 8% sales tax), shipping included,
to Scott Fybush, 92 Bonnie Brae Ave., Rochester
NY 14618.
*And we're also happy to announce that
our good friends at M Street have released the 11th edition of
the M Street Radio Directory. With the disappearance
of the old Vane Jones log and the declining accuracy of the Broadcasting
Yearbook, the M Street directory is widely regarded as the most
accurate, most comprehensive source of information on the US
and Canadian radio scene - and we're thrilled to be able to offer
it to you at a substantial discount!
The directory includes power, frequency, ownership, key personnel,
formats, ratings and much more information for every radio station
in the U.S. and Canada, and now runs almost 900 pages in an 8.5"
x 11" softcover book. List price is $79 (plus $7 shipping/handling),
but if you order through fybush.com/NorthEast Radio Watch, you
can get this invaluable resource on your shelf for $69 (plus
$7 s/h) - a $10 savings! And your purchase benefits the continued
publication of NERW and Tower Site of the Week, so everybody
wins!
You can order in either of two ways: to order by major credit
card, call 1-800-248-4242, ask for Irene, and tell her
you want the "NorthEast Radio Watch" discount. Or,
send check or money order for $76 ($69 + $7 s/h) to Scott Fybush,
92 Bonnie Brae Ave., Rochester NY 14618. Either way, you'll put
the most trusted, accurate information about the radio industry
in print today on your bookshelf.
*Finally, another scheduling announcement: we'll be back with
our next regular issue next Monday, Oct. 7 - but there will be
no NERW on October 14, while we're out in Dallas to see all the
broadcast activity the Big D has to offer. We'll be back later
that week...stay tuned!
NorthEast Radio Watch is made possible by the generous
contributions of our regular readers. If you enjoy NERW, please
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is copyright
2002 by Scott Fybush. |