FCC Proposes $20,000 Fine Against WNEW For Using EAS Tones

[Y2kTheNewOldies]

https://radioinsight.com/headlines/185965/fcc-proposes-20000-fine-against-wnew-for-using-eas-tones/

The FCC has proposed a $20,000 fine against Entercom Hot AC “New 102.7” WNEW New York for “its apparently willful violation of the Commission’s rules” by utilizing the EAS tones in a parody skit.

The FCC states that on October 3, 2018 as the agency and FEMA was preparing for a test that afternoon of a test to wireless devices, the “Karen & Jeffrey” morning show at WNEW used the tone “in a skit lampooning the nationwide WEA test that was conducted later that day” that aired at 7:52am. After sending Entercom a letter of inquiry, the station admitted they used the EAS Attention Signal that was not in connection with an actual emergency, authorized test of the EAS, or a PSA. Program Director Jim Ryan told the FCC that an initial version of the skit was produced by a station employee that included the EAS Header Code and was identified as problematic by Ryan and replaced by approximately one second of the Attention Signal which was approved for airing.

The EAS tones is in reference to a segment in 2018.

 

[kenglish]

My station did exactly the same thing a day or two ago.
Thank goodness I'm not Chief Operator any more.
They also did it a couple of years ago, right after I told them not to. The reporter reasoned that it was "only for a second or so".

 

[awsherrill]

A couple of years ago, a Denver TV reporter did a story on the upcoming national EAS test which was to include cell phone alerts. Knowing that use of actual EAS tones was prohibited, he substituted duck quacks for the tone bursts.

 

[kf4rca]

It doesn't surprise me that this is an EnterCom station. What a mess. I really don't think they have anybody there who has a clue. Do you remember the KDND (Sacramento) fiasco?
Cost them about $16M.
I wouldn't work for them if they begged me.

 

[Kelly A]

It doesn't surprise me that this is an EnterCom station. What a mess. I really don't think they have anybody there who has a clue. Do you remember the KDND (Sacramento) fiasco?
Cost them about $16M.
I wouldn't work for them if they begged me.

So, you wouldn't work for a company because one of the station Promo folks made a mistake in 2018? Talk about high standards!

I'll bet if you were one of the six and a half million people that are now out of a job, you wouldn't be so picky.

 

[davideduardo]

It doesn't surprise me that this is an EnterCom station. What a mess. I really don't think they have anybody there who has a clue. Do you remember the KDND (Sacramento) fiasco?
Cost them about $16M.
I wouldn't work for them if they begged me.

You have just indicated why owners incorporate their operations. A lower level employee (with less than thorough local management supervision) created a contest that sounded edgy, hip and clever for a station that thrived on those commodities.

Sadly and unfortunately, failure to consult with a doctor or nurse or other medical professional let them endanger lives with one very sad result. It was a stupid contest that seemed cool but was really very dangerous.

The owners sacrificed the station to facilitate their merger with CBS. They likely could have finished the court proceedings, settled and moved on. But they had to do something about the case to let the merger go through. And in the process, they got a tax deduction of the current book value of the station at the time the license was surrendered.

 

[CTListener]

The owners sacrificed the station to facilitate their merger with CBS. They likely could have finished the court proceedings, settled and moved on. But they had to do something about the case to let the merger go through. And in the process, they got a tax deduction of the current book value of the station at the time the license was surrendered.

That makes it sound as if the whole affair cost the owners little in the long run, hardly the way to handle a poster who believes the cold-blooded focus on bottom line and image of the company drives everything "corporate radio" does and that getting a tax break was more important to the top brass than finding an appropriate settlement with the family of the listener who died. Couldn't the merger have waited? Am I reading you wrong on this?

 

[Kelly A]

That makes it sound as if the whole affair cost the owners little in the long run, hardly the way to handle a poster who believes the cold-blooded focus on bottom line and image of the company drives everything "corporate radio" does and that getting a tax break was more important to the top brass than finding an appropriate settlement with the family of the listener who died. Couldn't the merger have waited? Am I reading you wrong on this?

Mergers and acquisitions don't happen in a month, week, or overnight. There are hundreds of hours of preparation and negotiation just to submit an offer, followed by hundreds of hours of negotiations. Once the parties agree, then it takes hundreds of hours for both sides to prepare for the transaction, receive various Governmental approvals, plus account for any changes made by either side as circumstances might change. Stopping the process, could mean scrapping the deal and loss of millions of dollars of legal and internal expenses.

Settlement negotiations for an unfortunate incident that would come up in operation of a business, are usually handled by the company lawyers, but mostly insurance company legal teams.

 

[CTListener]

Mergers and acquisitions don't happen in a month, week, or overnight. There are hundreds of hours of preparation and negotiation just to submit an offer, followed by hundreds of hours of negotiations. Once the parties agree, then it takes hundreds of hours for both sides to prepare for the transaction, receive various Governmental approvals, plus account for any changes made by either side as circumstances might change. Stopping the process, could mean scrapping the deal and loss of millions of dollars of legal and internal expenses.

Oh, boo hoo. Again, there would be little sympathy for this corporate "plight" from the family and friends of the deceased. Maybe scrapping the deal would have been an appropriate course of action.

 

[Kelly A]

Oh, boo hoo. Again, there would be little sympathy for this corporate "plight" from the family and friends of the deceased. Maybe scrapping the deal would have been an appropriate course of action.

How would a business discontinuing doing a business deal resolve the loss of life? Heck, just look to the President's recent tweets. Additional losses of potentially thousands of innocent lives by pushing people to go back to work and their normal lives, are deemed more acceptable than a worsening economy. Isn't that worse on a much larger, grander scale? I don't see your outrage about that. Instead, you're outraged that a merger went through which had been started well before the incident.

There are hundreds of innocent lives lost from producing or sales of products and services supplied by organizations every day. A tower worker building a cell site is killed on the job. By your measure, that cell company shouldn't continue business operations because of an unfortunate accident. What about that dock worker who is accidentally crushed by a shipping container? Should all dock freight come to a halt as some symbolic gesture to the worker's family? What about that truck driver killed in an accident? Should all trucking companies stop delivering freight to grocery stores? You might not be able to hoard that toilet paper if that shipping company shut down in remorse from an accidental loss of life.

Nobody wants to witness or experience a loss of life, business or otherwise. If a business or government officials have developed a track record of innocent death or serious injury, then they should absolutely be scrutinized, investigated, and punished if violation of safety laws has occurred. Equally, Politicians who lack empathy to put their constituents at risk, should be voted out of office.

 

[CTListener]

How would a business discontinuing doing a business deal resolve the loss of life? Heck, just look to the President's recent tweets. Additional losses of potentially thousands of innocent lives by pushing people to go back to work and their normal lives, are deemed more acceptable than a worsening economy. Isn't that worse on a much larger, grander scale? I don't see your outrage about that. Instead, you're outraged that a merger went through which had been started well before the incident.

There are hundreds of innocent lives lost from producing or sales of products and services supplied by organizations every day. A tower worker building a cell site is killed on the job. By your measure, that cell company shouldn't continue business operations because of an unfortunate accident. What about that dock worker who is accidentally crushed by a shipping container? Should all dock freight come to a halt as some symbolic gesture to the worker's family? What about that truck driver killed in an accident? Should all trucking companies stop delivering freight to grocery stores? You might not be able to hoard that toilet paper if that shipping company shut down in remorse from an accidental loss of life.

Nobody wants to witness or experience a loss of life, business or otherwise. If a business or government officials have developed a track record of innocent death or serious injury, then they should absolutely be scrutinized, investigated, and punished if violation of safety laws has occurred. Equally, Politicians who lack empathy to put their constituents at risk, should be voted out of office.

Good points. I guess I was overreacting to the tax deduction mentioned by David in his response to kf4rca, thinking that no one should have benefited, even indirectly, as a result of the KDND blunder. It, and your citation of the millions in lost legal fees in your response to me, just struck me as tone-deaf, bolstering the original accusation that big corporate radio is heartless and soulless. But yes, I agree that the potential downfall of a company and the loss of who knows how many jobs would punish far too many completely innocent parties.

 

[TheBigA]

BTW the situation in Sacramento happened in 2007. All of the responsible people were fired. The case went to court and the station paid $16 million to the family. Everything seemed solved, and then a couple of local people revived the issue in 2013. So this was one of those situations where the only way to kill the vampire was to put a stake in its heart. That's what they did.

 

[davideduardo]

That makes it sound as if the whole affair cost the owners little in the long run, hardly the way to handle a poster who believes the cold-blooded focus on bottom line and image of the company drives everything "corporate radio" does and that getting a tax break was more important to the top brass than finding an appropriate settlement with the family of the listener who died. Couldn't the merger have waited? Am I reading you wrong on this?

There are two separate issues here, but they combined at a critical moment.

The station contest resulted in considerable liability issues. Not only did they pay a huge settlement to the victim's family, they had enormous legal costs and the rest of their stations seem to have suffered in billings due to "guilt by association".

The CBS deal was, in a way, an open window that would have closed if not completed in a timely manner.

The problem was getting FCC approval while a licensee character issue was open. On its own, Entercom could have gone through the legal proceedings and kept the license after showing it had satisfied the civil case, taken internal measures to prevent like occurrences company wide and presented its actions to the FCC. That would have taken longer than the CBS merger window would accept.

So the quick way out was to sacrifice a station to be able to complete the deal.

They definitely lost something in the vicinity of $20 to $25 million with the Sacramento case... the settlement, legal fees, the loss of the actual value vs. the book value (acquisition cost) of the station and lost market revenue due to image tarnishing. The tax write off was only for the book value while the station had a much higher market value.

 

[kf4rca]

A million here, a million there, pretty soon you're talking real money.