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Townsquare Media Oneonta

E

EricSam

All the stations run by Townsquare Media in Oneonta, New York are now automated but some of them are no longer on the air. Sadly, local content fell into the dodo bird. The reason is because they're a bunch of cheapskates. They took away the jobs of our trusted radio personalities for decades Leslie Ann & Doug Decker in Oneonta (originally with WSRK), Ron Galley in Walton, and Jim Sargent in Norwich. Here are the list of Townsquare stations currently on:
WZOZ 103.1FM Oneonta
WSRK 103.9FM Oneonta
WDOS 730AM Oneonta
WKXZ 93.9FM Norwich
WDLA 92.1FM Walton
Now a list of Townsquare stations that had their last nail to the coffin:
WCHN 970AM Norwich (since Feb 2023)
WDHI 100.3FM Delhi, WIYN 94.7FM Deposit, and WTBD 97.5FM Delhi (since New Years Eve 2023)
WDLA 1270AM Walton (for months now)

Since Townsquare Media took away local content, the only radio station worth listening to in Chenango, Delaware, and Otsego Counties is the independently owned WCDO from Sidney at 100.9FM & 1490AM plus a signal for Norwich at 92.3FM. WCDO is the only station in the tri county area with 100% local content. They run news twice an hour from 6am to 6pm and playing the best mix of AC music from the 70s to the present with no repeats. WCDO is a favorite among listeners to stay informed plus great music.
 
EricSam said:
All the stations run by Townsquare Media in Oneonta, New York are now automated but some of them are no longer on the air. Sadly, local content fell into the dodo bird. The reason is because they're a bunch of cheapskates.
Click to expand...
Or, could it be that the market isn't hitting advertising/revenue targets enough to justify local talent? Yes, I'm pretty sure that is the answer.
EricSam said:
Since Townsquare Media took away local content, the only radio station worth listening to in Chenango, Delaware, and Otsego Counties is the independently owned WCDO from Sidney at 100.9FM & 1490AM plus a signal for Norwich at 92.3FM. WCDO is the only station in the tri county area with 100% local content. They run news twice an hour from 6am to 6pm and playing the best mix of AC music from the 70s to the present with no repeats. WCDO is a favorite among listeners to stay informed plus great music.
Click to expand...
If anything like other similar markets that used to have local talent, my bet is the ones going automation or syndicated talent from other markets will see any decrease in listenership or advertising. That's just how it goes in these days of advertising downturns and fractured media consumption.
 
This unfortunately is the state of radio today, dominated by a few big corporations, saddled with debt they used to acquire their broadcast empires, cutting costs into the bone. I have noticed Townsquare is particularly aggressive in selling , or even turning off underperforming stations, mostly on AM.
But they are not alone. Iheart has three stations in Catskill- Hudson NY, and nobody at all works there. They have a contract engineer that goes to the station if something needs to be physically fixed or maintained. 1230 WHUC and translator W295BN 106.9 - simulcasts country WRWD, Poughkeepsie .
WCTW 98.5 the Cat is satellite fed or voice tracked CHR, and Oldies 93.5 WZCR I believe uses Ihearts Premier Network satellite feed. The news what their is on the stations comes from the Albany cluster.
In my opinion stations fed from afar do not serve their local community. The FCC should never have allowed consolidation. But allowing mega corporations dominate our economy is a disease that affects much of our business world.
 
MHVRadiofan said:
In my opinion stations fed from afar do not serve their local community. The FCC should never have allowed consolidation. But allowing mega corporations dominate our economy is a disease that affects much of our business world.
Click to expand...
What you're missing is that had consolidation not been allowed back in the 90's, radio as an industry would have been dead long before now.
 
MHVRadiofan said:
I have noticed Townsquare is particularly aggressive in selling , or even turning off underperforming stations, mostly on AM.
Click to expand...

That should be seen as good news. Now, anyone can bid for those stations and run them without debt or other larger agendas.

Maybe some local person in Oneonta or Corning, or anywhere might want to revive AM using their own private money.

The FCC says any US citizen who hasn't been convicted of a crime can own radio stations. Not just corporations.
 
TheBigA said:
That should be seen as good news. Now, anyone can bid for those stations and run them without debt or other larger agendas.

Maybe some local person in Oneonta or Corning, or anywhere might want to revive AM using their own private money.

The FCC says any US citizen who hasn't been convicted of a crime can own radio stations. Not just corporations.
Click to expand...
The reality is, some local citizen would still be taking on debt, assuming they could get a loan for an AM station. Either that, or they would potentially wipe out their life savings for what amounts to unbridled exuberance.
 
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