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1110 New Format

One of the negative effects of deregulation was some organizations have thought they "own" their piece of the spectrum when actually they are only licensed or tenants. I feel right now the FCC (landlord) is more interested in the tenants than owners the public.

I know supposedly around half of the stations before 80 / 90 were losing money but using FCC licenses to create a monopoly in a small town is wrong. On a bigger scale. 1110's land is private property and the owners have the right to sell it. Has there be a "public offering" of the license since U1 doesn't want it. If they have plans, shouldn't they be at least in their public files.

IMHO The FCC should have an auction of EVERY deleted AM or FM license stating 30 or 60 days after the filing of the deletion. There should be a 60 or 90 day window for bids No minimum, no engineering studies, just the normal no drug use questions etc. The winner gets a 3 or 4 year period period to file a construction permit and build to at least 75 % of the original daytime (AM) paper coverage using the same conditions of the stations original paper footprint. FM A B & Cs simply fulfills the allocation. FM translators / class D remain within 50 or 100 miles without creating interference. The CP can be sold but there should be a multiple times bid penalty if the station is not built. Of course if no one bids the license should go away.

Another formally regulated industry is the Airlines.

When an airline goes broke, they don't teardown the gates at the airport. Another airline takes over the gates once the legal dust settles.

A FCC license should be considered a "gate" to an area. You shouldn't destroy it. Let someone use it.

A lot of posters automatically say AM or Radio is dead and of no value. At least, let the taxpayers get some bid money and see what happens.

Disclosure: I am not a MAGA person, but I know if I was 10 or 15 years younger and in better health, I could personally sell iHeart's conservative talkers on the street on any signal that covers over a million people south of the Mason Dixion line.

I get U1's ownership and the company's cultural issues with Trump's GOP but their money is green too.
 
secondchoice said:
One of the negative effects of deregulation was some organizations have thought they "own" their piece of the spectrum when actually they are only licensed or tenants. I feel right now the FCC (landlord) is more interested in the tenants than owners the public.

I know supposedly around half of the stations before 80 / 90 were losing money but using FCC licenses to create a monopoly in a small town is wrong. On a bigger scale. 1110's land is private property and the owners have the right to sell it. Has there be a "public offering" of the license since U1 doesn't want it. If they have plans, shouldn't they be at least in their public files.

IMHO The FCC should have an auction of EVERY deleted AM or FM license stating 30 or 60 days after the filing of the deletion. There should be a 60 or 90 day window for bids No minimum, no engineering studies, just the normal no drug use questions etc. The winner gets a 3 or 4 year period period to file a construction permit and build to at least 75 % of the original daytime (AM) paper coverage using the same conditions of the stations original paper footprint. FM A B & Cs simply fulfills the allocation. FM translators / class D remain within 50 or 100 miles without creating interference. The CP can be sold but there should be a multiple times bid penalty if the station is not built. Of course if no one bids the license should go away.

Another formally regulated industry is the Airlines.

When an airline goes broke, they don't teardown the gates at the airport. Another airline takes over the gates once the legal dust settles.

A FCC license should be considered a "gate" to an area. You shouldn't destroy it. Let someone use it.

A lot of posters automatically say AM or Radio is dead and of no value. At least, let the taxpayers get some bid money and see what happens.



Exactly, maybe this very thing is the reason why ownership limits were put in place to begin with.
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secondchoice said:
IMHO The FCC should have an auction of EVERY deleted AM or FM license stating 30 or 60 days after the filing of the deletion. There should be a 60 or 90 day window for bids No minimum, no engineering studies, just the normal no drug use questions etc. The winner gets a 3 or 4 year period period to file a construction permit and build to at least 75 % of the original daytime (AM) paper coverage using the same conditions of the stations original paper footprint. FM A B & Cs simply fulfills the allocation. FM translators / class D remain within 50 or 100 miles without creating interference. The CP can be sold but there should be a multiple times bid penalty if the station is not built. Of course if no one bids the license should go away.
Click to expand...

I fully expect that if the FCC implemented a policy like this, just about every AM license that's handed in for deletion would draw zero bids and would stay deleted.

Almost no AM station on the air right now has any intrinsic value to just its license. The AMs that remain viable (which is maybe 1000 at most) are viable because they exist as ongoing businesses where most of the major expenses that bedevil AM have been paid for - they already have built-out transmitter sites, ideally in locations where they're not immediately threatened by development pressure.

But if you're buying a license that's been surrendered, it's been surrendered for a good reason. There's no transmitter site attached, and probably no ongoing sales business either. So you're starting with a lot of big expenses (you simply cannot put up a new AM transmitter site for much less than $100,000 anywhere, and that cost grows exponentially with a directional array or high power), no income, and you're starting from scratch with identity and visibility in the marketplace.

If nobody came forward with $50,000 (which is what a nice new car costs these days) to pick up the 1430 license in St. Louis, a solid coverage facility with an existing transmitter site that could have been acquired inexpensively, that sort of answers the question about what an auction policy like this would look like in reality.

There's also an administrative burden to consider for the small staff at the FCC. If you don't impose some sort of minimum bid and don't require some sort of engineering study, you're basically opening the doors for anyone to come in and pay $10 just to keep a dead AM frequency on the books - and then what? Do you continue to protect that dead frequency based on the previous licensed parameters, and is that fair to any remaining viable stations that would like to expand their signals but can't do so? If the penalty for not building the station is just a multiple of that $10, the FCC will end up spending a lot more just administering this mess than the $50 or $100 it might take in at the end of the process a few years down the road. And whatever time the FCC staff spends on this process is time that it can't spend processing legitimate applications from existing stations, which means they have a slower, harder time getting their applications approved.

As for FM, the situation is different. If you surrender a full-power FM license, the allocation for that frequency remains on the books, and it does already automatically go to auction the next time there are enough facilities (and Congressional authorization in place) for an auction. Those minimum bids aren't very high these days, and even so, we're seeing fewer and fewer bidders going after FMs.
 
secondchoice said:
I know supposedly around half of the stations before 80 / 90 were losing money but using FCC licenses to create a monopoly in a small town is wrong.
Click to expand...

Keep in mind that, before 1980, that was exactly what we had in small towns. Small towns had one owner and, at most, two stations, one AM and one FM. You might have been able to find the occasional exception, usually because the owner of the AM decided not to build the FM allocated, but your average small town was a monopoly for radio advertising until the floodgates opened in the 80's.
 
There is difference between a high band AM class B and a mid dail Class A AM. I forgot about squatters. A maybe a minimum $20k or $30k penalty for non build out is reasonable. The 3 channel change limit on AM CPs needs to go. You could put a ninety day period where existing stations that could expand their coverage should be able to grab the channel first.
 
secondchoice said:
There is difference between a high band AM class B and a mid dail Class A AM. I forgot about squatters. A maybe a minimum $20k or $30k penalty for non build out is reasonable. The 3 channel change limit on AM CPs needs to go. You could put a ninety day period where existing stations that could expand their coverage should be able to grab the channel first.
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As Fybush mentioned above, any sort of endeavor like this is not worth the administrative burden given AM's lack of revenue potential for a new operation. What you see going on now is just the beginning. As facilities continue to age requiring expensive investments and land becomes more valuable, combined with dwindling revenues, owners have some serious financial decisions to make. I don't think that fans of obsolete AM technology will like those decisions.
 
Mike Sheridan said:
Obviously. If an AM station is so expensive to operate why program a re-direct for six months? That doesn’t make sense.
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theyre not paying music royalties.. theyre not paying any staff seperately to mess with the am.. its just about the electricity bill only .... and theyve figured that with selling the FMs they can afford to waste money on the AM

Im starting to wonder if this weas the plan all along.. they had nothing new coming for 1110, but they dont dare say that.. and knew theyd be selling the FMs so they could take the hit
 
What did they pay for the FM properties they sold*? How much was the debtholders "claw back" from the FM properties being sold. I sure the note holders wanted something for assets being sold.

*I know they were part of a cluster but there is at least a "paper value" that had to be assigned for tax reasons for capital gains or losses.

Back to 1110, I still don't get wasting electricity. If you are a prospective buyer and plan construction, you should "walk" or inspect every square foot of what you are buying. Letting folks get near an energized tower isn't really smart.
 
Kent said:
Keep in mind that, before 1980, that was exactly what we had in small towns. Small towns had one owner and, at most, two stations, one AM and one FM. You might have been able to find the occasional exception, usually because the owner of the AM decided not to build the FM allocated, but your average small town was a monopoly for radio advertising until the floodgates opened in the 80's.
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The AM and FM radio station and newspaper competing for ad dollars worked well in small towns. There was enough revenue (I'm not counting shopper publications, etc) to keep the stations and paper in business. When the 80-90s moved in, they sunk all boats.
 
I wish more Americans would support (if possible) people or organizations that tell the truth. I also wish Americans would financially or use any LEGAL means punish organizations that use "corporate speak" to lie or avoid telling the truth.
 
KilowattKat said:
I was listening to a replay of the Tuesday night Rollye James show, and she announced that the land under the WBT towers has been sold, and will become housing. She lamented about it's demise, but didn't offer any more specific details.

She begins discussing it just after the 1:40 time point near the end of the show.

Click to expand...

It could simply be that nothing went wrong regarding a new format, but somewhere along the line, corporate decided that selling the land and shutting down 1110 (or allowing another station to assume the frequency and find a way to broadcast 50 kw in a fashion that would adhere to the protections needed for other stations) would be more profitable and/or realistic. The comment upthread about allowing another station within three channels (WEAF Camden SC or WKGX Lenoir) to move to 1110 is intriguing, and there is always WHKY, though I don't know what would be involved in that, or even if it would be possible.
 
IM42A said:
It could simply be that nothing went wrong regarding a new format, but somewhere along the line, corporate decided that selling the land and shutting down 1110 (or allowing another station to assume the frequency and find a way to broadcast 50 kw in a fashion that would adhere to the protections needed for other stations) would be more profitable and/or realistic. The comment upthread about allowing another station within three channels (WEAF Camden SC or WKGX Lenoir) to move to 1110 is intriguing, and there is always WHKY, though I don't know what would be involved in that, or even if it would be possible.
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The notion of "possible" is irrelevant when you consider it being financial stupidity. Investing in a high-powered directional AM station is nuts.
 
luperm said:
The notion of "possible" is irrelevant when you consider it being financial stupidity. Investing in a high-powered directional AM station is nuts.
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Well, I don't know. All of this is like reading tea leaves when you first have WBT promising that a new format is on the way, and then broadcasting generic lounge music in a loop for six months.
 
IM42A said:
Well, I don't know. All of this is like reading tea leaves when you first have WBT promising that a new format is on the way, and then broadcasting generic lounge music in a loop for six months.
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Promise? What, do you have some sort of contractual commitment or marriage with WBT?
The only obligations they have are to the FCC and ownership.
There are no tea leaves. RO has said nothing. The only conversation about WBT/1110 is happening in this message board.
 
I wonder if you take the cost of the cluster U1 paid. Factor in the cost of captial, plus or minus the operating profit, subtract the capital gains , recapturing of depreciation and paying the creditors what ever they have too for what parts they sold. Was Charlotte good or bad for the shareholders.
 


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