1090 AM Bellville

[jd]

This station, which has a current application for assignment license from Roy Henderson to JHT Ventures of Houston, is no longer KNUZ. Off the air for the most part over a span of several years, it now is officially known as KBAL, interestingly the former call letters for an AM station way out in San Saba. The FM there is now KNUZ-FM, the AM is KNVR, and yes, they're both owned by Henderson. Once again he has shifted the call letters on some of his stations, for whatever reason.

Cutting to the chase, though, the new owner of KBAL Bellville has applied to upgrade the 250-watt day-timer to 10,000 watts. That's right, 10kW daytime, two tower directional from a new site about eight miles east of town. It's not easy to discern how the coverage will look from the exhibits that accompany the application but suffice it to say it's somewhat of a figure 8 with the bottom of it being considerably larger than the top (northern) lobe. It's shifted into kind of a northwest/southeast configuration, complete with the necessary deep nulls toward KNTH 1070 Houston and KDRY 1100 Alamp Heights/San Antonio.

Here's a link to the application in case you want to wade through it: https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/w...xt=25&appn=101343091&formid=301&fac_num=48653

Yes, if this happens the station will put a healthy signal from Waller County into Fort Bend and western Harris County. One has to ask some pertinent questions, however. For starters, who is the prospective new owner and president of JHT Ventures, Janice Hollan, and why is she willing to pay half a million dollars for a station that barely exists? Equally important, who is paying for upgrade? The application was filed by JHT but at last report the station is still owned by Roy Henderson, pending FCC approval of the sale.

 

[ChuckTiller]

Null or not, it will cause a problem fro KNTH. It will erode an already weak signal on the Houston west side.

 

[Mediafrog+]

Also interesting is that the engineering statement reveals KYND has future plans to co-locate its transmitter at the new 1090 site. No indication if additional towers would be needed, but a peek at the future, perhaps. Would go along with the co-channel Hallettsville station moving west.

I smell more brokered programming on the way.

Null or not, it will cause a problem fro KNTH. It will erode an already weak signal on the Houston west side.

KNTH already has a second adjacent squeeze from KCHN. If the westside reception problems are to be solved, a new transmitter site would have to be built (extremely unlikely) or Salem (or a future owner) would have to buy out and shut down KOPY.

 

[jd]

Also interesting is that the engineering statement reveals KYND has future plans to co-locate its transmitter at the new 1090 site. No indication if additional towers would be needed, but a peek at the future, perhaps. Would go along with the co-channel Hallettsville station moving west.

There are a couple of possibilities here. First, start by going back and reading some of the asset purchase agreement for the Bellville station (emphasis added):

Buyer also understands Seller’s intention to relocate a station from Hempstead, Texas, and the necessity for KNUZ to be moved and re-licensed to serve that community, with Seller also relocating a replacement station to serve Bellville, and agrees to locate a permanent site that will meet the requirements to be licensed at Hempstead, and to then file the application necessary to request that change in community of license, and upon grant to then construct and operate the station as authorized, and Buyer further recognizes that Seller in turn agrees that he will offer his assistance in locating the new transmitter site and making the change, [etc]

There is just one station licensed to Hempstead; Henderson's KTWL 105.3. If this is to be taken literally it might mean that KBAL would be relicensed to Hempstead and KTWL would move to Bellville. However there's another scenario; this would bring the possibility of moving KYND to Bellville, co-located with KBAL and re-licensed to Bellville with KBAL going to Hempstead and KTWL going to Cypress. Never mind that Cypress is not a city as such, but it does have its own post office and fits the criteria as a "community of license" in other ways, too.

KNTH already has a second adjacent squeeze from KCHN. If the westside reception problems are to be solved, a new transmitter site would have to be built (extremely unlikely) or Salem (or a future owner) would have to buy out and shut down KOPY.

You're right. Feeling the squeeze between KBAL and KCHN 1050 there's really not much KNTH could do from their present site, and as an aside, I still think that KCHN has a signal that's entirely too potent for their licensed 410 watts. Buying out and silencing KOPY Alice/Corpus Chisti would indeed open up some possilibilities for KNTH but they'd still need to put a lot of metal up with a another complicated array located (probably) northeast of Houston. That would be a lot of work but there would be one upside to it besides getting better coverage out west. The land where the present 11-tower KNTH array is located, off 1960 west of Kuykendahl, would fetch a very good price.

 

[johndavis]

However there's another scenario; this would bring the possibility of moving KYND to Bellville, co-located with KBAL and re-licensed to Bellville with KBAL going to Hempstead and KTWL going to Cypress. Never mind that Cypress is not a city as such, but it does have its own post office and fits the criteria as a "community of license" in other ways, too.

How would they pull that off? Cypress has a post office, but no government. It's not like you can get the mayor of Cypress to write the FCC a letter stating how wonderful life would be if they got their first local service.

Then again, stations have conned the FCC into licensing a trailer park.

 

[jd]

They've had their first local service for years; KYND 1520 is licensed to Cypress. But if they moved away it would look good to the FCC if another station took its place.

 

[ChuckTiller]

The 1090 upgrade will be challenged. Although it doesn't have a radio station, Alief has a post office and a school district with no government.

 

[jd]

(check your e-mail, Chuck.)

You are correct. Another good example is KREH 900 AM, which moved from Oakdale LA and is licensed to Pecan Grove, which is nothing more than a "census-designated" place adjacent to Richmond.

 

[gabigley1]

The Historic KULF call letters are now assigned to 1090 in Bellville, Texas as of today.

Call Sign History
Current Call Sign: KBAL
Facility ID Number: 48653
Call Sign Begin Date
KULF 12/14/2009
KBAL 11/20/2009
KNUZ 06/13/1997
KFRD 08/27/1993
KACO

I recall when this station signed on the air with equipment tests. It was in late 1972 or 1973, as KACO.

 

[foursider]

If the present 1070 site is to fetch any kind of decent price; they're going to have to drain the swamp first.

 

[ChuckTiller]

If the present 1070 site is to fetch any kind of decent price; they're going to have to drain the swamp first.

Not really. The 1960 area is all prime real estate. Anybody building anything usually builds it up anyway. However, all of this is a moot point, since KNTH will not be moving. (The swamp, as you say, has great ground conductivity) It would not be economically sound to move KNTH. The costs would be too high.

 

[jd]

The Historic KULF call letters are now assigned to 1090 in Bellville, Texas as of today.

Kind of saw that one coming. "KULF" was shown on one of the exhibits in the upgrade application.

I recall when this station signed on the air with equipment tests. It was in late 1972 or 1973, as KACO.

You're close. I remember hearing KACO when they first signed on, too; the "license to cover" was granted in November 1974.

 

[gabigley1]

This station, which has a current application for assignment license from Roy Henderson to JHT Ventures of Houston, is no longer KNUZ.

Apparently, JHT Ventures of Houston is the new licensee of KULF 1090 in Bellville. I couldn't find the sales
agreement but the sale of 1090 is mentioned here:

http://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/getimportletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=13822

Also, The Consummation Notice of sale is here:

https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/w...xt=25&appn=101346200&formid=905&fac_num=48653

JHT Ventures of Houston applied for the new/current KULF call letters.

 

[busyguy7447]

I used to be a DJ at this station back in the 80's. The Ditterts were wonderful people to work for. I made no money but loved that job!

The Historic KULF call letters are now assigned to 1090 in Bellville, Texas as of today.

Call Sign History
Current Call Sign: KBAL
Facility ID Number: 48653
Call Sign Begin Date
KULF 12/14/2009
KBAL 11/20/2009
KNUZ 06/13/1997
KFRD 08/27/1993
KACO

I recall when this station signed on the air with equipment tests. It was in late 1972 or 1973, as KACO.

 

[fredcantu]

I made no money but loved that job!

If only there were more places like that. Stations could save themselves a lot of money if people loved working there.

 

[Frank Roberts]

Wow, this thread brings back memories. I gave up the better part of two years of my life building the 11 tower KENR directional from late '80 through '82. Although it only involved adding two shorter towers into the existing 9 tower array, separate day and night phasor cabinets meant that we had twenty towers worth of phasing and two tuning doghouses at each tower base. I buried about two miles of heavy control cable to actuate all the contactors and relays involved in switching patterns. Six months later, I had to dig it all up and bury new cables after fire ants ate the insulation off of them.

All of that money and effort was spent just so that we could push out our daytime null toward Alice, Texas by a few percent and penetrate a bit more into the southwest side of Houston (where the studios were). We actually ran 11 towers daytime and 9 at night at 10 kw.

In late '82 I began consulting stations from Crockett to El Paso. My first client? Lee and Dinah Dittert at KACO, in Bellville. BTW, KACO signed on the day Nixon resigned in August of '74. That day just happened to be the day that I began my broadcasting career too.

Frank Roberts
KLRU-TV
Austin

 

[Frank Roberts]

Oh and one other thing.....

Not only is the land beneath the 1070 AM transmitter site something of a swamp, it is also an active natural gas field. The tower foundations were interspersed with well heads when I was there. What a combination, high pressure natural gas and high power RF. I don't think anybody is going to be putting up office buildings there anytime soon, even if it is on one of the most prime locations in Houston.

Frank