Alarmism and the integrity of Christian radio

[JimmyJames]

After perusing this link:

http://savechristianradio.com/

I can't help but be shocked that Christian broadcasters would stoop to such alarmism. Well, admittedly, there's other examples in a broad range of sectors, but it never ceases to amaze me when they try this stuff.

It's almost identical to this:

http://helpradionow.com/

Come on. Be real. Where outside of select small market stations and public radio is all this "niche" and "specialty" programming and how much money are most stations spending on it? Most station's budget for that sort of thing is ZERO. Therefore, these requirements won't affect the programming budgets other than meaning perhaps another voicetracked daypart or a "most music workday" instead of a jock.

While the ideas may be debateable, and religious broadcasters have every right to be concerned about any possible intrusions on their freedom of speech, I've seen nothing to suggest that these advisory boards have to be followed or that they have to be of people who have a detrimental agenda.

For a religious station, it could very well be a group of area pastors and clergy. Which I think would be a great idea to start doing anyways. Have occasional meetings with your area religious leaders, talk about what's going on, build a relationship. If your station isn't doing this, you should be. Why wait for the FCC to mandate GOOD community service?

It seems to me the people most "afraid" of this are the people who want to protect their right to "do the least" and that's a shoddy way to minister. What I'm seeing behind all this rhetoric is a "please, don't make us put actual live bodies in our building or be accountable to the public, let us run what we want to do and just renew our license."

Sorry. It's public spectrum and it doesn't work that way. It's about time we looked at changing some things.

 

[justalurker]

We had rules a few years back that were repealed to allow broadcasters the freedom to be better without overbearing regulation. The regulations in question are turning back the clock to a time that should be left in the past.

While I don't agree with everything on those sites, the proposals are unneeded and will hurt the smaller broadcasters ... doing NOTHING for diversity and localism on the mega stations. The conglomerates have the money to spend on the extra rules ... they can spend it in bulk. Multi-station owners will do what they always do ... just enough to make the FCC happy then whatever they damn well want.

But the small guy ... the independent station that IS serving a local market locally with local input is at risk of needing to make efforts to appease everyone or see a challenge at renewal time. And that challenge may come because they DID stack their "community advisory board" with like minded people instead of allowing one person from a different opinion on the board.

This is major to them ... I wish it were expressed better but the loosening of the rules a couple of decades ago allowed growth that will be cut off if the rules are tightened up again.


This isn't to say that there are not some big bad multistate religious broadcasters that need to be more local ... just like the multistate non-religious broadcasters. But there has to be a way of doing it without hurting "the little guy" these rules are claiming to protect.

 

[techie2]

Guess some folks are afraid of losing those waivers to run full power satellators.

 

[gr8oldies]

Wow, it's Madelyn Murray OHair all over again! And of course, you won't be a "real Christian" if you don't agree with everything on these sites!

I'll agree 24/7 staffing is ridiculous, and it won't get more DJs on the air. Would it absolutely kill the KLove's of the world to have at least some local presence? Instead of just one guy who travels Dayton and Cincinnati to raise funds? Advisory boards? You can easily take those with a grain of salt.

 

[radiocph]

What's the worst that could happen? Equal time for atheists or some other religious group?

 

[justalurker]

What's the worst that could happen? Equal time for atheists or some other religious group?

That would be the start. Perhaps if those voices wanted "equal time" they should be required to provide "equal support" ... but it isn't fun having your station taken over by someone you don't agree with.

Imagine a station with a conservative approach to topics and a Gospel message. They don't get deep into the politics of issues and (being conservative in approach) don't go overboard arguing one side of political issues. They do the best they can to present information evenly ... reporting facts and avoiding opinions and crusades. Their focus is on the Gospel message ... not politics.

Now imagine someone who has a different opinion of how that station should be run. Someone who wants to put a strong anti-abortion message on that station or a strong anti-gay message. The station management rejects them ... and the crusaders turn to the advisory board. The advisory board, being like minded with the station, rejects them ... and the crusaders turn to the FCC claiming that the station's advisory board does not reflect the needs of the community. This could happen with any "underserved" group. Running off to the FCC, delaying renewals and generally getting underfoot because their message isn't getting out.

It does come back to the "threat" raised in RM-2493 (which wasn't OHare, but was an attack on religious ownership). Someone thought it was unfair that religious broadcasters had the resources and desire to fill the non-comm band with religious stations. Instead of raising money and COMPETING for those stations they decided to complain and have the FCC block them. The FCC shot them down, but this new effort COULD be used by like minded people to attack religious broadcasters again ... some broadcasters who may be just getting by and not need the extra expense of paying lawyers to defend against attacks.

The KLove's, CSNs, BBNs, AFNs, Moody, SRN and other large networks will do fine. The have the resources to fight ... volume pricing on legal fees. But that nice little religious broadcaster down the road who IS actually serving the community from within the community gets hit hard with non-discounted fees.

I want everyone to follow the FCC rules ... but I have noticed errors by small stations in their filings. Forgetting to file renewals. Marking boxes wrong on applications. All sort of trivial stuff that if they had better lawyers (or lawyers at all) would not get missed. But too many small stations can't afford the lawyers. They try to get by but mistakes are made. Administrating these "advisory groups" and defending them before the FCC may be more that stations can afford.

 

[JimmyJames]

Alot of us who have been involved in Christian radio don't approve of the abuse of the translator concept by organizations like EMF either.

 

[joelr]

Here we go with the K-Love bashing again.

 

[JimmyJames]

It's not about bashing EMF or KLove/Air 1's programming product.

The fact of the matter is, translator services were meant to be licensed to fill in gaps in local and regional coverage for stations.

The translator program was never intended to allow any organization to create a national network. This isn't about the programming, it's about the fact that some organizations have taken advantage of translators for a purpose that was not intended.

Meanwhile, I'm sure many of the same people using the translator loopholes were also petitioning against the creation of an LPFM service, that would provide local content. The conclusion from that seems fairly logical and obvious to me.

 

[joelr]

Your point may be valid, but I find it humorous how every thread comes back to how EMF (and sometimes Way-FM) is doing this and that wrong.

I just think you are straying a little off topic with the translator discussion.

 

[justalurker]

Probably not as off topic as we wish it were ...

The "great translator invasion of 2003" riled up a lot of people and highlighted the pre-existing "problems" those people had with non-comm satellite fed translators and stations. It was fuel for the fire - and "proof" of their accusations against EMF and the other people free station operators.

 

[techie2]

I'll bash FCC policy here. There is no excuse for giving out all these main studio waivers to operators like EMF who are claiming "poverty", while they are paying market rates for full signal commercial band FM's.

Some of the FCC proposals in the localism NPRM are unnecessary. Stuff like requiring the main studio to be in the city of license. There is no point to that...but I would stick to requiring it to be inside the station's service contour, to keep things within a reasonable distance.

However, there is no reason for main studio waivers, period. There is also no reason to have translators with parent stations halfway across the country. That's not what the translator service was intended for. Let's pull the satellator licenses and clean up the dial.

I get a good laugh at all the complaints about "interference" from 100 watt LPFM's on third adjacents while 250 watt translators are being shoehorned in on second adjacents.

 

[William_Yeager]

I'll bash FCC policy here. There is no excuse for giving out all these main studio waivers to operators like EMF who are claiming "poverty", while they are paying market rates for full signal commercial band FM's.

I'd like to see the FCC limit a cluster to one studio waiver per Arbitron market (which would allow simulcasts from suburban signals that cover primarily the same market), and that the substiture main studio be located within 100 miles. This would effectively force the large national operators (EMF, AFR, etc.) to keep a studio everywhere they do business-not a bad idea given that they'll likely have someone there to drum up underwriters.

 

[joelr]

I guess I'm just tired of reading negativity on this board.

I wish EMF had local staffs, but I think they have done a lot (along with Way-FM and others) to bring the CCM format and the message behind it to a lot of places that didn't have a station or had a struggling station.

As for "accusations," what rules have the EMF folks broke?

 

[JimmyJames]

I think the contention here is that EMF and other organizations didn't "break" the translator rules, they exploited or took advantage of a loophole. I'd be just as against some California public radio network doing it as I would EMF.

 

[MikefromDelaware]

Here's another one, a smaller player, but they've got 21 translators, 6 of which allow WXHL to cover the state of Delaware (they are the only CCM station in Delaware). The other translators are in other states (see below) most of which are not in their city of license or even in the same state, that is The Reach FM, parent station WXHL-FM Christiana, Delaware, owned by Faith City Church, an non-denominational church. I'm not a listener as they are a CCM top 40 station and they never play any CCM Gold, but they reach a lot of younger folks, and who knows how God can use those 21 translators to reach people for him.

Delaware: 89.1 wilmington (christiana) (flagship station), 106.3 dover
97.1 middletown, 100.3 georgetown, 96.9 lewes, 96.3 seaford, 98.7 felton

Pennsylvania: 97.1 philadelphia,
103.5 delaware county

New York: 89.3 buffalo, 90.7 lockport
89.3 niagara falls

New Jersey: 88.3 ocean county/atlantic city,
95.3 Bridgeton

Maryland: 100.9 north east, 91.9 salisbury,
94.7 pocomoke city, 103.7 cambridge, 105.1 pittsville

Ohio: 91.7 ashtabula, 90.9 steubenville

South Carolina: 88.9 sumter

One man's loophole or blessing is another man's abuse of the rules. Many of these location may not have a CCM or even a Christian radio station in their area making The Reach FM an important work to reaching young folks for Christ in those underserved areas.

I've also benefited by this loophole where NPR's WRTI from Temple Univ, Philly, has numerous translators in PA, NJ, and two in Delaware (one in Wilmington and one in Dover) so that we have access to wonderful Classical music daytime and great Jazz at night. So it isn't only Christian non-comms that are using the loophole. As we don't have a CCM Gold station to listen to in Wilmington, I'm really blessed by the Classical Music from WRTI while at work each day and wouldn't want to lose that Wilmington translator. My guess is, many of those folks who are blessed each day by The Reach FM don't want to lose their local translator either. This loophole is a way to bring some diverse radio (both Christian and Secular) in an inexpensive way to underserved areas. You may think it jams up the dial, but the reality is that there are too many com stations that all serve the same narrow demo, get rid of some of them if you want to free up dial space. These translators bring something different that does keep people listening to radio and in the case of Christian radio, may be leading some lost folks to Christ, which justifies the loophole in my opinion.