Fybush Reports WFBS Berwick Sold...........

[carlvenorden]

After almost a decade of station ownership in NEPA (first with WAAT, Scranton, then WFBS, Berwick), Kevin Fennessey exits NEPA.
WFBS "Radio Smiles" 1280 has reportedly been sold to Bold Gold Media (owners of WDNH, WYCY, WPSN, Thunder Country, Honesdale, and WWRR/WICK/WYCK, Scranton/ WB), for the tidy sum of $10,000.

Bold Gold is in it's infancy (like Route 81), but apparently is looking for distressed stations.
After buying the four station cluster in Honesdale from Bob Mermell just a couple years ago, they aquired Doug Lanes stations in Scranton for a respectable price.

I do not know if the WFBS sale is just intellectual property, but there was not a lot of real estate invoved here. WFBS was housed in an old building on the second floor. The broadcast equipment was second hand (some of it from WSGD) or borrowed. There was a FCC issue with the tower, in that it was not properly fenced in, or was not registered, or lit.
And there were many personnel issues connected with WFBS; apparently Kevin, especially during his hospitalization, had difficulty attracting and keeping able talent to run WFBS.
Had he been able to keep on a station manager, who in this instance needed to be a Jack of all trades, WFBS may have survived. Kevin himself did 90% of the legwork on that station, not only hosting the morning show, but producing the newscasts, doing the production, and nearly all of the selling/bookwork. Really, it was a nice sounding, small town station with a big voice. I know this for fact: I spent a whole broadcast day with him and not only did he do the morning show on WFBS, he took me on a walking tour of Berwick, we stopped into some businesses that were on the air, and he took me over to the "old" WHLM building which had just been aquired by Joe Reilly. We spent an hour at WHLM, and he took me to the old 550am site, then, just a meadow. He also showed me the temporary wire antenna WHLM put up on a smokestack, before the new WHLM tower could be built. It was a memorable day.

Granted, WHLM was huge competition for WFBS.....it is money against very little money and the small guy didn't quite make it. I believe that before Kevin took ill, WFBS changed it's solid gold format to sports. Even with the solid gold format, Kevin took great pains to broadcast local high school games: a huge plus for a local station.
Although the solid gold format would be preferable, I predict Bold Gold will take WFBS sports full time, because they now use Fox Sports for their AM stations right now. Previously, WICK had an inhouse solid gold format, and 1590 Honesdale (I'm an alumni of that station) had a killer solid gold in house format. From what I understand, a small network of sporting stations will be built by Bold Gold, WFBS being it's fourth AM.

I believe Kevin is now Production Director for WWDJ/WMCA in Rutherford, NJ, and definately making more money there then he did here in NEPA owning and running stations.
And I think that is good for Kevin, because he is a very smooth polished production voice.
But you have to hand it to him for giving it a try; many of us dream of station ownership; it is hard, especially with small AM's in the backwoods, but most of us will never achieve that dream. Kevin lived it out.

I only wanted to talk about the sale of WFBS, lets not have a string of beatings here.
My best wishes for Kevin and for Bold Gold, here in Honesdale.
Carl

 

[warmland]

After almost a decade of station ownership in NEPA (first with WAAT, Scranton, then WFBS, Berwick), Kevin Fennessey exits NEPA.
WFBS "Radio Smiles" 1280 has reportedly been sold to Bold Gold Media (owners of WDNH, WYCY, WPSN, Thunder Country, Honesdale, and WWRR/WICK/WYCK, Scranton/ WB), for the tidy sum of $10,000.

$10,000???? That's $9,999 too much for that "station" My opinion of course. Maybe Bobby V is going to turn it into an all doo-wap station?

 

[MACK184]

What could they possibly do with it? Since it's too far from their other base of operations they have to open an actual studio and office there to be legal. Seems like a huge expense for a station that has really made no money. It has a poor signal, it has bad tower facilities. But...could it be that there's another "deal" in the works that BG buys WKAB from WHLM, then creates a combo? That could make some sense. Otherwise it really doesn't make sense for BG to own a low power stand alone AM many miles away from the base of operations.

 

[ElectricNoodle]

Since it's too far from their other base of operations they have to open an actual studio and office there to be legal.

They actually could put a "Main Studio" at the transmitter site and keep a copy of the Public File at the local library. That would keep them legal. Then just pipe in programming from where ever. Froggy does that with the station in Benton I believe (but I'm not positive about the "Main Studio" on that one - they may be within the legal distance). The only other thing they may need is a "local" phone number to get in touch with the office.

And yes, the existing facilities are in need of some attention but putting a fence around the tower base, if one isn't there already, should fix that problem. There have been questions about lighting for over 10 years now. Even though towers less than 200 feet don't need lighting anymore that tower was there and lit before the rule change. They would have to petition FCC and FAA to allow the tower to be unlit - and since they aren't any near-by airports I can't see why they shouldn't let them. They could claim financial hardship or something... (I hope...)

At least Kevin gave it his best shot which is more than some other big-time corporations do....

 

[carlvenorden]

I'm not really sure about this, but (this is what I heard) I believe there was a requirement to light the WFBS tower due in part to the closeness of the powerplant. It seems silly now to think about that, but yes, in the past it was lit. Many stations especially class D's with shorter than 200 foot towers were allowed to shut the lights off it it was outside a specific milage from an airport.
I didnt see the WFBS tower, I did hear a lot about it though, and the sum of the parts sound correct. My best thought is that there is little to no ground system to that tower. My drives around and in and out of Berwick put that signal on it's best days at about 15 miles (you could barely hear it in Scranton on a good day), and on it's lesser days, about 8 miles. That is a pretty wide range for what amounts to a class D on a regional channel.

There is recollection of a pretty good processing system; the WFBS audio was pretty darn good, it was the signal that wasn't so good, again I believe due to the absence of a good ground system.

Unless Vince Bennedetto and Joe Reily get to be good friends, I don't think there will ever be a WKAB owned by BG in the near future. And WKAB is an excellent station with good billing; Joes' thoughts for WHLM are for a future with that station......I believe he will keep building on it, in a "full format" type of thinking, til it is worth enough money to spin it off. Meantime, it right now is the only game in town. Plus he is looking to make WHLM look "nice" on main street with a street level studio (which I have not seen in person). But I was very very impressed with the "old studios"........excellently built, very classic, and I only saw a triangular studio like that ......and the WHLM one was "cooler" with the solid glass doors, once before; at WDHA in Dover NJ.........

As for BG, I agree that a local small office (like the one maintained for their 102.1FM in Liberty, NY) is about all that would be necessary, plus one full time employee present.
I would think WFBS will be a Fox rebroadcast, via a simple computer.....yes they will update the equipment, but there is nothing except a small office that will be needed to run WFBS as a Fox Sports station except a computer and ......well basically a dish.

As for Bobby V putting doo wop on there: wouldn't that just be a hoot?
But if I weren't afraid of being out of work, I'd go down there and run that.

My bet: sports.

 

[ElectricNoodle]

My best thought is that there is little to no ground system to that tower.

That statement reminds me of a story... Sit back and get comfy...

A number of years ago, an AM operator had the same problem with a bad ground system. Now here's the funny part - when he would get a phone call from a "listener" asking why the signal was so bad in (insert name of town here) he would run out to the transmitter site with a spool of copper wire. He would attach one end to the ground strap at the base of the tower then walk out a couple hundred feet in the direction of (insert name of town here) un-spooling the wire as he went. He would drop a rock on the end out on the field and head back to the studio and call them back asking if the signal was any better now. They would respond that it was better now than it's been in a long time and both the operator and the "listener" would be happy.

Kind of an uplifting happy holiday story for everyone... ;D (And it's true to boot)

 

[ThomasCarten]

Even though towers less than 200 feet don't need lighting anymore that tower was there and lit before the rule change.

I didn't think towers under 200 feet ever needed to be lighted, unless very close to an airport. The WRKC tower tops out at 196 feet. What I can't understand is why the windmills aren't lighted, unless they, also, top out at 199 feet.

 

[radioboss]

As the most recent GM for WFBS, I am quite pleased for Kevin and Joanne in selling the station.

I have no bad words to say about Kevin. I was able to learn a "few" things from him regarding production and on-air sound. Both of which are high quality standards for Kevin.

More than likely, Bob will make the station SPORTS and simulcast with WICK/WYCK/WPSN with the Fox Sports - The Game!

With Berwick being a "sports crazy town" it's a NATURAL.

 

[LeftyPunchbag]

Carl, this is already being discussed in the following thread titled "News Item."

http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,55938.0.html

Why are we starting two threads on the same topic? I don't understand that at all.

 

[ThomasCarten]

Why are we starting two threads on the same topic? I don't understand that at all.

Maybe because this one has the more informative subject line. "News Item" is not very explanatory and this one is. The OP here can easily think he's started something new. What I don't understand is why people in radio can't put a good subject line on their posts.

 

[theengineer]

On the issue of tower lighting and marking .. even if a tower is below 200' it still may require lighting or paint. This may be because it's considered a possible hazard to air traffic .. or in many cases it's because the tower was constructed at a time when the rules required it to be lit. All over the hilltops of PA there are examples of older towers, some as short as 130' that have a beacon and several sets of marker lights. These towers were constructed in the 40's and 50s' and would not be lit today if they were new unless special circumstances required it. I worked at a station that replaced a 150' tower with a 420' stick in the early 80's and had no more lights on the new tower than the old one.

Because the lighting and marking are still specified on their licenses or registration the owner or licensee must still meet the requirements even though a tower of the exact same (or higher) height could be built next to it that may not require any lighting or painting at all - obviously not the case with the 420' example above.

The WFBS Tower does not require lighting or painting according to the registration information on the FCC's web site. It is just over 200' tall. The registration dates to 2003, about the time of the fine. I recall there may have been fencing involved as well, but in any case the fine was a large amount for a small station. I don't know how it was resolved, but doubtless it ate up alot of time, legal fees and energy and would have been a big distraction.