WAGE 91.1 Chipley deleted

[Poledo]

A radio station died and nobody noticed. Sad.

WJED 91.1, Dogwood Lakes Estate, FL was a tiny FM simulcast of WVOB 91.3 from Dothan, AL. A few years back the station went silent. it was sold to the local junior college, in nearby Chipley, FL, for a token amount and the calls were changed to WAGE (Cute!)... but they never got the station off the ground. Apparently no one knew what they were doing and they probably didn't have any funding so the license was cancelled last year.

I assume an FCC attorney could get the license reinstated, but I doubt it'll happen unless a large religious network wants it.

Just another sad radio story I discovered this week in the Redneck Riviera.

 

[davideduardo]

Just another sad radio story I discovered this week in the Redneck Riviera.

"Redneck Riviera" sounds like beachfront property to me. Chipley is 50 miles from Panama City Beach and is more like a functional equivalent of Atmore that fell a few miles south of the Alabama border.

 

[Poledo]

As a 40 year local of the Redneck Rivera beaches between Biloxi and Panama City... it's borderline how far inland we use that term. Atmore is included now that it has the destination Indian Casino. Emerald Coast might have been a better description.

But you're right. The town of Chipley is a hole that's biggest asset is the regional office of Florida DOT. On second though, Chipley identifies more with the Wiregrass than the beaches. I was grouping WAGE with all the distressed Panama City and big bend area radio stations. I believe most Wiregrass stations are stable now.

 

[TheBigA]

According to Wikipedia:

WAGE's license was cancelled by the FCC on March 31, 2015, due to having been silent for more than twelve months (since sometime in 2012).

This station was 700 watts. No wonder nobody misses it.

 

[davideduardo]

As a 40 year local of the Redneck Rivera beaches between Biloxi and Panama City... it's borderline how far inland we use that term. Atmore is included now that it has the destination Indian Casino. Emerald Coast might have been a better description.

But you're right. The town of Chipley is a hole that's biggest asset is the regional office of Florida DOT. On second though, Chipley identifies more with the Wiregrass than the beaches. I was grouping WAGE with all the distressed Panama City and big bend area radio stations. I believe most Wiregrass stations are stable now.

It is interesting how the aftermath of Docket 80-90 seriously damaged the radio markets in North Florida, from Lake City to Pensacola. Too many new stations and too many move-ins and upgrades for the scarce ad dollars.

I had oversight for combos in Lake City and Tallahassee and the smaller market was destroyed and the Capital City was pushed beyond its limits to profitably sustain all the stations there. And with so many new and powerful larger city stations, the ones in the smaller towns were just SOL.

 

[Kmagrill]

Congress passed a law that any station silent for more than 12 months is to be deleted. This takes the pressure off of the FCC by making the deletion a simple matter of law. The law has some wiggle room so that the FCC can still carve out exceptions in certain cases, but WAGE is beyond resurrecting.

On docket 80-90, the new stations may have had a negative impact on some of the existing stations, but they've probably been good for the industry. In the case of Lake City, both clusters of stations are doing okay. Once upon a time, WQLC was in deep trouble, but they are back stronger than ever, now. Both clusters are in the black, so 80-90 certainly has not proven fatal up there.

With the competition for listeners from other media, having more radio stations representing more listener choices on the dial is a good thing. It's (arguably) better for listeners to find what they want on the radio rather than some online stream.