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Weigel to purchase Glen Iris Baptist's W16DS "Way TV"

Chad-Stevens

Chad-Stevens

This broke a week ago, but I hadn't seen anything about it yet: Weigel to acquire low-power TV station in Birmingham

The radio station's audio and nature scenes are still on 47.2, 47.1 is currently blank. I don't know if that's just their equipment glitching or if they'll get to lease a subchannel or two once Weigel takes over. I'll also note that their website still has the stream of their religious programming but now lists the church as both Glen Iris Baptist and Hope Fellowship Church.
Judging by their own programming, they as a small, older IFB congregation may no longer be able to afford the expenses of running a TV station and may be attempting a more youthful rebrand. I don't see anything on their website or socials about selling WAY-TV to Weigel nor about rebranding the church.
While I was never a follower of their broadcasting, I feel Birmingham's airwaves will be losing an important local connection if they go away. šŸ˜„
 
I wonder if the church might work out something with Weigel by which they could continue a presence on a W16DS subchannel, similar to what WWJS did with WHKY in Hickory NC, the difference here being that a religious broadcaster is selling their station to a secular entity, while with WWJS/WHKY, it was the other way around.

Interestingly, only the WWJS-14.1 subchannel is religious, the rest are secular. This practice is common among religious broadcasters. To my knowledge, however, Daystar doesn't do this, though they could. I've long maintained that WTSF Ashland KY could carve out a subchannel and work out a deal with WKYT Lexington to provide a "WKYT Plus" feed with news and other Kentucky-oriented programming, to serve a part of the state that is too far from Lexington for OTA reception, and which can't receive WYMT either.
 
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I'm really surprised and impressed that Glen Iris has kept the station alive as long as it has with having to flash cut it to digital and change channels due to spectrum auctions.
If they lease subchannels from Weigel after the sale, would they be able to continue PSIP as channel 47 while whatever (presumably commercial) networks that Weigel brings PSIP as a separate channel like 16?
 


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