North East RadioWatch: October 22, 2001

by Scott Fybush

A short column this week, in part due to a slow week (you don't suppose the nation had something else on its mind, do you?) and in part because we're busy getting the Tower Site 2002 Calendar ready for your holiday enjoyment (more on that in a bit). So what is going on?

• In NEW YORK, Clear Channel revealed the list of markets where it will have to spin off stations in order to swallow the Ackerley Media TV cluster it's buying, and it's a longer list than originally anticipated.

  In Syracuse, all the overlaps of signal between the Syracuse and Utica radio market mean WIXT (Channel 9) actually overlaps no fewer than six Clear Channel AM stations and ten FMs. Within the Syracuse TV "Designated Market Area" (DMA), that number drops to two AMs and five FMs, out of which Clear Channel will have to sell one station.

  Over in Utica, expect some AMs to get spun, as Clear Channel shrinks the radio cluster that's joining with WUTR (Channel 20) down to six stations from the present ten.

  In Binghamton, WIVT (Channel 34) joins a radio cluster of two AMs and four FMs, which will have to shrink to four radio stations total to meet the FCC caps. And in Rochester, one station out of Clear Channel's two AM and five FM cluster will have to give way to accomodate WOKR (Channel 13).

  Of course, this all assumes two things: first, that Clear Channel really intends to keep the TV stations it's buying from Ackerley (which include a big regional group in California and Oregon and a few stations in Washington state and Alaska) and second, that the FCC doesn't revise its ownership caps within the twelve months Clear Channel has requested to make the spins. We'll keep you posted...

• Radio People on the Move: Kevin Baker returns to Albany after his stint in Rutland, Vermont launching Vox classic rocker WEXP (101.5 Brandon) as "the Fox." Baker will join Ed Levine's Galaxy Broadcasting as it takes over WKLI (94.5 Ravena) and WABY (1400 Albany) and moves WHTR down to 93.7 in Scotia to serve the Albany market. Meanwhile, no replacement has been named at WEXP, where Baker was the founding PD and afternoon drive jock. Ted Edwards is leaving his PD job at WBAB (102.3 Babylon) on Long Island to become VP of operations and development at Jesscom, as well as PD of its new KFME (105.1 Garden City MO) in the Kansas City market. And Steve Andolino moves up from PD to OM at AAA's WBEA (101.7 Southold) and WEHM (96.7 East Hampton) way out on Long Island's East End; Brian Cosgrove takes his PD stripes.

• We'll hop across Long Island sound to CONNECTICUT next, just the same way WMOS (104.7 Montauk NY) is doing with its studios. The station's call change (it used to be WBEA and was briefly WCSO) turns out to be no coincidence: owner AAA Entertainment has worked out a deal with the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville to base WMOS in a studio near the casino's entrance, promoting it as "Mohegan Sun Radio." Very clever! (And we can attest from personal experience that the WMOS signal blasts across Long Island Sound to that part of southeastern Connecticut...)

  We hear WNEZ (1230 Manchester) has dropped its simulcast of Spanish all-news WNNY (1380 New York) in favor of Spanish-language music.

  And congratulations to Peter Delloro, who takes the "interim" away from his PD duties at oldies WKHL (96.7 Stamford), where he's also the afternoon jock. Delloro is a former WHCN (105.9 Hartford) PD, among other things...

• From MASSACHUSETTS comes word that the management team brought in to run Boch Broadcasting's Cape Cod stations has parted way with owner Ernie Boch, Jr.

  The Cape Cod Times says president/GM Rodney Rainey (former GM of KTJM in Houston), VP/sales Dan Endom (formerly sales manager at Hartford's WTIC) and VP/marketing Dale Pierce (formerly director of marketing at Clear Channel/Austin) all parted ways with Boch after being ordered to make deep cost cuts at the cluster, which includes market leaders WXTK (95.1 West Yarmouth) and WCOD (106.1 Hyannis).

  Boch himself is running the stations for now; Rainey says he'll stay put in the Bay State while he and Endom look for new ventures together.

  (NERW wonders if this explains the strange format progression that took Boch's WDVT (93.5 Harwich Port) from alternative to sports-talk to silent to alternative over the last few weeks...)

• Up in Boston, WUMB (91.9) GM Pat Monteith checked in to let us know we were pretty accurate in our speculation about the reasons Christopher Lydon won't make that station his next radio home. In a letter to her listeners (you can check it out at www.wumb.org), Monteith explains that a Lydon show would cost upwards of $500,000 annually to produce - which is most of WUMB's budget, not to mention a significant shift in focus for a station known for its music programming.

  Look for C|Net Radio to land on WBPS (890 Dedham) beginning November 5; the tech-talk network (currently heard only on KNEW 910 in the San Francisco market) will take over programming 24/7 on the Mega Broadcasting station, putting an end to the "romantica" music now running there as "Amor 890."

  Moving west, the word from a recent visitor to the WCAT (700 Orange) transmitter site is that the station is indeed silent (and on the verge of losing its license November 1 if it doesn't return.) The old AM tower at the site has been replaced with a fatter communications tower.

  And our condolences to WBCN (104.1 Boston)'s longtime PD, Oedipus (aka Eddie Hylton); we're told his father died on Thursday (Oct. 18).

• The big news from NEW HAMPSHIRE is at WKXL (1450 Concord/107.7 Hillsborough), where a talk shuffle adds an hour of local talk with Eric Scott from 9-10 AM. Howie Carr's Boston-based show adds an hour (from 5-6 PM), replacing the local "PM New Hampshire" there, and "Sports Zone" expands to a daily hour at 6 PM from twice-weekly.

  Up in Jackson, the 97.3 LPFM application from the Jackson Ski Country Radio Association was dismissed.

• Up in MAINE, a format change (of sorts) at WQSS (102.5 Camden): "The Coast" has become "The Peak," moving from classic rock to a rock-AC hybrid.

• Just two little notes from CANADA, and they're both AM-to-FM moves: CKBW (1000) in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia gets to move to 98.1 with 32 kW (which means DXers in New England will have an easier time hearing Chicago's WMVP), while up in Quebec, CHVD (1230) Dolbeau-Mistassini moves to 100.3 with 21.4 kW.

• Down in NEW JERSEY, metalheads may have to find a new favorite station after January. That's when the administration at Seton Hall University says WSOU (89.5 South Orange) will have to change format to something that's a better fit for the Jesuit university's community image. The students and community members who staff the station are understandably upset; WSOU has an industry reputation as a radio career-builder, not to mention an influential station for breaking new music, and it's one of the more professional college radio operations in the New York market.

• From PENNSYLVANIA, we hear the former WRPA (103.9 Laporte) is back on the air under new owner Kevin Fitzgerald (who also owns WPHD Tioga, in the Elmira market, and WCDW 100.5 in the Binghamton market.) The long-silent station, tucked away in an isolated corner northeast of Williamsport and southwest of Binghamton, came back with a repeating loop of Simon and Garfunkel's "Sounds of Silence," then switched to an all-Beatles stunt format as "Fab 104." The station is also changing calls, to WQZI.

  Down in Philadelphia, WMMR (93.3) is moving up, just a bit. The station has been granted an increase from 252 meters above average terrain to 264 meters, still on the same Center City office tower. Power will drop slightly, from 18 kW to 16.5 kW, when the new antenna goes up.

  And on the TV front, Dawn Stensland will soon move her desk a block east along Market Street. The Philadelphia Inquirer's Gail Shister says the KYW-TV (Channel 3) anchor is about to cross Fourth Street to take over the anchor desk at Fox's WTXF (Channel 29).

That's it for this week...stay tuned (and be patient with us) next week, when, if all goes well, fybush.com will be coming to you from a new, more reliable ISP. Please remember to change any bookmarks that point to our old "world.std.com" address to "fybush.com," the domain that will stay in use as we move from the once-great Software Tool and Die in Brookline, Mass. to the still-pretty-good Pair Networks in Pittsburgh. We hope you'll bear with us as we move to our new host; see you over there!