Surprising Breaking News out of Stockton! Well I'll Be!

[BossRadioDJ]

Independence expects to close on the deal in late June or July. It is a stock deal, as Newsperson noted.

The Larue family will retain the Ralph Avenue property and lease the towers to IndepMedia. It appears that the new owners will be cleaning house -- retaining none of the current staff (on air, admin or engineering) -- and will subsequently file to move the AM transmitter site farther east of Stockton and increase power.

The FM will be moved to the Bay Area and will change its city of license, if not to San Francisco then to some other city in the Bay Area. The transmitter will be moved to an existing site, perhaps sharing with KPFA in Berkeley or, perhaps, Sutro.

Either way, IndepMedia only expects to retain the stations for a brief time -- maybe only two years -- before they put them back on the market, probably individually rather than as a pair.

[DavidEduardo]

The FM will be moved to the Bay Area and will change its city of license, if not to San Francisco then to some other city in the Bay Area. The transmitter will be moved to an existing site, perhaps sharing with KPFA in Berkeley or, perhaps, Sutro.

Any move has to take into account the separation requirements as to 106.9 and 107.7.

[BossRadioDJ]

Do you have a link to the FCC filing?  I can't locate it anywhere!

The FM is listed on the FCC site at:

http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/fmq?list=0&facid=69685

The AM is listed at:

http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/amq?list=0&facid=58838

Click on "Assignments and Transfers" or "Application List" to view the application information.

DJ

[newsperson]

BossRadioDJ.

Good to see your comments.  I did read the application and it does say they have options for 25-years to lease the FM tower at Mount Diablo.

Remember there is the short spacing for 106.9 and 107.7.  However they don't need to move the main tower, all they need is a booster!

The booster rules are different and a Class B booster can be 10,000 watts ERP and the adjacent channel seperations do not apply.

As long as you do not exceed the protected cotour of your station (in this case 54-dbu) it is permitted.

So it is not a situation of where they are going to move their tower, it is where are they going to locate their booster?

Last I looked their 54-dbu goes out into the ocean.

Other considerations is that they should not interfere with the main transmitter.

The other option is to downgrade but I don't beleive that is viable.

Your views?

Newsperson

[DavidEduardo]

As long as you do not exceed the protected cotour of your station (in this case 54-dbu) it is permitted.

I believe that a booster must live inside the 60 dbu contour, and do nothing to extend the 60 dbu countour as well. Since most listening is inside the 64 dbu contour, there is not much that can be done to make KSTN anything but a partial coverage station in the foothills and mountains to the East of the bay.

[BossRadioDJ]

I believe that a booster must live inside the 60 dbu contour, and do nothing to extend the 60 dbu countour as well. Since most listening is inside the 64 dbu contour, there is not much that can be done to make KSTN anything but a partial coverage station in the foothills and mountains to the East of the bay.

This has already been addressed by the new owners' engineering staff ... remember: this is a grandfathered C-1 you're talking about here. The same rules don't apply.

[gibby88]

Reverend Crosby....HAHAHAHA!  That guy was great.  "This is the Reverend Crosby...at KTNS..."

Best KSTN stories...anything involving the overnight guy Shawn Meade nicknamed "Mumblystache".

When the computer program the music ran off of would stop suddenly, and you'd have dead air.

The same five people calling in the same requests every day , like "Popeye" for "Disco Duck" or that old lady for
Freddy Jackson.

Knox parking his big Lincoln in the back so he could spy on the jocks.

John Hampton digging stuff out of his apartment to use as giveaway prizes.

Playing "Hey Jude" when you had to use the bathroom really bad.

[Fredrated]

Interesting that there aren't that many stories about how creepy Knox Larue was as an owner....(or just as a human being in general)

Several people I worked at at other stations had spent time at KSTN in the mid 70's...stories they told included Knox spying on jocks on the request line and business line from extensions in his office...

[newsperson]

BossRadioDJ,

Any lunch meetings coming up soon?

Yes KSTN is the power and height that is closer to a Class C1 than a B.  However it is grandfarthered as a Class B which is much better.  This allows a booster to cover anywhere within their 54-dbu contour and not just the 60-dbu.

So in this situation a booster's 54-dbu can go anywhere as long as its 54-dbu does not extend beyond the 54-dbu contour of KSTN.

As I remember a booster may be up to 20 per cent of the class of the channel, in this case 20 per cent of 50Kw is 10Kw.  Can you imagine a 10Kw covering S.F. and San Jose?

Or do they have other Plans?


Newsperson

[DavidEduardo]

This has already been addressed by the new owners' engineering staff ... remember: this is a grandfathered C-1 you're talking about here. The same rules don't apply.

Yeah, any grandfathered station is only protected to the extent of a conforming station of the same class as was originally authorized. When KSTN-FM went on the air, there were no C-1 stations in existence.

The booster rules (http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2006/octqtr/pdf/47cfr74.1231.pdf) make no exceptions to booster contour restrictions (60 dbu) but do have different requirements for protection to other classes of service.