Wow..greenwood am operated for 12 years on a deleted license?

[quadraphonic]

Everyone outside the Radio Geek world would call that "moxie!"

[DudeFan]

I'll note that the FCC action was directed at the former (now very former) licensee, and not the current operator. I'll give Ann Ellis a lot of credit if she still ad the money she was going to pay for the facility since according to the narrative, the license transfer to her had not become final. In such a case, she was making money selling ads and is now able to rescind the deal and keep all of teh purchase price but what a fair LMA fee would be or has simply been operating under an LMA and not been out the purchase price. Either way, slick strategy. What will get her in trouble now is remaining on the air.

[Ssummers]

I don't know why people think you're a legal wonk, Steve. 

[DudeFan]

 

Unfortunately, some of that read like jibberish because Java was acting up on my machine... too much a lag between keystrokes and appearing on the screen... and between brain and hand....

[vchimpanzee]

I wonder what will happen to Anne.  She is quite a big deal in the Greenwood community, I believe.

Sad place for radio.  Sunny 103.5 is the only station still around there, the AC format they air via satellite is pretty good.

If it's the same one I heard in the mountains, that's true. You seem to like the harder stuff, though.

[Alan McCall]

The FCC letter is basically a ceas-and-desist. Further operation makes it the equivalent of a pirate.

Here's what appeared on Radio-Info:

The FCC has permanently pulled the plug on WLMA-AM (1350) Greenwood, S.C., after nearly 12 years of its operating without a license. The station also got into a heap of trouble with the feds when a December 1996 inspection revealed that licensee Morradio had moved its antenna 10 miles from the licensed site. The paper trail documenting its wrongdoing is a mile high, including a $12,000 fine levied in 2000. And now the FCC has finally declared that enough is enough. The agency determined that WLMA’s license expired December 3, 1997, and that “all authority to operate this facility is terminated and any operation of the facility must cease immediately.” WLMA has been running a talk-and-sports format, with a good amount of local content, as well, but its new call letters, courtesy of the commission, are “DWLMA,” with the the “D” standing for “deleted” from the FCC database. For now, the station’s website and Facebook pages remain intact. 

[borderblaster]

Wouldn't they be putting the station that is licensed at risk by continuing to operate DWLMA?

[Alan McCall]

Borderblaster: Yes. WLMA has no license.

Having read that entire 6-page letter from the FCC, the problems were caused by Morradio, which apparently was never fit to be a licensee in the first place.

All of the records for WLMA have been deleted from the FCC database. There's just no way it will be able to legally broadcast again.

[payb4upray]

It's still kind of a sad story. WLMA, formerly WGSW was a neat station many years ago. Top 40, Country, good local stuff with decent on-air guys like Furman Corley and Dennis Dickerson.
Struggling in the shadows of WCRS AM/FM, which ran as a very polished professional station from the 40's through the 80's then very polished again under Art Sutton's ownership prior to the FM sale. I made a go at it in management/on-air in the late 90's-early 2000's with some success as well before all hell broke loose for both 94.1 and 1450 and the whole operation became a laughing stock of SC radio.
 When Wally came to town, first with the "Mighty" 1090 and later with 103.5 all the ad budgets in town seemed to split it down the middle between WCRS and WMTY causing a loss on WCRS revenue and damn near killing WGSW(WLMA).  The whole time WGSW and later WLMA struggled very hard to just stay on the air for lack of capital and virtually no showing in Arbitron.
 I think Ron couldn't pay the rent or lease at the tower site so he made the HUGE mistake of just moving the operation 10 miles away (not even in the same county and certainly not adequately covering the city of license). I guess he did this in desperation. At some point he moved it to the old Moose Lodge which is really just a mile or so across 221 from the original WGSW tower site so it would have been a minor filing to make it legal but I guess he didn't have the money for a good M Street Lawyer to fix it all for him. I think things just kind of piled up then he got sick and passed away leaving the Eller's to figure it all out. Still just very sad in my opinion.

[w9wi]

Technically, it's not really that they were operating for 12 years on a deleted license.  The station *was* authorized to operate for most of that period.  Mostly because if you file for renewal, your license will be extended until the FCC acts on that renewal. 

What got them in trouble...  was that for more than 12 years they were operating with unauthorized facilities.  (they moved their transmitter without telling the FCC.....)  (believe me, your station will have a bad day if the FCC inspector hears it on the air but can't find the tower!) 

For the purposes of determining whether a station has operated in the last year, operation with unauthorized facilities doesn't count.  Which is where the "12 years on a deleted license" thing came from.