Catching Up on the News

In Florida, station WXEL has been sold but apparently the only thing that will change is the name.  From the Palm Beach Post News:

BOYNTON BEACH — WXEL-FM 90.7 is no more.  The public broadcasting station, a Palm Beach County institution for four decades, changed call letters today to WPBI-FM after its sale to Broward County-based Classical South Florida became official.

Barry University, which has owned the radio station and its television counterpart, WXEL-TV Channel 42, since 1997, voted in April 2010 to sell the radio side for $3.85 million…  

WXEL-FM’s seven full-time and four part time employees will stay on, Classical spokesman Jason Hughes said this afternoon… Classical South Florida, whose corporate parent is Minnesota-based public radio programmer American Public Media, operates WKCP-FM 89.7… What would stop Classical South Florida from, somewhere down the road, shutting down the Palm Beach County operation and simply transmitting its Miami programming on that spot on the dial?  “We don’t have any intention of doing that,” Hughes said.

In Massachusetts, the Berkshires can expect an expansion of classical broadcasting this fall.  From the Bennington Banner:

ADAMS, Mass. — WFCR, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst-based radio station that’s rebranding itself as New England Public Radio, aims to expand its audience in Berkshire County by transmitting a new, full-power FM signal from North County later this year. 

WFCR’s foray into the Berkshires began in 2007 with five, low-power relay transmitters carrying the station’s mix of classical music, jazz, regional news and NPR programming to most of the county. The towers are located in North Adams, Williamstown, Pittsfield, Lee and Great Barrington.

New England Public Radio’s latest venture represents a competitive challenge for WAMC Northeast Public Radio, the longtime major player on the county’s airwaves. “What it will come down to is, who does the job better,” said WAMC President and CEO Alan Chartock.

We’ll keep you posted as news develops.  The WFCR Foundation has to raise $3.7 million, of which they’ve raised about $900,000 so far.

In Cleveland, commercial classical station WCLV is “restructuring the ownership, governance and operation of WCLV 104.9 FM” by becoming a part of the arts/media conglomerate Ideastream, and has moved its operation to the Idea Center.  I asked longtime WCLV General Manager Robert Conrad to explain what this means for the station physically.

Ideastream raised the money to build-out our new facilities in the Idea Center.  We are a tenant, and pay somewhat less than what we were paying in our former facilities. And there are other expenses that can shared. We get the use of ideastream’s facilities, including three performance studios. And we are in the vortex of the cultural happenings in Cleveland. Playhouse Square has four operating legit theatres, and The Cleveland Play House is moving in next door to us with three more theatres to be operated in co-operation with Cleveland State University. Once a week, our PD meets with the ideastream content people to dicuss what we are all doing, and what co-operations might be possible.

One mundane item: We have one of the best classical CD collections in the city, and the ideastream production people can borrow music they may need from us.

I also asked Bob to explain the ownership and management structure.  

[In 2001] the independent public TV station (WVIZ) and public radio station (WCPN) were in the process of merging and constructing a super facility on Playhouse Square in downtown Cleveland.  They invited us to join them. At the time we said we were involved in our own re-structuring, but maybe sometime in the future. That future arrived last December when we moved into the Idea Center.

The structure is that WCLV will be a subsidiary of ideastream with its own board. And Rich [Marscher] and I are members of the ideastream board. This was designed to give WCLV the most legal protection from any future effort to change the format, sell the station etc.  … Once ideastream has the stock, they can do what they want with WCLV. However, we have the utmost confidence in the current ideastream administration.

Thanks for the clarification!