 |
 |
|
|
|
| About | Contact | Subscribe | Calendar | Publish | Donate |
|---|
|
More
 $20.00 donated in past month
|
Microradio Stations Fight Back!
As the FCC pushes forward to enforce its deregulation decision to vastly expand media congolmerates" ownership limitations, the public should be aware of its vast use of resources devoted to repressing and silencing microradio stations, including "secret police" type investigative activity... San Francisco Liberation Radio is just one of many stations being hassled by the FCC, also one of a growing number fighting back (per July DIYmedia report).
As the FCC moves to implement its recent deregulation scheme into law next week, facilitating more media mergers and buyouts for the likes of Clear Channel Communications, it quietly continues taking dubious enforcement actions against microradio stations across the country. From DIYmedia.net, the following statistics are compiled in the Enforcement Action Database, between 1997 and 2003: The FCC has taken 303 enforcement actions against unlicensed stations, including 122 visits, 86 raids, 10 arrests/convictions, 89 seizures and 27 fines worth a total of $257.000. 37 of the 303 actions have been taken against California stations. During 2003, there have been 39 enforcement actions against stations, compared to close to 50 for the entire 2002 year. 4 have been against California stations. Interestingly enough, almost half (18) have been taken against stations in Florida (what political information might they be trying to suppress there?) SFLR is not the only one fighting back: More skirmishes between the FCC and free radio - this time the good guys are on the offense. FCC agents were discovered snooping around a suspected broadcast location of KBFR last week. Nobody was home at the time, but the agents spoke with others on the premises and swore them to secrecy: "We were never here, okay?" This particular game of hide-and-seek in Boulder has been going on for more than a year now and it sounds like the FCC's angling for a raid over fines and/or criminal prosecution. There's also new developments in the showdown between Free Radio San Diego and the FCC. Field agents have stopped by twice so far but the station was quick to sound the alarm. It sent every member of California's congressional delegation letters and CDs detailing FRSD's first encounter with field agents, where DJ "Bob Ugly" specifically asked about his legal rights and was rebuffed. Those mailings paid off: Senator Diane Feinstein has dispatched a staffer from San Francisco to "assist" with an inquiry into the agents' conduct. A response is expected by the end of August. Feinstein's staffers decline to elaborate in response to my phone call for information yesterday. More recently: 8/22/03 - RFB Returns; FRSD Gets Grant; RFPI Gets Reprieve [link to this story] When the FCC came and intimidated Radio Free Brattleboro off the air in June, the Vermont community responded with zeal. A parade float, petition drive, and countless benefits and station meetings later, the station returned to the airwaves today on 107.9 FM. That frequency is currently vacant, but there is a pending LPFM application for it. RFB has promised to vacate the frequency if and when the license is awarded and the station is ready to broadcast. A local petition drive has drawn "way more than 2,000 signatures" in support of the station, reports RFB's Steven Twiss: "The petition's signatories include several area heavy-hitters including politicians, business owners and artists. One, a wonderful older woman, is on the town council. She bought a 'Free rfb' T-shirt and wore it to a few council meetings, which are broadcast on the local cable access channel." There is also an online petition drive for anyone else interested in symbolically standing with them. As we have seen in the past, getting "official" recognition from the community seems to keep the FCC away, or at least slows them down. Considering that Brattleboro is a community of 12,000, having one out of every five or six citizens onboard already demonstrates a strong sign of community solidarity. In summary, should the FCC be allowed to use vast public resources to run repressive "secret police" investigative/enforcement campaigns against stations that operate on unsued dial space which they won't license (or which refuse to participate in licensing)? It I don't think the rules/laws they use come under any active scrutiny or oversight by government oversight agencies and have not been subject to comprehensive legal challenges. The fight for access to the airwaves goes on!!!
Add Your Comments
Comments (Hide Comments)Former Radio Pirates Enjoy Victory Against FCC
Tuesday Sep 9th, 2003 10:15 PM
http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAT9VD9EKD.html
Former Radio Pirates Enjoy Victory Against FCC By David B. Caruso Associated Press Writer PHILADELPHIA (AP) - It's been five years since the Federal Communications Commission broke down the door to Radio Mutiny's pirate broadcast studio in West Philadelphia and hacked apart its unlicensed antenna. Now a group led by Radio Mutiny veteran Pete Tridish has exacted revenge on their old nemesis. Last week, they persuaded a federal court to temporarily block the FCC from relaxing restrictions designed to prevent big media companies from monopolizing public airwaves. The delay will give the group, the Prometheus Radio Project, time to argue that the new regulations decrease the public's ability to get on the air, a difficulty apparent in Philadelphia, which has no public access radio or television. The ruling also galvanized congressional opposition to the regulations, which would allow single companies to own newspapers and broadcast outlets in the same market, and let an individual TV company reach up to 45 percent of the nation's viewers. The FCC says the changes are needed to help broadcasters compete in an industry changed by cable television and the Internet. The court victory is being savored with some trepidation by the folks at Prometheus, who are battling to convince regulators that there is enough room on the nation's radio and TV dials for amateur broadcasters. "I'm always cautious about getting too excited about court victories," Tridish said. "Eventually, the weight of the system always seems to wind up catching up with you." A dose of pessimism is probably to be expected from activists who named their group after a mythological character who stole fire from the gods and gave it to man, only to be punished by eternal torture. Tridish, 33, was born in New York as Dylan Wrynn but took a pseudonym inspired by the petri dish, a container for culturing bacteria, in 1996. That was the year he became one of the founders of Radio Mutiny, a pirate station that broadcast from secret locations in West Philadelphia. Radio Mutiny didn't last long. The station had been on the air for less than a year when there was a knock on the door. "'FCC, open up,'" Tridish recalled the visitors saying. "The girl who went to the door said, 'Yeah, right,' because there were always people coming to the door and making jokes. But then she looked out, she saw some guy she didn't know and a couple of cops. She told them she wouldn't open the door unless they had a warrant, so they went away." After a few months of political theater, and a protest in which pirate disk jockeys broadcast live from Independence Mall, the FCC got a court order, broke down the station's door and shut it down. After that, Tridish said, he put his pirate days behind him and helped found Prometheus, a nonprofit group run from an office beneath the Calvary United Methodist Church that is trying to help hundreds of low-power FM stations set up legally around the country. In the past two years, Prometheus has had some success, mostly in rural areas underserved by commercial broadcasters. Last year the group helped build KOCZ 103.7 FM in Opelousas, La., a 100-watt station that plays zydeco music, does some local news and is owned by a civil rights group. It had another successful radio "barn raising" in Anne Arundel County, Md., where it helped found WRYR 97.5 FM. Another station start is planned this autumn in Spokane, Wash. Prometheus staffer Hannah Sassaman, 23, said the startups may be unpolished, but are a relief from a fast-consolidating industry (one giant player, Clear Channel, already owns 1,200 stations) in which she believes it is difficult for people with different viewpoints to get their opinions on the air. "They need to be curtailed in how far they can spread their arms over the countryside," Sassaman said. "It will change the way broadcasting sounds in America if it is all centralized out of the big cities." FCC officials said the ownership rules blocked by Prometheus' suit would do nothing to increase the likelihood that a radio market would become dominated by just a few big companies. FCC spokeswoman Michelle Russo said a series of other rule changes have recently expanded the number of licenses for lower-power FM stations. Prometheus' claims were also rejected by the National Association of Broadcasters. "We don't buy into their claim that radio has somehow lost its local flavor. The reality is that the most successful stations today are highly committed to serving their local audiences," said the association's senior vice president, Dennis Wharton. He said close to 4,000 companies own radio stations, and, while the industry has seen a proliferation of stations specializing in formats unavailable a few decades ago, including Spanish-language broadcasting and business news, it's still the most community-oriented of any mass media. "We're still where you turn for announcements about school closings," Wharton said. --- |