Mapping Brookyln's Diverse Pirate-Radio Scene

The Federal Communications Commission has identified New York as a problem area, and Brooklyn, with its diverse immigrant communities, is the epicenter of the city’s pirate scene. In 2017, when President Donald Trump appointed Ajit Pai Chairman of the FCC, Pai promised to “take aggressive action” to stamp out pirates. In early May, the Preventing Illegal Radio Abuse Through Enforcement, or pirate, Act was introduced in Congress; it would increase fines from a maximum of a hundred and forty-four thousand dollars to two million dollars. But the stations aren’t going away, said David Goren, who launched the Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map. And he says transmission equipment has only become cheaper and more sophisticated. “The problem, as I see it, is that the technology has gone beyond what the law has been able to do," he said. Between 87.9 and 92.1 FM, Goren counted eleven illegal stations, whose hosts mainly spoke Creole or accented English. Pirates, he said, “offer a kind of programming that their audiences depend on. Spiritual sustenance, news, immigration information, music created at home or in the new home, here.”