Inside radio

It is beginning to look like the 2-2 deadlock that has marked the Federal Communications Commission for the past two years is not about to come to an end in the near-term, even though Democrats now have an extra vote in the Senate to confirm Gigi Sohn [Senior Fellow and Public Advocate at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society].

Congressional Republicans have raised questions about the size of the Federal Communications Commission’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year, including growing the agency’s workforce. But FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel says the Biden administration’s proposed 4.3 percent hike that would raise the budget to $390 million is “both balanced and cost-effective” and would only make staffing levels “roughly equivalent” to the agency’s staffing in 2016.

The Media Action Center (MAC) is declaring victory after Entercom announced it will turn its license for radio station KDND in Sacramento. MAC had urged the Federal Communications Commission to hold a hearing on the station’s license renewal based on KDND’s 2007 “Hold Your Wee for a Wii” contest, which led to one of the contestants, Jennifer Strange, 28, dying of water intoxication.

Entercom is alerting listeners that the station’s format will live on at a new dial position as it takes over what has been hot AC “Star 106.5” KUDL, which has been the company’s lowest-rated FM in the ownership cluster. In a brief filing with the FCC, Entercom’s attorney said the company plans to power down KDND on Feb. 8, and then hand in the license with a request that the station authorization be canceled. The company makes no explicit mention of the situation that put KDND at risk.

The parties pushing to challenge the license renewal of KDND Sacramento are trying to raise the stakes against station owner Entercom. Attorneys for Media Action Center (MAC) and Sue Wilson filed a Petition To Enlarge the license renewal hearing to include Entercom’s entire six-station Sacramento cluster. Should MAC and Wilson prevail, the licenses for KUDL, KIFM, KKDO, KRXQ and KESG would be on the line in the same hearing for the KDND license. Each of the six stations has a renewal application accepted for filing at the Federal Communications Commission but not granted. In late October, the FCC took the extremely rare step of announcing it will decide whether KDND would be granted a new license in what amounts to a trial. At issue is the company’s ill-fated “Hold Your Wee for a Wii” 2007 contest, which led to one of the contestants, Jennifer Strange, 28, dying of water intoxication.

The Federal Communications Commission’s hearing into whether Entercom should be allowed to continue holding the license for CHR “107.9 The End” KDND, Sacramento (CA) isn’t likely to occur until spring 2017 at the earliest, but the legal maneuvers behind the scenes have begun. Legal teams from the company and the challengers to its license met recently in what chief administrative law judge Richard Sippel says led to “extensive” discussions about how evidence will be collected. The outcome has cleared the way for the Enforcement Bureau to begin serving requests for e-mails and other information from KDND.

Sippel has ordered that rather than requiring Entercom follow the standard 10-day deadline for filling requests, the company will be permitted to turn over documents in two batches. The first will be due Jan. 13 with a second due date set for Feb. 10. The discovery process is expected to focus on the planning and execution of the station’s 2007 ill-fated “Hold Your Wee for a Wii” contest where the contestant who was able to drink water every 15 minutes for the longest time without urinating or vomiting won a Nintendo Wii video game console. One of the constants, Jennifer Strange, 28, died of water intoxication.