FTV: WOAS FM Update
Both Chinese and Greek philosophers are given credit for the origins of the old saying, “The wheels of justice turn slowly.” Sun Tzu’s version is often quoted (“Wheels of justice grind slow but grind fine”). Greek biographer Plutarch’s claim is based on his paraphrasing an ancient Greek proverb when he said, “Thus, I do not see what use there is in those mills of the gods said to grind so late as to render punishment hard to be recognized, and to make wickedness fearless.” I had considered applying my own interpretation (“The wheels of government . . .”) to WOAS-FM waiting to hear news about our application for a change to a new frequency. When I read Plutarch connecting the ‘justice’ saying to ‘wickedness and punishment’, I was glad I took the time to look up the origins of this particular saying. The delay we experienced in the processing of our application had more to do with the Federal Communications Commission being slammed with a pile of applications to review in the summer and fall of 2024. With this time lag in mind, now would be the appropriate (and final) time to catch everyone up in the tale of ‘what happened to 88.5 and what is the new WOAS FM frequency?’
If you are new to the story, let me give you a synopsis of how we ended up at our new home frequency of 91.5.* The station was originally built and put on the air in 1978 by a large group of school and community volunteers under the leadership of then Ontonagon Area Schools librarian Tom Lee. The station had a full day and evening schedule of volunteer DJs that provided the first local radio station in Ontonagon until WUPY Y101 (first known as WONT) came to town. The station had some ups and downs but continued to broadcast each school year after Lee stepped down. The manager’s position passed from Margaret Muskatt to Mike ‘Zenith’ Bennett, and finally to me (Ken Raisanen) in 1997. As the Community Schools director, Bennett secured grant funds to re-equip the station and had plans to upgrade WOAS FM from ten to one hundred watts. Those plans were never realized when Bennett had to leave the area for another job opportunity.
The station’s FCC license nearly lapsed when Bennett left in 1997, but once it was renewed, WOAS continued only with a much smaller crew of volunteers. The station’s original electronics were all ‘pre-owned’ pieces. With the financial help arranged by superintendent John Peterson, the station was able to do a $9,000 renovation of the studio that included all of the electronic devices and studio furniture beginning in the 1998-99 school year. By 1999-2000, WOAS FM was virtually a new station albeit still a Class D, 10 watt educational / community station. Such was the status quo until the spring of 2022 when WOAS hit a major bump in the road.
In April of 2022, the station was informed via e-mail that our 88.5 frequency had been purchased at an open FCC auction in November of 2021. A religious non-profit radio group operating as a Class A station planned to begin broadcasting from a tower location near Rockland using 88.5 as their frequency. That organization’s manager apologized for not notifying us earlier because, “We thought the FCC would let you know.” For the record, the consultant who recommended this group buy our frequency should have known that the FCC does not do the notifications of frequency auction sales in cases like this (consultants are hired because they are supposed to be up on rules and regulations after all).
It was all a little confusing because being the volunteer General Manager of a low power FM station doesn’t mean one comes armed with all the rules and regulations neatly filed in a binder. What I have learned about running a radio station has come largely from relying on those who know about such things and by researching topics not in my wheelhouse. We immediately made contact with the FCC and were told that, “ Yes, Class A stations have rights to bid for frequencies that Class D stations do not.” The FCC representative (Rudy Bonacci by name) was extremely helpful as we navigated the legal waters. He threw us our first lifeline when he said, “There are many open frequencies available and you will only need to do a ‘Minor Modification of License’ application to move to a new one.” The initial shock soon wore off and we began planning for a post 88.5 future for WOAS. At first it looked like we would be off 88.5 in the fall of 2022, but the wheels of building a transmitter site also turn slowly. We were relieved to have the 2022-23 school year to figure out what our path forward would look like.
Naturally, the first concern was monetary. Our 20 year-old 25 watt BEXT transmitter had recently been repaired and it made sense to upgrade to a new unit going forward. The FCC had also let us know that low power stations were no longer limited to 10 watts. It also made sense for our new transmitter to be able to broadcast up to the legal 99 watt low power limit for Class D stations (I am sure ‘Zenith’ Bennett (R.I.P.) is smiling). We considered applying for a Class A license to protect us from another takeover in the future, but more on that idea a bit later. The most pressing concern at this early stage of planning was the $3,000 WOAS needed for a new transmitter. When approached, the Ontonagon Area Schools (who own the WOAS license) suggested we do some form of fundraising. The district had no ‘extra’ money available in the budget for the upcoming 2023-24 school year and were planning on reducing their operating costs even further..
I have never been overly fond of fundraising, but after a quick visit with the school’s business manager to find out how we would handle donated funds, a plan took shape. An appeal was made via the Ontonagon Herald and our www.woas-fm.org website. Since the last renovation in 1999-2000, we have financed most of the station’s needs via a modest income from two vending machines we operate in the school (plus occasional donations). With artists and labels donating music and occasional gifts of CDs from listeners, our overall operational costs have been kept manageable. Just the same, I held my breath until the first donation appeared in our mailbox. We are not equipped to do on-line fundraising so everything came in the old fashioned way via the U.S. Postal Service. The very first donation came from a local donor who wished to remain anonymous and I blinked twice to see what they had sent: they called WOAS a ‘community asset’ and kick started our campaign to the tune of $1,000! Over the next three weeks, more donations came in (or were handed to me on the street or at local stores). Thanks to our generous listeners and many former DJs and other volunteers, we reached our transmitter goal in less than a month.
Just after we passed the $2,000 mark, John Carlisle from The Detroit Free Press called and asked a few questions about our appeal. John covers many local interest stories across the Upper Peninsula (the most recent before he called me was all about Stubb’s Bar in Ontonagon). He said he would be in the area in a few weeks and would like to do a feature about the station. “Maybe it will help your fundraising,” he said. When informed that we would probably have reached our goal before he got here, John said, “Well, it will still be an interesting story. Plus, you can always use more money, right?” The ‘run the station with minimal income’ mentality finally snapped and I said, “You know, you are absolutely right. Why settle for ‘just barely enough?”
When John and photographer Ryan Garza arrived in town, we sat down in the school library to go over what they wanted to see. Over coffee and donuts, they laid out a half day plan and I got out of their way. They interviewed some of our DJs, took a lot of photos, and did the leg work needed for their article. I snapped their picture and asked if it would be okay to use it when I wrote my own article about their visit. “Sure,” John said, “but please don’t run it until our article goes to print in The Free Press.” That sounded fair enough so I wrote up my account of The Freep visit and waited to hear from John. Finally, with a day notice. I found out the article would be in print on July 13, 2023. I was able to read the on-line version first and John promised to send me a couple of copies of the paper as The Free Press is no longer distributed in our area. He didn’t mention that we were front page news!
As John had predicted, state-wide coverage of our appeal began attracting notes of encouragement and even more donations. Within a month of publication, we had more than doubled our $3,000 goal. A few days after The Freep article came out, I got a call from someone at Mitch Albom’s WJR AM radio show in Detroit. He asked if I would be available for an on-air interview later in the afternoon. I said ‘yes’ and told me he would call back 10 minutes before the segment. Mitch and his partner both had fond memories of getting started on radio in college and we had a great talk about what was happening with WOAS. Albom was curious who did the 2:00 AM shift (apparently the time slot he had started in back in the day). I informed Mitch that, “We aren’t typically on the air at 2:00 AM,” but I also took the opportunity to invite him to stop by and fill the slot if he was in the area. Sure enough, the next round of donations included many references to people hearing about our story on his show.
Not long after The Freep article and Albom Show helped spread the word, I got yet another phone call, this time from Kinjal Patel. She worked for The NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt and asked many questions about the station. She said, “Well, I want to pitch this to our production team as a possible feature. I see it as a ‘feel good’ story. I will get back to you.” It didn’t take long before I got the news: “They loved the idea,” Kinjal told me. “When will the new transmitter be in operation? They would like to send up a team from Chicago to do the feature.” At that point I said I would keep her in the loop but the transmitter had not even been ordered yet. When the time gap between first contact with NBC grew to six weeks, I apologized and said, “I fully understand if this is out of your timeline.” Kinjal assured me that they still had it on their planning board.
We were just in the process of organizing the transmitter swap out when Kinjal got back to me with a date: Friday October 13, 2024. She said the producer, Ramon, would be in touch to lay out the plan. I got on the horn to our engineer, Jim Bradley, and gave him the news. I did not think we could have the new equipment installed by then but Jim is a ‘get ‘er done’ kind of guy.
Our funding appeal had now brought in six times our original goal so we had added a new equipment bay to our plans. With Jim putting in some long hours (with some minor assistance from yours truly), we managed to have the new transmitter on the air by the time the NBC crew arrived. All that remained was a deep cleaning the station hadn’t seen in a while.
The segment that aired on The NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt in November of 2023 is still out there if one wishes to view it. Ramon and his team did a wonderful job of showcasing the entire community along with the radio station and DJs. What the clip doesn’t show is the amount of effort it takes to gather enough information for a couple of minutes of air time. Ramon arrived first from New York City and spent the night at a local establishment. He said he would meet me at the school at 7 AM along with the film and sound guys. The crew of Steve (cameraman) and Marty (sound) had spent the night in Marquette and arrived first. They were happy we had set aside the entire library for their use for the day. Ramon came in next and reviewed the timeline they needed to follow. Reporter Maggie Vespa flew into Green Bay and drove up from there. By the time she rolled in around 9 AM, the rest of the crew had everything ready to go including breakfast from downtown which the gopher (go-for)(me) picked up while they were scoping out the station.
As with the Freep guys, my job was pretty simple at that point – stay out of their way. I had arranged for a couple of DJs and station volunteers to drop by and we were off to the races. Doing an interview with a national correspondent should have made me nervous, but Maggie is the kind of pro that makes you forget you are being interviewed. The two student DJs (Violet Amos and Jack Nelson) must have had the same reaction because Maggie said, “They were great.” The final session took place downtown for some aerial shots of the mainstreet taken with a drone. At 5:00 PM, they concluded their ten hour day on site (travel time not included). I can not express how interesting it was to watch this well oiled machine roll in from the NBC mothership in Chicago, do their thing, and then depart for the long trip home. They work hard for their stories.
The evolving story up to this point was interesting and a balm for the soul. In the space of 18 months, we went from thinking WOAS FM was history to having a brighter future than we could have dreamed of. Our fundraising went over the top, the station equipment was upgraded, and we were positioned to move forward with a new frequency. It made me more than a little nervous to contemplate how deep down the FCC rabbit hole I would have to dive to apply for the ‘Minor Modification’ of our license. Before I could even contemplate where to start the process, I got an email from Todd Urick at an organization called commonfrequency.org. Todd explained that his group specializes in helping low power community and educational FM radio stations file applications with the FCC. “I would be glad to help you do the paperwork on your station license at no charge to you,” he said.
There was a lot of back and forth communication concerning our equipment, our goals, and where we wanted to land, frequency wise. After many months of research on his part, Todd filed our application which the FCC acknowledged receiving on June 17, 2024. In August, I inquired about the FCC timeline to review it to which Rudy replied, “It usually takes 2 to 4 weeks. If it is a more complicated matter, it may take 3 to 6 months.” When we hit five months, I sent a second email asking where things stood and Rudy replied, “We have been slammed with applications. We should have yours reviewed by the end of November or early December.” With that, the waiting game continued until now. With this last communication, we at least knew why the wheels were turning slowly, but they were still turning.
On December 20, 2024, Todd at commonfrequency.org was informed by the FCC that, “Our application to move to 91.5 had been approved by the FCC on December 19, 2024.” With the school district on Christmas Break from December 21, 2024 to January 5, 2025, we used this opportunity to make the switch to 91.5. Many thanks to all parties involved and an extra big ‘thank you’ to Rudy at the FCC and Todd at CommonFrequency. Thank you also to Andy at Gospel Opportunities for allowing us to continue using 88.5 during the review of our application to change to 91.5. Happy New Year to all – you know where to look for us starting on January 6, 2025 and beyond.
*A footnote – We were not totally sure if our current tower elements would support the new frequency and had no way to start testing it until 91.5 was approved. The good news is we can broadcast for now at 15 watts until we get new elements in place on the tower. The old tower bays could be retuned, but the wisdom of removing 45 year-old (plus) elements and then returning them to the tower makes little sense. Once we have the new units here and in place, we will be able to increase to 99 watts. Our web feed at www.woas-fm.org will remain active during this time. A radio engineer’s job is never done, right Jim?
Top Piece Video – Chicago expresses how we feel heading into 2025! Happy New Year to you, too!