Tomorrow, the Board of Supervisors will be considering an application by Potomac Radio, LLC to construct three radio towers on leased land owned by Loudoun Water, in order to bring WAGE back on the air under the auspices of a 50,000 watt “blowtorch” of a radio station.
A noble cause, right? After all, WAGE was Loudoun’s quaint little AM radio station that broadcast local news & sports, had local advertising, and occasionally some Capitals or Orioles games. But they went dark a few years back because of lack of advertising. They had drifted away from local programming into brokered and syndicated programming, which was cheaper than hiring good on-air talent.
Not so simple. The area where Potomac Radio is looking to build the towers is located in a floodplain, and near a heron rookery. Supervisor Kelly Burk has an environmental issue with the tower location, but someone with whom I spoke who has intimate knowledge of the situation has been assured by “experts” that the impact will be “minimal and mitigated”. If it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me.
The main concern, then, would be WAGE’s provision of local content, with which they did a great job in their heyday. The owner of Potomac Radio, Rockville’s James Weitzman (who made a large donation to Eugene Delgaudio’s campaign a few years back), is eager to get WAGE on the air again. One could question his motives – AM radio in Loudoun County, in an age where iPods and satellite radio are prevalent? How would someone make money in such a limited environment? Easy; through brokered and/or syndicated programming.
Brokered radio is where the broadcaster pays the station for the right to use their airwaves; it’s akin to a radio infomercial. Most of the international/ethnic and religious stations you hear on the AM dial are brokered programming. Syndicated programming works the other way, where the broadcaster markets themselves and the station owner pays for the privilege. Syndicated hosts generally run towards right-wing hate talk, a la Michael Savage, the infamous Glenn Beck, and Alex Jones.
Potomac Radio also owns WBIS 1190 in Annapolis (as subsidiary Nations Radio, LLC), which provides brokered business news and syndicated programming. Interestingly, Potomac Radio also received approval from the FCC on October 29, 2008 to move WAGE’s signal from 1200 to 1190 on the AM dial. If WAGE does indeed go back on the air, WBIS, with only a 10,000 watt daytime signal, would need to shut down, as it would be overtaken by WAGE’s signal. Presumably then, the programming currently being broadcast on WBIS would be transferred to WAGE (and possibly even the call letters, eventually), and the coverage area would increase.
Leesburg Town Councilman Ken Reid had a letter published in Sunday’s Washington Post which (his environmental ignorance notwithstanding) stated his support to bring WAGE back as a “Leesburg-based station”. Since WBIS doesn’t provide any local programming, I don’t see any indication that WAGE would provide any, either. So Mr. Reid is being disingenuous when he states that the return of WAGE would be good for the county. If WAGE does come back on the air, it won’t resemble the old WAGE in the least. As local radio maven Dave Hughes (aka “DCRTV Dave”) said on the Loudoun Times-Mirror discussion board, “Unless the station returns to local-centric programming, the county will receive little or no benefit.”
Mr. Weitzman is out for one thing – to make as much money as he can, Loudoun County be damned. Nothing wrong with making money, just don’t go around professing that ignoring and ridiculing environmental concerns in the guise of returning WAGE to the airwaves is serving a civic purpose. Because it’s not. There is no longer any FCC requirement to provide local content, and if Mr. Weitzman’s current holdings are an indication of his future ideas for WAGE, we won’t see any.