After licence revoked, new Ryerson group seeks to claim FM frequency for campus radio

Radio Ryerson will compete against 21 other applicants in its effort to claim a CRTC licence to operate a campus radio station on Toronto’s 88.1 MHz frequency. The Ryerson University organization is among several companies and individuals that responded to a CRTC call for applications to use the frequency vacated by Ryerson community station CKLN when the commission revoked its licence last February. The commission said this month that it will discuss the applications at a hearing in Toronto on May 7. If granted the licence, Radio Ryerson said it would represent the diversity of Ryerson’s downtown Toronto campus and surrounding community with a wide range of content, including music and spoken word programming with a focus on issues that matter to the community. The organization said in its application that it would feature a “new music” requirement so the Ryerson station becomes a “vital incubator” for emerging artists and promised to devote at least half of its musical programming content to Canadian artists. CKLN’s broadcasting licence was revoked by the commission last year due to poor-quality program logs, paperwork problems and a lack of involvement from Ryerson students, whose fees make up a major part of the station’s revenue. Jacqueline Tuinstra Harrison, president of Radio Ryerson, told The Wire Report in an interview Monday that the new Ryerson station would serve as a “launch pad” for local artists and talents. “We really see the growth of young talent as our mandate for a community licence station,” she said. Tuinstra Harrison said the not-for-profit organization has received significant support for the new station from Ryerson students. She cited an October 2011 referendum in which 84 per cent of students voted in favour of a $10.35 per student levy that would go towards the operation of a volunteer-run station. “That’s a fairly recent show of support by the students and we have tons of volunteer students coming out and helping,” she said. Harrison said the station would also seek to attract young listeners through advertising and programming. “I think it’s incorrect to say that the younger audience is just abandoning FM,” she said. “I think FM also abandoned them in not advertising to them and not programming to them. We’d like to change that.” The group is asking the CRTC to allow it to broadcast ethnic programming for up to 20 per cent of its broadcast week, a 33 per cent increase over the maximum allowed under current commission rules. “Radio Ryerson recognizes that the CRTC permits a maximum of 15 per cent ethnic programming for a campus station in the same market as an ethnic station, and is seeking permission to go above this threshold to ensure its programming reflects the extraordinary diversity of Ryerson University and the Greater Toronto Area (GTA),” the group’s application said. The group added that campus and community stations offer programming based on the needs and interests of a community through the broadcast of local and regional news as well as the promotion of local cultural and artistic expression. In its application, Radio Ryerson said the new station would be “a completely new and different undertaking” from the former CKLN-FM. Radio Ryerson said it has been studying best practices and “cautionary tales” from the campus and community sector to establish “realistic goals and processes” for a new station. Before it can put those studies into practice, the Ryerson group must first beat out nearly two dozen other applicants interested in obtaining the coveted Toronto radio slot. Newcap Inc. (a Newfoundland Capital Corporation Inc. subsidiary) proposed to operate a new adult format station called The Sound, which would offer new “singer-songwriter” content. Unlike the American “Triple-A” music format that includes “strong elements” of alternative and rock music, “our modern adult format is different in that it avoids the tougher edges and harder rock elements, and focuses more on the singer-songwriters, harmonies, and the powerful lyrics,” the company said in its application. Newcap said artists who fit into this format such as Feist, Hey Rosetta! and Mumford and Sons, are not heard with any regularity on existing Toronto commercial radio stations. “There is no single radio station in Toronto dedicated to this type of music, and there remains a vast collection of incredible songs—by these artists and others like them—that is going unheard on Toronto radio stations,” Newcap said. Newcap also said its new station would feature an interactive programming format called “Your Sound,” which would allow listeners to use a mobile app, a Facebook app, or a web browser to indicate what songs should be played. “There’s technology out there today that essentially allows us to give listeners control of the radio station,” Steve Jones, vice-president of programming at Newcap, told The Wire Report in an interview Thursday. He said that songs played during the Your Song segment would be chosen according to listener votes and input. “We can play the song that is in most demand at any given time,” he added. Other applicants vying for the 88.1 FM frequency include Trust Communications Ministries, MZ Media Inc., Larche Communications Inc., Intercity Broadcasting Inc., Durham Radio Inc., Family FM Inc., Rock 95 Broadcasting Inc., Radio 1540 Ltd. and La Coopérative Radiophonique de Toronto Inc. Frank Torres, the owner of Ottawa’s 101.9 DAWG FM station, is proposing a Toronto-based DAWG FM station that would copy the Ottawa station’s popular classic rock and blues format. Dufferin Communications Inc. (a Evanov Communications Inc. subsidiary) has asked to move its local PROUD-FM station to the 88.1 MHz spot on the dial due to problems with the station’s current 103.9 frequency. Dufferin said that PROUD-FM, which caters to the region’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, has run into “very serious” problems associated with its current frequency due to its proximity to other broadcasting channels. The CRTC first launched its call for licence applications last September after receiving a request from Dufferin to make use of the 88.1 frequency vacated by Radio Ryerson. “The frequency previously held by CKLN would offer a stronger and more reliable signal to listeners that would guarantee they could hear the station in the traditional Gay Village at Church and Wellesley and throughout the downtown core as the community grows and changes,” Dufferin said at the time. dgrenier@thewirereport.ca

After licence revoked, new Ryerson group seeks to claim FM frequency for campus radio

Broadcast | March 12, 2012

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