BLOOMING PRAIRIE – A local Christian organization is among about 60 nonprofit groups across Minnesota seeking licenses from the Federal Communications Commission to operate low-power FM stations.

Tuesday, September 19, 2000

BLOOMING PRAIRIE – A local Christian organization is among about 60 nonprofit groups across Minnesota seeking licenses from the Federal Communications Commission to operate low-power FM stations.

In a Sept. 1 filing with the FCC, Christian Radio Broadcasting of Owatonna Inc. seeks to set up a 100-watt maximum station on 106.3 megahertz in Owatonna. The group is based at the Blooming Prairie business of its president, Bradley Schrank.

"Our interests are to broadcast Christian radio and we are not going to do any programming," Schrank said this morning. He said the station would rebroadcast programming from Christian networks such as 3ABN and World Adventist Radio.

While the station will broadcast from an antenna 66 feet up a tower to be erected at Seventh-day Adventist Church in Owatonna, the signal is expected to reach out up to 10 miles away, Schrank said, including the Blooming Prairie area.

While no local programming is planned for the station at present, Schrank said the station might transmit the church’s services in the future, as well as other locally originated programming.

"I was excited about spreading the gospel," Schrank said. "I couldn’t do it myself."

Other licenses sought in southeastern Minnesota include requests from Rochester and Houston.

Low-power FM is a new, noncommercial radio service authorized earlier this year by the FCC. The service will consist of 100-watt stations, which will cover a radius of just more than 3 miles, and 10-watt stations, which would serve areas within a radius of 1 to 2 miles.

Among those seeking licenses in the round of applications accepted by the FCC from Minnesota recently were Women Against Military Madness, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and the Minneapolis American Indian Center.

The FCC believes it may grant 1,000 or more 100-watt stations nationwide, as well as 10-watt stations. In the Twin Cities, federal officials estimate there might be room for six 100-watt stations, but more room for 10-watt stations.

The low-power stations can be slipped into the FM radio band without causing "unacceptable levels" of interference with existing, more powerful stations, the FCC contends. But big broadcasters vehemently disagree, arguing the low-power FM stations threaten to mess up their signals.

"We are seriously concerned about the potential for interference," said Jim du Bois, chief executive officer of the Minnesota Broadcasters Association, the trade association for almost all of the state’s radio and TV stations. "If the FM band becomes an unlistenable collection of interference, people will go to other sources."

Radio broadcasters have been trying to get Congress to force the FCC to reconsider its position.

With Congress caught between the broadcasting lobby and the religious, education and ethnic groups that want radio stations, a compromise seems likely.

"Going into this, the industry thought this (low-power FM stations) was a horrific idea," du Bois said. "Now, the industry supports compromise legislation that says, ‘Let’s test and see if there’s interference."’

Minnesota Public Radio is among the worried broadcasters.

"We support the licensing of low-power stations," said Will Haddeland, senior vice president of public affairs for MPR. "But we are not supporting the erosion of existing protections for existing stations. The FCC has dropped long-standing technical safeguards."

FCC chairman William Kennard says the first low-power station may be on the air by the end of the year.

 

Associated Press reports were included in this story