Following Connoisseur Media’s announced acquisition of Alpha Media’s 207 stations back in May, the FCC has given the go-ahead on the transfer, which includes a waiver that gives Connoisseur control of Alpha’s East Texas signals.
The deal places Connoisseur among the top 10 radio groups by station count. (For more on the financials involved, including its assumption of debt, see a related story from RadioInsight).
In the Tyler-Longview market, Alpha owned five full-power FM stations. In a market of its size, that was over the four-station AM or FM band limit according to the commission’s local ownership caps. Alpha was able to continue operating the stations under a grandfathered capacity, but circumstances — such as a transfer of control request — would change the provision.
But after the commission reviewed a waiver filed by Connoisseur, it concluded that the transfer would maintain status quo in the market and ultimately serve the public interest.
Tyler-Longview waiver details
The commission noted that Alpha’s transfer of control application for all of its stations, as well as Connoisseur’s local ownership waiver request in Tyler-Longview, went uncontested.
Alpha’s five Tyler-Longview market full-power stations are:
- Adult Contemporary 106.5 KOOI(FM)
- Country 105.7 KYKX(FM),
- Classic Country 104.1 KKUS(FM)
- Regional Mexican 96.7 KOYE(FM) and its simulcast on 107.9 KTLH(FM), the latter of which is silent, as of May, through a silent STA filed by Alpha because of the transfer of control request.
Alpha has owned those licenses since 2015, adding the license for KTLH in 2017 when it was granted a construction permit.
But the five signals are one more commercial FM station than is permitted under the AM/FM subcaps in the commission’s local ownership rule.
[Related: “Appeals Court Leaves Radio Ownership Rules Intact”]
Connoisseur, meanwhile, did not have any prior stations in the Tyler-Longview market.
The commission cited BIA Advisory Services data that determined there are 37 stations, commercial and noncommercial, in the market. In markets with 30–44 stations, the rule states that a licensee may own up to seven stations, with no more than four in the same band.
Alpha’s ownership in the market was grandfathered under the FCC’s Note 4, which permits existing over-the-limit station combos to continue until certain events, such as a transfer of control, occur.
“Accordingly, a decision to grant the applications would require a waiver of Note 4,” the commission wrote.
Connoisseur’s waiver request argued that the unique circumstances of the transaction supported a waiver allowing control of the Tyler-Longview Stations.
A 2022 BIA market designation change for KOYE, licensed to Frankston, approximately 22 miles south of Tyler, and KTLH, licensed to Hallsville, approximately 40 miles east of Tyler, resulted in the overages, Connoisseur said.
Since KTLH — when it is on the air — simulcasts KOYE, Connoisseur explained there is no independent revenue attributed to KTLH, and that it is unlikely to be profitable if sold and operated independently “due to declining advertising sales revenues in the market,” citing analysis from Borrell Associates and a letter from the brokerage firm Bergner & Co.
Connoisseur said that granting the waiver would serve the public interest by “minimizing disruption” and allowing the public to continue to receive the same programming currently available from the stations.
The commission found that strict application of Note 4 was not warranted due to the circumstances of Connoisseur’s waiver, and that it would indeed serve the public interest.
It said the fact that Connoisseur does not have an attributable interest in other market stations supported the waiver grant, and that it will simply maintain the status quo.
BIA’s data showed the Alpha stations ranking third in the market in terms of local ad revenue, according to the commission, which it said further made the case that granting the waiver would not be “anticompetitive.”
