Shoals Radio Daze?

A guest commentary that asks some surprising questions:

Shoals residents should be questioning this situation. Have you tried to listen to WLAY or WVNA in the last few years? They have both been getting Special Temporary Authorities (STA) from the FCC to operate on "temporary" antennas at low power (after both were off the air for a protracted period). 

I question the use of the word temporary since this has been going on for years now. I think in the case of one of the stations they were renting property for the antenna and the landlord raised the rent. I'm not sure if that happened with the other, or if they just decided to sell the property to make a quick buck. 

It's possible that they are working on getting facilities to broadcast as licensed, but my suspicion is that they're just keeping something on the air so they don't have to turn in the licenses, either in hope of selling the license to someone who will really use it or (my real suspicion) they don't want to turn in the license because someone else might get it and bring some competition to the market. 

Stations are supposed to meet the conditions of their license. An STA is for a temporary emergency, such as a tower collapse or station fire. WYLE-TV had its license revoked by the FCC because they were not operating as licensed.

*****

Anyone have any ideas on the current situation with these two stations? Comments welcome.



Shoalanda