Competing applicants are vying for a Federal Communications Commission license to build a 50,000-watt AM radio station, possibly transmitting from Port Angeles, Sequim or on Whidbey Island across from Port Townsend.
A 50,000-watt station is the strongest allowable on the AM band.
By comparison, the North Olympic Peninsula’s only two AM stations, KONP and KIKN in Port Angeles, broadcast daytime at 1,000 watts each.
An Everett radio station owner has applied for the license to build the station, available on the on 1520 kilohertz frequency, in Port Angeles.
A Boston broadcasting group is competing to locate the station in Sequim.
And a California investment partnership has applied to build it in Oak Harbor, where 500-watt KWDB now broadcasts.
Andy Skotdal, owner of Everett radio station KRKO and part of CAAM Partnership that has filed the Port Angeles application, says the FCC has made the 1520 frequency available on the Peninsula and north Puget Sound, and potential licensees are competing for it.
“Basically what you have is four entities applied for one frequency in different areas, but they all conflict with each other,” Skotdal said.
“The FCC chooses who survives. . . . Everybody just got in line, and now there’s just a big wait.”.
Langer Broadcasting Group LLC, listed out of Massachusetts, has applied for the 1520-AM radio frequency in Sequim, FCC records show.
CAAM Partnership and Langer Broadcasting are competing for the frequency with James Rondeau of North Hills, Calif.; Cleo Broadcasting LLC of Corpus Christi, Texas; and JNE Investments Inc. of Palo Alto, Calif.
Besides Port Angeles and Sequim, other applications seek to locate the 1520-AM radio station in Everett, Marysville, Arlington, Snohomish, Clearview and Monroe, Freeland or Oak Harbor.
