Two new applicants for nearby communities
OTTAWA — The CRTC is asking for more comments as it considers whether or not the radio market in and around Quebec City can sustain more stations.
The Commission issued on Wednesday three separate Broadcasting Notices of Consultation, calling for comments regarding the market capacity and appropriateness of issuing a call for radio applications in Quebec City, as well as Sainte-Marie and the Regional County Municipality of Portneuf, Que, both of which are small towns within transmitter range of Quebec City.
The CRTC’s original call for comments regarding the Quebec City radio market dates back to April 2016. More than two years later, the CRTC is now asking for interested parties who have already filed comments in this proceeding to update their information and for other interested persons to submit comments. So far, the Commission has received applications from Dufferin Communications (owned by Evanov Radio Group) to operate an English-language commercial radio station in Quebec City at 105.7 MHz FM and from Gilles Lapointe and Nelson Sergerie (on behalf of a corporation to be incorporated) to operate a French-language station at the same frequency. The deadline for the submission of the second phase of comments is August 31, 2018, and the deadline for the submission of the second phase of replies is September 17, 2018.
At the same time, the Commission is seeking comments on the market capacity for additional radio stations in the smaller communities of Sainte-Marie and Portneuf. In the case of Sainte-Marie, the CRTC has received an application from Groupe Attraction Radio to operate a commercial radio station at 105.3 MHz FM. In the Portneuf market, a broadcast licence application has been submitted by Michel Lambert (on behalf of a corporation to be incorporated) to operate a commercial radio station at 88.7 MHz FM.
In parallel with the Quebec City proceeding, the deadline for the submission of interventions in both the Sainte-Marie and Portneuf proceedings is also August 31, 2018, and the deadline to file replies is September 17, 2018. Only parties that file interventions will be able to file replies to matters raised during the intervention phase, the CRTC said.
The CRTC has made available updated aggregated financial information related to the Quebec City radio market via the Commission’s Statistical and Financial Summaries 2013-2017 on the Open Data portal.
