OTTAWA – Rawlco Radio, Harvard Broadcasting, Newcap Inc. and CHUM Limited will soon all launch new radio stations in Calgary.
The CRTC approved four new stations for Calgary and three other new stations serving: Calgary bedroom communities Airdrie and Cochrane (Tiessen Media Inc); Lethbridge (a numbered company partly backed by Island Radio’s [B.C.] Paul Larsen); and High River/Okotoks (Golden West). Also approved was Golden West’s purchase of CJTS-FM Lethbridge from Spirit Broadcasting.
(There are more stations to come in the resource-rich province as the CRTC just went through a hearing in June, as attended by Cartt.ca, studying 19 applications for stations in Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie.)
Harvard’s station will be an alt-rock station, Rawlco’s a folk/acoustic specialty station, Newcap’s an "adult album alternative" format and CHUM’s a Hot AC format.
"We look forward to continuing to provide innovative music programming to one of Canada’s fastest growing cities, while giving an additional voice to community groups and local organizations," said Newcap CEO Rob Steele in a press release. "CAFE 90.3 FM’s adult album alternative format, will be a perfect complement to our existing station, California 103."
"The company’s efforts will be focused on launching this new station as soon as possible. Work will begin immediately," added the release.
CHUM says its station will be called ENERGY FM. “We are pleased to have this opportunity to offer Calgarians a new radio station that is uniquely suited to the market and that reflects the energy, diversity and vibrancy of the city,” said Paul Ski, CHUM’s executive vice-president, radio. “ENERGY FM will not only benefit the local community and all Canadian artists, but will also fill a programming void with a fresh new music mix that has been missing from Calgary radio."
Under the terms of its licence, CHUM has committed over $4.4 million in Canadian Talent Development initiatives. The company did not say when the new station would launch.
Outside Calgary, Tiessen Media’s new station will be an "eclectic adult AC" station, Larsen’s will be adult standards and modern nostalgia (sounds Jack-ish), while Golden West’s is to be contemporary rock.
Of course, with approvals come denials. The list of companies denied their applications are as follows:
Touch Canada Broadcasting (in Calgary and Lethbridge)
Larsen’s company’s Calgary application
Evanov Radio Group
Calgary Independent Radio Broadcasters Inc.
Jim Pattison Broadcast Group Ltd.
Yadwinder S. Sivia
Golden West Broadcasting (in Airdrie)
Newcap Inc. (in Airdrie and Lethbridge)
Vista Radio (in Calgary and Lethbridge)
Commissioner Helen Ray del Val, however, dissented with the Calgary decision, saying the market could support five new stations, not just four, and that the Pattison app for an easy listening station should have been approved.
Licensing five new stations instead of only four would not have had an unduly negative impact on the incumbent stations because… objective measures indicate that the Calgary radio market is exceedingly healthy… it is unlikely that the PBIT margin of the incumbent Calgary stations would have been unduly eroded; and… it is unlikely that the impact on the revenues of the incumbent Calgary stations would have been unduly negative," she wrote.
"This is particularly so where Rawlco, one of the new entrants, is being licensed in the specialty format and is expected to attract an audience share of only between 2% and 4%."
And, if four’s the maximum, she would have denied the Newcap application instead, were it up to her. "Assuming that the Calgary radio market could only sustain four new stations Pattison should have been licensed instead of Newcap for the following reasons: Even if the two applications were of equal quality, licensing Pattison would have capitalized on the opportunity created by the health of the Calgary market and the caliber of the competing applications. The conditions were ideal for introducing new radio voices and increasing competition. Approving Pattison would have added another new voice with the means to compete effectively as a standalone station in the Calgary market. By contrast, awarding a second station to the incumbent Newcap further consolidates ownership in a market where radio ownership is already concentrated and worsens the competitive imbalance for several standalone stations in that market," she wrote.
