The CRTC last week approved an application from UFV Campus and Community Radio Society to operate a new FM transmitter in Chilliwack, B.C., to rebroadcast programming from its English-language campus radio station CIVL-FM, located at the University of the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, B.C.
Operating at 92.3 MHz, the new transmitter will allow UFV to broadcast relevant programming to the university’s students, faculty and staff residing in Chilliwack, the location of its second campus, and the surrounding community.
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By Ahmad Hathout
The News Forum allegedly entered into an affiliation agreement with Rogers knowing that the CRTC may grant it mandatory distribution, so it is inappropriate for the national news service to now ask the regulator to revisit the terms of that 2021 agreement after it was granted must-offer status, Rogers argues.
The ad-based service “understood the commercial implications of the Affiliation Agreement and was aware of the regulatory environment under which that Agreement would operate, and agreed to a period,” Rogers said in its April 14 response to The News Forum’s application to the CRTC…
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The CRTC in an April 8 letter has directed Iristel to make payments past due to Bell that the far north telecom provider had been withholding in response to an interconnection dispute between the two companies.
The commission has told Iristel to pay the amounts owed to Bell based on the payment plan proposed by Iristel in a Part 1 application it filed with the CRTC in March. The commission’s requirements regarding these payments have been provided in confidence to Iristel and Bell, and have not been made public.
In addition, the…
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In two unrelated broadcasting decisions published Monday, the CRTC has approved Local Radio Lab’s acquisition of Vista Radio’s CJFB-FM Bolton station, and Blackburn Media-owned CFCO Chatham’s conversion to the FM band.
In the case of CJFB-FM in Bolton, Ont., new owner Local Radio Lab is expected to devote at least five per cent of the station’s musical selections in each broadcast week to selections from Canadian emerging artists. In addition, the broadcast regulator expects CJFB-FM to include indigenous musical selections on its playlist. Local Radio Lab is required to report annually on how…
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By Connie Thiessen
John Meisel, who served as the chair of the CRTC from 1979 to 1983, has passed away at the age of 101.
According to an obituary published in the Kingston Whig Standard this week, the Queen’s University Professor Emeritus died peacefully on March 30.
Born in Vienna, Austria to Jewish Czech parents, the Meisel family was sent abroad by the Bata Shoe Company where Meisel’s father worked, as the Nazi occupation loomed. Jewish employees were dispatched to other Bata facilities, taking Meisel to the Netherlands, Morocco and Haiti before arriving in Canada in 1942.
He attended Ottershaw College in the…
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The CRTC announced Friday its hearing on the definition of Canadian content for audio platforms will occur starting September 18.
The regulator originally scheduled the hearing for June 18 but postponed it – as well as two other hearings collectively called “The Path Forward” consultations on the implementation of the new Broadcasting Act – to accommodate the caretaker convention during the federal election period.
The convention limits the regulator’s ability to launch new regulatory initiatives and engage stakeholders.
As such, and after requests from parties, the regulator also extended the intervention deadline from April 7 to May 5 for the…
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Telco suggests ‘rare’ use of subpoena power if AG doesn’t hand over materials
By Ahmad Hathout
Last month, Canada’s attorney general (AG) filed a motion to strike as moot an application filed by Telus in December that asked the Federal Court to quash a cabinet order that asked the CRTC to reconsider allowing the three largest telecoms to use the fibre facilities of Bell and Telus in Ontario and Quebec.
The AG argues that, because the CRTC declined to change the interim decision after a proceeding on that order, Telus’s application – which alleges that cabinet…
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The CRTC on Monday announced new dates for two of the broadcasting hearings it recently postponed after the federal election was called last week.
The public hearing focused on the definition of Canadian content will now start May 14 in Gatineau, while the hearing concerned with creating a sustainable Canadian broadcasting system is scheduled to begin June 18.
A new date for a third hearing, related to supporting Canadian and indigenous audio content, has not yet been announced. It had previously been scheduled to start June 18, before…
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The CRTC’s triad of “The Path Forward” broadcasting public hearings on defining Canadian content, creating a sustainable Canadian broadcasting system, and supporting Canadian and indigenous audio content are all being postponed as a result of the April 28 federal election that was called Sunday by Prime Minister Mark Carney.
The three hearings were originally scheduled to begin March 31, May 12 and June 18, respectively.
With the federal election now underway, the CRTC said Monday it is postponing the hearings while the federal public service operates under the “ Continue Reading
The CRTC has informed the Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) via a letter that the commission will not rescind and reissue its Broadcasting Notice of Consultation 2025-52 on modernizing its policies for radio and audio streaming in Canada.
Earlier this month, the CAB had asked the CRTC to start over on the consultation, saying the commission’s preliminary views expressed in its call for comments effectively affirmed a regulatory status quo, including maintaining existing music quotas on commercial radio stations, while also increasing their obligations with respect to emerging and indigenous…
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