FORSETH – How many more nails will be hammered into the coffin of radio?

I’M ANGRY!

Yah … I guess maybe I’m a grumpy old man, although I’m only 68, but is the Canadian Radio and Television Commission (CRTC) not going to quit until there is nothing left of “local” media in small and medium markets across the country – including right here in B.C.?

How many more nails is the Canadian Radio and Television Commission (CRTC) going to allow to be hammered into radio in Canada?

Luckily for me, I was able to be part of a proud industry in what was for me its heyday … a 25-year span in the late ’60s to the early ’90s, and all in smalltown British Columbia – Williams Lake in fact (although I did spend another 10 years in radio in Kamloops).

As a 14-year-old kid I walked into Cariboo Radio’s CKWL studios, ready to become an on-air personally (back then we were still called DJ’s), and my best friend’s dad and station manager, Bob Leckie (awarded the Broadcast Citizen of the Year award by the B.C. Association of Broadcasters in 1978) actually said he’d give me a shot.

And boy did he ever! I considered him to be one of the best mentors I ever had, teaching me everything there was to know about radio from in front of, to behind, the microphone.

In addition to being on-air as a DJ, I also read and wrote news, sold airtime for commercials — as well as writing and producing them, and even developing and producing radio programs. He also taught me management skills, which I was using many years later in Kamloops. And from CKWL / Cariboo Radio, I moved on to CFFM Super Country also in Williams Lake – a unique from the ground start-up that I was lucky to be part of.

For me it was indeed the golden age of radio, where every small town had its own radio station – many staffed with local people – and it was live pretty much 18 hours a day. Those people were all plugged into the community – especially its clubs and organizations – so they knew what was going on – and they kept listeners informed and involved in community happenings.

Today’s stations?  Not so much.

Many are lucky if they have someone live in the studio for 6 hours a day — usually in the morning (6 to 9 or 10) and afternoon drive shift from 3 or 4 in the afternoon to 6 p.m.

The rest of the time?  Well, it’s automated.

Somebody (often not even in the same community) has recorded on computer all of the voice parts needed for an air shift, and the computer then syncs them up with the music, news, and commercials for the middle of the day and the evening.

You can tell when it’s automated if you know what to listen for. During automated times you will never hear an actual time check (IE: ‘It’s 3:29 and coming up in 60 seconds we’ll have a quick look at news.’).  You’ll also never hear the actual temperature; sure, they’ll give you a weather forecast but you won’t hear what the actual temperature is at that moment – that’s because it was recorded hours earlier.

Sadly around 40 to 50 years ago, local community radio stations were bought up by larger market stations, those in turn were bought up by even larger regional networks. This kept compounding until companies in several provinces would own dozens of radio (and TV) stations, which then were swallowed up into companies that were right across Canada. And in many communities, multiple stations are owned by the same company, or companies.

A good example is here in Kamloops with Stingray owning CHNL, Country 103 and K-97.5 … and the Jim Pattison Broadcast Group with CIFM, B-100, and CFJC-TV.

EVERY STEP OF THE WAY … including the Cariboo where I grew up, staff and news departments were reduced and gutted, community programing reduced, and hours of local program eliminated.

Just a week ago, Bell Media axed 100’s upon 100’s of jobs as they shuttled multiple radio stations, and consolidated newsrooms. They weren’t the first, nor was it the first time Bell has done so, and it also won’t be the last time this happens.

AND NOW COMES THIS NEWS.

Broadcast Dialogue, the voice of Canada’s broadcast industry since 1992, noted on Friday that Bell Media was asking to have the following Conditions of License (COL) eliminated immediately:

• Locally Reflective News—Expenditures: the COL requiring that Bell Media’s English-language television stations shall in each broadcast year devote to the acquisition of or investment in locally reflective news 11% of the previous broadcast year’s gross revenues of the undertaking; and that Bell Media’s French-language television stations shall in each broadcast year devote to the acquisition of or investment in locally reflective news at least 5% of the previous year’s gross revenues of the undertaking.
• Locally Reflective News—Exhibition: all COLs requiring the exhibition of specific amounts of locally reflective news during each broadcast week in both English- and French-language metropolitan and non-metro markets.
• Local Programming—Exhibition: the COL requiring Bell Media’s English-language television stations broadcast in metropolitan markets no less than 14 hours of local programming in each broadcast week; and the licence requirement requiring that Bell Media’s French-language television station CFJP-DT Montréal broadcast at least 8 hours and 30 minutes of local programming in each broadcast week.

Those Conditions of Licensing (COL) were often times put in place when the CRTC allowed these big companies and conglomerates to buy up smaller / mid-sized stations and smaller networks.

They were put in place to ensure at least a modicum of local program remained in place.

IF the CRTC allows this to happen, other large broadcast media companies will naturally ask for the same thing, and what this will do is rip the guts out of any, and all, news programing in local market radio stations – and especially in this instance, those Bell Media has acquired in smaller markets, and in all regions of British Columbia … those include:

Northern BC: Ft. St. John, Dawson Creek, Ft. Nelson

Central Interior and North Coast: Kitimat, Prince Rupert, Terrace

Okanagan / Shuswap: Penticton, Salmon Arm, Summerland, Vernon

Kootenay / Rockies: Nelson, Golden, Revelstoke

In other markets (Kelowna, Victoria, and Vancouver), having stiff competition, will hopefully(?) keep local news production at, or close to, former levels.

In its request to have their COL’s eliminated immediately, Bell is actually making the argument that having more flexibility will allow it to better serve its local audiences.

That’s a load of bull – – it, because every step of the way, over several decades, Bell, Rogers, and other media giants have done nothing but eliminate staff and programming.

How can it possibly, with a straight face, says that eliminating their conditions of license will allow them to provide better service. I say, prove how that will work BEFORE they are allowed to eliminate those conditions.

Better yet, the CRTC should outright refuse this request.

IF the Bell Media cannot, or will not, agree to maintain the conditions placed upon them as license holders for the radio and TV station they own, then give them one and only one option.

Turn in their licenses!

That way perhaps small market stations can once again be owned and operated from within their own communities, and much smaller network (as in the past) can be put together.

That will be my hope, but the sensible part of me says the CRTC will cave, and the final nails will be driven into radio in some of the communities I have already mentioned.

They be little more than complete syndicated and computer generated programing – in which case their audiences will continue bleeding into smaller and smaller numbers.

It didn’t have to be this way … but it’s sad the CRTC – in my opinion – allowed it to happen.

In Kamloops, I’m Alan Forseth … I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Alan Forseth is a Kamloops resident. For 40 years he has been active, in a number of capacities, in local, provincial and federal politics, including running as a candidate for the BC Reform Party in the 1996 provincial election. He more recently was involved in the BC Liberal leadership campaign.