Radio and Television Transactions

In an update to a television station sale originally reported Sept. 26 by RBR+TVBR's TRANSACTIONS TODAY, a Savannah-market station is trading hands. It is now known that two translator stations are included in the deal — and the buyer is getting the properties thanks to a top bid in a U.S. Bankruptcy Court auction precipitated by the seller's Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

Call it a rainbow of radio flavors, or a checkerboard cornucopia of unique programming. Whatever you consider WATB-AM in the Atlanta suburb of Decatur, consider it gone in a matter of months — unless the station's soon-to-be new owner decides to leave the multi-genre multicultural facility's mission, and lineup, intact.

Here's a deal that has a value that's likely less than your lunch bill. A 3kw Class A FM serving a rural community of Alaska south of Juneau is heading to a new owner. The total value of the transaction is a mere $10.

The owner of the main PBS member station in the Windy City has snatched a "zombie" station. That's because the "station" it is acquiring no longer exists, and is now operating via a Channel Sharing Agreement (CSA) with another station in Chicago. That station just happens to be owned by the company lassoing this former competitor in the non-commercial TV space.

In the world famous ski town of Snowmass Village, Colo., is a 23-watt FM translator that until recently has served as a rebroadcast partner of "The Range," a Classic Country station. Programming has shifted to another translator, with a slightly bigger coverage area, from nearby Aspen. As a result, the owner of the 23-watter is giving the facility away.

Blame it on the red eye? Many of the top communications lawyers and most of the industry's leading brokers arrived home from the 2018 NAB Show in Las Vegas on Thursday. This could explain why two translator deals are the lone subject of conversation in TRANSACTIONS TODAY from RBR+TVBR for April 12.

In Colorado is a radio station with a booming Class D signal that stretches to the New Mexico border in the south all the way to the Wyoming border in the north. It also boasts a valuable FM translator that puts a signal right over its primary market. Locals need not ask if the "Blazin'" programming currently heard will be torched by the new owner.

Between the Texas cities of Galveston and Victoria is Bay City, and Matagorda County. Here, a Class C3 facility designed to make people feel good is being sold. The buyer is already giving this FM a little "TLC," and it's our top deal in TRANSACTIONS TODAY for July 5, 2018.

A "hometown" Class C3 facility in the Land of 10,000 Lakes is being sold, and the buyer is another entity based in the state of Minnesota. This deal includes a consulting fee and a promissory note, giving the owner possession of his second radio station. The other property is a small AM adjacent to the Twin Cities.

A Kentucky 'Tiger' has been sold to a 'Ham' of an operator. A licensee led by Ted Tucker is parting ways with an Idaho FM, following this entity's  May 2017 Consent Decree with the FCC to resolve a matter involving the failure to operate stations in Arizona for more than a handful of days over a period of several years. These are the two deals described in detail in TRANSACTIONS TODAY.

The privately held owner of an AM/FM combo in a town south of Wichita has just filed a Form 315 with the FCC requesting the approval of an internal stock purchase. This will put the company fully in control of an individual who is making the acquisitions from the heirs of the individual whose untimely passing necessitated the lone deal up for discussion in TRANSACTIONS TODAY.

In September 2017, TRANSACTIONS TODAY reported on the sale of a silent FM translator serving a popular Montana winter resort town. It appears this facility remains dark, and the individual who bought the translator some 15 months ago has just sold it to a university.

Behind the "Redwood Curtain" lies Humboldt County, Calif., famously known as the "greenest" part of the Golden State for its marijuana industry and its tall trees of grandeur. It's also home to a Class C1 noncomm Educational Media Foundation is selling. There's a likely explanation for the divestment.

In the final weeks of 2018, Tejas Broadcasting agreed to sell a Class C1 FM on the Texas Gulf Coast to Educational Media Foundation. The station it is diplexed with was then sold in a different deal, along with a Class A FM. Now, that deal has closed, and Tejas is out of radio.

A 100kw FM serving the Grand Junction, Colo., market from high atop a mountain peak some two hours to the north of the city is being sold. The buyer has a major presence along the western slope of the Rocky Mountains.