It’s a transaction hinted at in a press release released Sunday evening by Cumulus Media pertaining to two audio brands serving Atlanta radio listeners. What that announcement didn’t note was that an asset sale has been agreed to by the company that recently attained U.S. Bankruptcy Court approval of its second restructuring plan in a decade.
An Assignment of Authorization filing appearing in the FCC’s LMS as of late Sunday confirms that the company led by CEO Mary Berner has signed off on the divestment of W250BC at 97.9 MHz in Atlanta, as well as WWFN-FM in Marion, S.C., and WWFF-FM in New Market, Ala.
The buyer is Radio Training Network, parent of Christian-themed noncommercial audio brands The Joy FM, HIS Radio and individual radio stations in a pair of Southeast markets. A $2.45 million price has been agreed to by the parties, with a $122,500 escrow deposit paid to Cumulus by RTN.
Todd Fowler of Fowler Media Consulting in Mount Pleasant, S.C., served as the broker in this transaction, representing RTN.
W250BC, with 250 watts of power, uses a transmitter on a American Tower Corp. site in Northeast Atlanta to cover nearly the entire metropolitan area with a city-grade signal. Today, it is the home of “OG, ATL’s Classic Hip Hop.” This service will relocate to W255CJ at 98.9 MHz, which uses a smaller directional signal at the same site to reach Atlanta listeners, and WWWQ-FM 99.7’s HD2 channel. In turn, the simulcast of Classic Alternative WNNX “99X” on W255CJ and WWWQ HD2 will cease, leaving the main Class C2 signal on 100.5 MHz as the sole broadcast home for the station.
WWFF serves the Huntsville, Ala., market, and boasts a Class C2 signal that today airs gold-based Country music under the “NASH Icon” brand.
WWFN, formerly WQPD (these call letters, last used in 2023, appear in the LMS filing incorrectly), is at 100.5 MHz, and is a Class C3 Sports Talker serving Florence, S.C. from the north, reaching such communities along the I-95 corridor as Dillon, S.C., and much of Lumberton, S.C.
Terms call for Cumulus to continue to provide electricity to W250BC, with RTN reimbursing the company “for its allocatable share thereof on a monthly basis.”
Serving as RTN’s legal counsel is A. Wray Fitch of Gammon & Grange.
