Abstract

The Rockland Radio Revolution

The author reports on the emergence of a new form of local, community-based radio that defies the trend towards media consolidation. Three years ago, Joe Steinberger, a city councilor in Rockland, Maine, decided to do something about the dearth of local media in his town. After initial efforts to give voters livelier coverage failed, he learned about a Federal Communications Commission initiative then being debated in Washington: low-power FM radio (LPFM). In an age of increasingly consolidated media, in which commercial broadcasters blast thousands of watts over dozens of miles, LPFM stations are 100-watt operations, each with an effective radius of 3.5 miles. They are noncommercial by definition and vibrantly local by nature. Costing as little as $6,000 to build, they are beacons of grassroots democracy.Today, with thirty-five volunteer deejays, the sponsorship of thirty-four local businesses (monthly operating costs are only $500) and more than half the city listening, WRFR is Rockland's only completely locally programmed station and one of the most active LPFM stations in the country. Shunning the canned programming approach of Rockland's two Clear Channel stations, WRFR offers an array of local talent, tastes and interests, and was recently named Maine station of the year by a state music association. Just five years ago, the FCC would have out-lawed WRFR as a "pirate" broadcaster. Of the nation's 13,700 radio stations, more than 80 percent are commercial. In January 2000, then-FCC chairman William Kennard reversed twenty years of neglect of noncommercial community radio by authorizing LPFM. Many LPFM advocates still believe fear of competition was the true impetus behind NPR's and NAB's positions.