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August 5, 2009: In an op-ed in today's New York Daily News, Inner City Broadcasting Chairman Pierre Sutton lays out a case for emergency federal assistance for minority-owned broadcasters. Sutton cites the recent sales of WAMO/Pittsburgh and Spanish-language KLOK/San Jose, and writes, "Imagine how different New York City's history would have been -- or how difficult our future could be -- without African-American and Latino radio stations."

Sutton continues, "Perhaps you're thinking: Just about every industry under the sun is hurting during this deep recession, and the traditional media have been adapting and contracting over the course of many years. Why should minority-oriented radio stations get any special consideration or treatment? Because these radio stations -- which serve a vital and underappreciated role -- have been suffering economic body blow after body blow in the current crisis."

Sutton points to changes in radio ownership, the PPM controversy, and ad cutbacks for minority radio and says, "Black and Hispanic radio stations must not be allowed to go extinct." He says representatives of minority broadcasters are meeting today with Obama administration officials to ask for emergency assistance.

Sutton says the assistance could be granted under the Troubled Asset Relief Program and no new laws would need to be passed. He says, Minority radio stations aren't failing businesses begging for handouts; they're healthy enterprises, beset by a perfect storm of bad circumstances, that are in need of a lifeline."

Read the op-ed here.

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