Updated: FCC Issues $8k NAL To Clear Channel Over Unauthorized Transfer
November 23, 2009: The FCC's Enforcement Bureau has issued a notice of apparent liability for $8,000 to Clear Channel Broadcast Licenses, finding that Clear Channel's use of Clear Channel rate cards, EEO website postings, and PSAs on WOLL-FM/Ft. Pierce, FL after the station had been transferred to the Aloha Station Trust in 2008 constituted an unauthorized transfer of control.
The FCC says that, "standing alone, the rate cards, EEO website postings, and PSA might evidence carelessness and a lack of attention to detail rather than that Clear Channel actually controlled the personnel, programming, and finances of stations licensed to Aloha. However, coupled with the facts that Aloha operates its stations using staff also employed by Clear Channel and with equipment owned by Clear Channel, these post-assignment irregularities indicate that Clear Channel failed to exercise a proper degree of care to separate its stations from the Aloha stations in all cases. Accordingly, we find that the foregoing post-assignment activity by Clear Channel evidenced an unauthorized transfer of control warranting the assessment of a forfeiture."
Clear Channel EVP/Chief Legal Officer Andy Levin said, "Any violation of the terms of the Aloha Trust agreement by Clear Channel was unintentional, and we regret that it occurred. Clear Channel takes its responsibilities to the trust seriously, and we will redouble our effort to ensure that we are in compliance with all requirements."
The issue was raised in a petition to deny filed by Vero Beach Broadcasting in January of this year, when Clear Channel filed to reassign WOLL-FM, licensed to Hobe Sound, FL, back to Clear Channel from the Aloha Station Trust. Though it issued the NAL, the FCC disagreed with VBB's assertion that Clear Channel continued to run WOLL while it was in Aloha's hands as though the transfer had never happened.
The FCC has also granted the transfer of WOLL to Clear Channel and a construction permit to modify its facilities, and has also granted denied VBB's objections to applications for community-of-license changes for Clear Channel's WKGR-FM from Ft. Pierce to Wellington, FL, and for WLDI-FM from Ft. Pierce to Juno Beach and granted the applications.
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