Radio Movimiento Moves To The Left
On November 22nd, 800 Radio Movimiento listeners packed into the Woodburn High School commons to celebrate the second anniversary of full-time broadcast on KPCN-LP, PCUN's low-power FM radio station.
The celebration marked another historic occasion: KPCN-LP's broadcast frequency change from 96.3 to 95.9 FM. On November 22nd, Radio Movimiento moved to the left...on the radio dial, at least.
The robust turnout is yet more evidence of Radio Movimiento's success in building a loyal audience in the Latino community around Woodburn. The entertainment provided without charge by a half dozen bands was a big draw. The event, promoted entirely via Radio Movimiento, served more serious purposes as well.
For example, hundreds signed petitions calling for an end to deployment of Oregon National Guard soldiers to Iraq and Afghanistan, part of a campaign coordinated by Peace and Justice Works, aiming to deliver thousands of signatures to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski on January 21, 2009.
PCUN turns back "Move-in" Threat
Implementing the frequency change culminated PCUN's successful defense of KPCN-LP's very existence. As reported in past PCUN Update editions, a full-power commercial station filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in February 2007 seeking to move into KPCN-LP's broadcast territory, threatening, in effect, to silence Radio Movimiento.
A vigorous legal and organizing campaign pressured the FCC to freeze the petition (and dozens of others like it around the country prompted by an FCC corporate-friendly rule change) in September 2007. PCUN and Horizon Broadcasting Group, owner of KWLZ in Central Oregon, negotiated a settlement in February which the FCC approved in August 2008. Under the settlement, KPCN-LP moved to 95.9.
Radio Movimiento's move "left" also shifted KPCN-LP's broadcast territory to the south, now reaching into northern parts of Salem and Keizer. Given that PCUN has thousands of members and Latino supporters in those communities, beaming our signal into these areas offers valuable new opportunities.
At the celebration, we debuted the re-designed Radio Movimiento logo, T-shirt, bumper sticker and cap. "We're thrilled to have such solid community support and participation," declared station co-manager Marlen Torres. "We wouldn't be here celebrating if it weren't for all the volunteer programmers, for our funders and underwriters, and for the professionals like our lawyer, Michael Couzens and technical engineer Gray Ferguson Haertig."
Marlen specificially cited the support of the Funding Exchange's Media Justice Fund which recently approved a $20,000 capacity building grant. In April 2007, the New York-based foundation made an emergency grant to help the KPCN-LP defense effort. Funding Exchange has invested $70,000 in Radio Movimiento, starting in 2006.
In Radio Movimiento's third year of life, we plan to take a more active role in efforts nationally to defend and expand community media including legislation and regulatory reform which a new administration and Congress may now make achievable. Among those changes is strengthening the rights of low-power noncommercial stations like KPCN-LP and expanding the availability of noncommercial licenses.
The life of a station like KPCN-LP is challenging enough without having to fight just to save it!
-- From the Fall 2008 PCUN Newsletter
