Christian stations vie
for broadcast license

Kelly Henschel
CW Staf
khenschel@christianweek.org

KITCHENER, ON–Two Christian radio stations are pledging financial and material support to one another in their bids for "competing" broadcast licenses in Kitchener-Waterloo (KW).

FAITH FM doesn't yet exist as a full-fledged station, although the group behind the concept has been airing their one-hour "Sunday Sound of Faith" program on a Kitchener station for the past three years.

LIFE 100.3 FM has operated in Barrie, Ontario since 1999 (CW April3/01), offering Adult Contemporary and Aggressive Top 40 music. They made known a year and a half ago their intention to start a new station in the KW area.

Scott Jackson, station manager for LIFE 100.3, says he hadn't intended to apply for the KW license until later in the year, preferring to wait until the finances and the personnel were in place.

However, when the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) announced it was accepting applications in December, he knew he had to act quickly.

"It sort of forced my hand. I really didn't want to do it this soon, but I'm not going to miss out on the opportunity," he says. "This is really cool, because I believe it's God telling me 'Don't worry about the finances and don't worry about your station manager, go out on a step of faith and I'll open the door wide for you.' We know that God will provide."

Jackson posted a message to an online Christian radio newsletter in December, giving notice that LIFE was going ahead with the application for a full-power station. In the e-mail, he made reference to another application for a Christian station that had apparently been turned down by the CRTC.

That station was the proposal for FAITH FM, says David MacDonald, one of the hosts of the Sunday morning program and a member of the core group developing the station. FAITH FM was not turned down, he says, but had voluntarily withdrawn its first application to make amendments, with the full intention of re-applying.

"Our original approach was to have a community station, which would have opened the doors for secular special interest groups with conflicting principles," says MacDonald. "Some of these groups could have requested controversial programming on our station and we would have been obliged to give them air time."

FAITH FM is still very much in the picture and is applying for a religious specialty license for a low power 50-watt station, he says.

Jackson and MacDonald met in January and agreed to cooperate as both apply for the KW license. (A country western station is also vying for a license).

"Some people probably see it as competition, but the way we see it is we're giving the CRTC two Christian choices, which is better than only one Christian choice," says Jackson. "If FAITH FM gets the license, we'll be disappointed, but we have vowed to each other that we'll support each other."

If both stations are approved, the competitive factor will be a small one, says MacDonald, as LIFE is a full-power station while FAITH is low-power. "We're not really competitors. Even if we were both given a license, we would be able to co-exist because we're looking at different demographics."

"We feel that we have a really cooperative spirit and we're praying for God's will that one of us or maybe both of us will get the license. If both of us get the license, then KW will be served by two Christian stations and that's even better," says Jackson, adding it is a "slim chance, but possible."

If the CRTC approves the license applications, FAITH FM hopes to be operational by the end of 2002 and while the other new station (an as of yet undisclosed name) hopes to be running in September 2003.

More information is on the web at www.christianradiokw.com and www.faithfm.org.