Levine: CBS Violating FCC Rules With KFRG Simulcast

Illegal HD3 Broadcast?

MOUNT WILSON FM BROADCASTERS owner SAUL LEVINE has complained to the FCC about what he considers a violation of the FCC's rules by CBS RADIO. 

CBS airs its Country KFRG (K-FROG 95.1)/SAN BERNARDINO-RIVERSIDE on an HD-3 multicast channel of Smooth Jazz KTWV (94.7 THE WAVE)/LOS ANGELES, and LEVINE tells LARADIO.COM that he has filed a complaint with the Commission about the competition to his own Country KKGO (GO COUNTRY 105.1)/LOS ANGELES, saying, "I don’t sit kindly about what CBS is doing with K-FROG. It is a mean-spirited thing and we’ve determined what they are doing is not permissible. I have signed off and we are filing a petition with the FCC on FRIDAY morning (10/23) complaining that CBS RADIO is putting KFRG on a LOS ANGELES HD channel." 

LEVINE believes that CBS is already over the ownership limit because it owns two TV stations in the LOS ANGELES market, CBS affiliate KCBS-TV (CBS 2) and independent KCAL-TV, and has not divested any of its seven radio stations in the market.

"They have violated an FCC rule about bringing in an outside station into the market," LEVINE says of CBS. "It becomes attributed to the number of stations you own. They are using the HD band as a translator and you can’t use a translator to extend the station’s primary coverage outside its primary coverage. K-FROG’s signal reaches just east of downtown L.A. It is not allowed."

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