Have you been wondering what's happening on 1470 AM in Estes Park lately? Well, we have too! Here's what we've been able to piece together.

The station went silent (off the air) on October 16, 2011.  It was sold to Kona Coast Radio, owned by Victor Michael, Jr. of Loveland, CO (the application was granted on December 29, 2011). Here is a copy of the FCC Ownership Report.

As far as we are able to determine, the station remained off the air throughout most of 2012. It appears that it signed back on for a couple of days beginning on September 18, 2012 (see the Resumption of Operations Notice). If the station had not signed back on, the license would have been cancelled after the special temporary authority (STA) allowing it to go silent had expired.

But then, apparently it went off the air again, as the owner filed a Request for Extension of the authority to remain silent on September 20, 2012. The reason given was the loss of the lease for the tower site at Mary's Lake. Kona Coast was given until March 24th, 2013 to bring the station back on the air. 

Well, Kona didn't get it back on. Instead, on April 29, 2013 Victor Michael filed another Request for Extension to allow the station to remain silent for another 180 days. This is a game that people often play, and unfortunately the FCC lets them get away with it..

Fast forward to July 2013-- where do things stand? As far as we know, the FCC never granted the above mentioned Request for Extension and the previous authorization to remain silent expired. However, the FCC Media Bureau records still show the station as "Licensed and Silent". As far as we know the station is still in "limbo". It is off the air, but the license has not been canceled. It remains to be seen if the FCC will act on the Request for Extension, or whether Kona Coast will succeed in getting the station back on the air by the end of July, 2013. We are doubtful.

On the one hand, we are not confident that Kona Coast is serious about getting the station back on the air. On the other hand, it would be a shame to lose the license. It would be ideal if a local Estes Park group would step up and buy the license from Kona and do something with it. Maybe something is going on behind the scenes, but we are not aware of it.

What are your thoughts on the future of 1470 AM radio in Estes Park? Do you think the station will eventually come back on the air? How important is it to the community? Back in the 1970's and 1980's, AM radio was much more important than it is today. At that time, KSIR was the dominant radio signal in Estes Park, but it was a daytime-only station. There were only a couple of weak FM translators of Denver stations. AM stations from Denver and the Front Range communities of Loveland and Fort Collins could be heard, but they were weak. Everyone in Estes Park listened to KSIR because it had great programming and because the station had the best signal.

If there is any group in Estes Park that believes it is important to once again have a locally-owned full-power commercial AM station in the town, this would be a good time to contact the current owner and discuss buying the license before it is lost. Once the station's license expires or is transferred elsewhere, it is very questionable whether Estes Park could ever get another allocation. 

Some background info: Kona Coast applied to the FCC to renew the station's license on December 5, 2012. Here is the Renewal Application. Meanwhile, a group of former KRBR station employees filed an Informal Objection to the transfer of ownership, but they apparently failed to submit it properly and the FCC was unaware of the objection until later. They treated it as a Petition for Reconsideration and denied it. Even if the objection to the transfer of ownership had been filed in a timely and proper manner, it is unlikely that it would have been granted. The FCC rarely grants informal petitions of any kind. In this case, the informal objection also relied on various unsubstantiated opinions, which even if valid would carry no legal weight.