willdav713 said:
I have a really burning question to ask about this: I am sort of new to NPR and Non Commercial Radio talk here:
Can a non profit station I will use as an example, KUT 90.5 if they had a second FM say on 98.9 be non profit from 6am to midnight, and the same frequency be a commercial station from midnight to 6am in some sort of Local Marketing Agreement?
A station holds either a commercial license (which allows it to sell airtime) or a non-commercial license. (which doesn't allow it to sell airtime) A single license must be one or the other -- must be either commercial all the time, or non-commercial all the time.
- A station holding a commercial license *may* sell airtime. It isn't *required* to sell airtime. I suppose 98.9 could choose not to sell any time between 6am and midnight. However, as PTBoardOp94 says, there are some advantages to holding a non-commercial license. Having a commercial license & choosing to not sell airtime isn't the same thing.
- It is possible for two stations to share the same frequency. There are two different licenses. For example, commercial station KUTA might broadcast on 98.9 between 6am and midnight, while non-commercial KUTB uses the frequency between midnight and 6am. Indeed, this happened on two frequencies in Kansas: commercial station WIBW, Topeka shared the 580 AM frequency with a non-commercial station in Manhattan; and commercial station WREN shared 1250 AM with a non-commercial station in Lawrence.
(in both cases, the commercial stations ended up buying out the non-commercial operations; both frequencies are now commercial 24/7)
- There is nothing to prevent the same organization from owning both commercial and non-commercial stations. For example, Chicago's public TV station WTTW owns commercial FM station WFMT.
- Don't confuse "non-profit" and "non-commercial". My understanding is that it's legal for a non-profit corporation to own a commercial broadcasting station, as long as any profits from the commercial station are plowed back into the operation of the non-profit organization. Indeed, it's my understanding that's what's going on in Chicago: the profits from the operation of WFMT help finance the operation of non-commercial WTTW.