Four St. Louis Radio Stations Deleted

Pogo

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Dec 7, 2012
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Not one, not two, not three but FOUR St. Louis AM radio stations have now been shut down as of March 20.
Licenses canceled:

● KFTK-AM 1490 (1972-2020) East St. Louis IL, 1000 watts day/night, with FM translator in St. Louis;​
● WQQW-AM 1590 Highland, IL (1998-2019) 1000 watts daytime only;​
● KQQZ-AM 1190 Fairview Heights IL (1968-2020) 10,000 W day/650W night​
● KZQZ-AM 1430 St. Louis (1922-2020) 50,000 W day / 5kW night​

(Radio World March 20)
>> The Federal Communications Commission has stepped in and stripped away operation authority from the owner of four AM radio stations in St. Louis, thereby deleting the stations from existence after a years-long series of enquiries into alleged violations of commission rules.​
In a ruling reported by the FCC on March 20, the commission said Administrative Law Judge Jane Hinckley Halprin permanently dismissed the applications to renew and the consent to assign licenses of four AM radio stations in the St. Louis area — KFTK(AM), WQQW(AM), KZQZ(AM) and KQQZ(AM). The application to renew and assign had been requested by Entertainment Media Trust (EMT).​
But according to the commission, EMT was allegedly actually controlled by Robert S. “Bob” Romanik, a shock jock convicted of obstruction of justice and bank fraud. According to FCC rules, persons convicted of felonies involving dishonesty are generally disqualified from holding attributable interests in broadcast licenses. <<​
The complaint to the FCC from 2012 can be read here.

Background on Romanik from the St. Louis Riverfront Times last summer:

>> The Federal Communications Commission says its investigation found "significant evidence" that the radio host is the true owner of four metro area radio stations, something they say he has clumsily concealed for years.​
Romanik always put someone else's name — his lawyer, his late son, his girlfriend — on the paperwork for the ownership company, Entertainment Media Trust, as it bought up stations KFTK-AM (formerly WQQX-AM), WQQW-AM, KZQZ-AM and KQQZ-AM.​
But Romanik has been the face of the stations, where he has distinguished himself in the crowded St. Louis market by repeatedly saying the n-word on air. He was the one who put up the money for the stations and helped negotiate the deals, according to the FCC.​
That kind of maneuvering might sound familiar to anyone tracing Romanik's career path over the past couple of decades through the gutters of the Metro East. Romanik pleaded guilty in 1999 to federal bank fraud for his straw-man applications to land banks loans for a pair of strip clubs.​
He had previously pleaded guilty in a separate case involving an illegal video gambling operation run by former East Side heavyweight Thomas Venezia and politically powerful attorney Amiel Cueto. Federal prosecutors described Romanik as the muscle, installed as Washington Park's police chief by the city's crooked mayor to protect the gambling enterprise.​
"They said I lied 150 times to a grand jury," Romanik told the Riverfront Times in 2012. "I probably lied 600 times. I wasn't going to give up my friend. If you're a man, you don't give up your friends." <<​

Here's an example of IRresponsible operation of a public trust license in stark contrast to my last media thread.

The last named station was one of four radio licenses to be granted to St. Louis in 1922 to the local Benwood Company

375px-Benwood_Company_radio_studio_-10February1922.jpg

Got a few million bucks lying around? Here's an opportunity to get on the air.
 
FM band here is too crowded......got stations walking on other stations signals inside the metro loop
 

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