The FCC has made a decision in the Orange County, CA MX Group #34 which involved four LPFM stations seeking to operate on 104.7 in Orange County and nearby Corona, California.
Within this group, two of the applicants had filed a time share agreement to aggregate their points.
A Petition to Deny was filed by LC Media, LP. LC Media is the licensee of two full-power co-channel stations on 104.7. All 4 LPFM applicants are the appropriate distances from the full power stations.
In their petition, LC Media claims that when an LPFM station seeks a waiver of the second adjacent channel spacing, that they are required by the Local Community Radio Act (LCRA) to protect all radio stations. LC Media claims that due to the geography of Orange County and based on Longley/Rice studies, the proposed LPFM stations in Orange County will cause interference to the listeners to the two full power stations.
In denying the Petition to Deny, the FCC states that the interpretation of the LCRA is that the provision in Section 3 that states that an LPFM station under a second adjacent channel waiver must not cause interference to any radio service is limited to those radio services on second adjacent channels and does not extend new protections to co-channel or first-adjacent channel.
As a result, the applications for Centro Cultural de Mexico en el Condano de Orange and Latino Center for Prevention & Action in Health & Welfare are the winners of MX Group #34.
With this decision, we believe that the FCC will soon issue a similar decision in Pasadena, California for the LPFM application of Razorcake/Gorsky Press, the lone applicant from MX Group #58 who is seeking to use 92.7. In this case, Educational Media Foundation made a similar argument about the reach of the LCRA to provide additional co-channel protections if a second adjacent channel waiver is granted. In this case, there is overlap of the service contour of KYLA(FM) Fountain Valley and the interference contour of the proposed LPFM despite the LPFM being at legal distance. In this case, REC had filed stating that the commercial FM radio rules specifically permit overlap by LPFM stations if the minimum distance separations are met. REC had also further stated that due to the terrain of Southern California, there is no way that a 100-watt foothill FM station in Pasadena could cause interference to a Class-A station in Orange County.
This leaves MX decisions still looming in San Francisco, Baltimore and the big one for Los Angeles on 101.5 FM.
