Headlines

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is partnering with Univision to host the annual St. Jude Promesa y Esperanza (Promise and Hope) radio event Thursday and Friday.

A hearing over iHeartMedia's debt began in State District Judge Catherine Striker's court in San Antonio Monday. iHeart is suing 15 bondholders who, the company says, are trying to force it into bankruptcy by triggering bond defaults that would require $15 billion of its $20 billion debt to be repaid quickly. The bondholders do not like that iHeart set up a subsidiary called Broader Media and transferred 100 million privately traded shares of Clear Channel Outdoor. They say its a shell company and they want the shares returned to the Outdoor division. At the hearing, iHeartMedia Senior VP and Treasurer Brian Coleman said the transfer is part of a strategy called "Project Indigo."

And that includes keeping Ronn Owens in his original timeslot (minus one hour) and not moving him to KSFO. Cumulus says the change in plans was due to "listener outcry."

The National Association of Broadcasters Education Foundation has announced the winners of the 2016 Celebration of Service to America Awards. The awards recognize outstanding community service and the winners will be honored at a dinner in Washington, D.C., June 21. Cox Radio Miami won the award for individual campaigns, projects or programs, and CBS Radio in Southfield, MI, won the Service to Children award.

The Telos Alliance - parent company of 25-Seven, makers of the Voltair Watermark Monitor and Processor - has announced the release of Voltair Data Export Licenses. The company says this new feature will help broadcasters get a comprehensive minute-by-minute understanding of exactly which programming is not encoding well in PPM.

Media Services Group tells Radio Ink that High Plains Radio Network in Plainview, Texas, is buying three stations in Altus, Oklahoma -- KEYB-FM, KJOK-FM, and KKRE-FM -- from Altus FM, owned by Paul and Scott Wilmes, for $750,000.

The religion-focused broadcaster picks up Bob Carlson's Retirement Watch newsletter and accompanying website retirementWatch.com. Written by Bob Carlson, Retirement Watch offers independent research and advice about retirement planning. Carlson is also the author of Invest Like a Fox…Not Like a Hedgehog and The New Rules of Retirement.

(by Bob McCurdy) Simon and Garfunkel were on to something when they wrote The Sound of Silence. Maybe we can learn something from them and their #1 hit. A couple of seconds of “silence” strategically placed within a Radio commercial could greatly enhance the effectiveness of the remaining 27 seconds.

Consultant Richard Harker was not impressed with Nielsen's last press barrage touting the new and improved enhanced CBET. Harker has been very critical of PPM, especially since Telos' Voltair hit the market. And, in his latest blog, he continues to apply the pressure on the ratings firm. He called Nielsen’s press release "pure Orwellian doublespeak essentially bragging about improvements to a technology that Nielsen and before that Arbitron claimed was virtually perfect. Then Voltair showed that it wasn’t true." Read the new Harker blog HERE...