News

Albany, Georgia's first-ever radio station, WGPC-AM, is gone for good. The station went dark on January 2 after a big storm came through town twisting its tower to pieces and depositing three trees in the studio. WALB-TV reports that Cumulus has surrendered the license back to the FCC. WGPC signed on in 1933, and was Albany's only radio station until 1941.

It only took six months for former City Council president Monica Conyers to lose her weekday afternoon hosting job on WDFD-AM in Detroit. The Detroit Free Press reports that Conyers was fired for violation of corporate policy. Conyers disputes what the radio station claims and says she left on her own and did not want to be associated with the station any longer.

14 Representatives and 2 Senators have joined as cosponsors of a resolution the NAB has been pushing that opposes "any new performance fee, tax, royalty, or other charge" on local radio stations. The Local Radio Freedom Act now has 156 cosponsors in the House and 17 in the Senate. Here are the latest Washington lawmakers that are now on your side...

The station won five awards for Excellence in Broadcasting from the Pennsylvania Association of Broadcasters. WBEB won for outstanding achievements in radio and television across the state of Pennsylvania. Here's a list of the awards the station took home...

Westwood One will be broadcasting the upcoming NCAA Men’s Final Four in Spanish, the championship’s first-ever Spanish language broadcast on any platform. The event will be produced by Westwood One an ESPN Deportes. The trio of Rafael Hernández Brito, Greivis Vásquez, and Clemson Smith Muñiz will announce all the action.

CRS 2017 was a huge success as well as a cornucopia of valuable information. Now available to CRS 2017 registrants, the panel sessions and educational handouts from this year’s event are online for streaming. To access them, registrants should visit www.CountryRadioSeminar.com and log in using the username and password they created upon registering.

EJ Foxx has joined Adams Radio of Delmarva as midday host on “Your Country, 107.7 WKHI. A longtime Maryland and Washington DC native, Foxx has over 10 years experience as a PD and has worked at WASH FM in DC and on the air in Baltimore with WMAR TV.

Triton Digital announced on Tuesday that the company has expanded its Webcast Metrics’ online audience monthly rankers to Latin America. The first-ever ranker for Latin America was released Tuesday.

As our socio-political climate becomes one constant monsoon, ABC Radio is launching a podcast to give voice to the disparate views being shouted through the tumult. ABC News’ Amna Nawaz new podcast is called Uncomfortable and she will be going head-to-head with influential voices in America to tackle some of the country’s most divisive issues.

Starting in 1985, Radio Martí broadcast Spanish-language news into communist Cuba. According to The Miami Herald 26-year-old Oscar Barcelo started with the station that year and stayed for 13, including eight as PD. Barcelo then went on to work for Voice of America in Miami for 18 years. He died of cancer March 4. Picture courtesy Miami Herald.