Battle Continues over Who Should Get Minneapolis FM Upgrade

The battle over which suburban station should be allowed to move its transmitter to Minneapolis continues with new allegations over when the spectrum became legally available.

Park Public Radio’s KPPS-LP/97.5 (St. Louis Park) and Central Baptist Theological Seminary’s K250BY/97.9 (Plymouth) both sought upgrades after the license of KQEP-LP/97.9 (St. Paul) expired in April 2021. The FCC’s July decision chose K250BY for the upgrade, saying KPPS-LP’s application was filed too soon because KQEP-LP’s license was still active in the FCC database the day it was filed.

Park Public Radio has now filed a petition for reconsideration saying that the FCC should have done more to determine when KQEP-LP’s license expired as a matter of law. Federal law stipulates that a station automatically loses its license if it fails to transmit for a year. Park Public Radio alleges that KQEP-LP had been off the air for more than a year before its license expired, therefore meaning Park Public Radio’s application would not have been filed too soon.

KQEP-LP had been licensed to New Culture Center in the Midwest. It applied for a license to cover on Dec. 4, 2017, a day before its construction permit was due to expire, saying that its facility was constructed as authorized. The construction permit called for the station to transmit from 72 feet above ground on an existing building along University Avenue.

After the license to cover application, the FCC database has no record of further filings from the station. It did not file seek license renewal when its term was up in 2021.

Though KQEP-LP had not informed the FCC that it had gone off the air, Park Public Radio raises allegations about whether KQEP-LP was broadcasting and whether it used its licensed facilities.

The petition includes an email from the property manager of a building that appears to have been KQEP-LP’s licensed transmitter site stating that she had never heard of the group and that there had not been a radio station at the facility.

“I have managed Court West for the last 10 years and have not had any radio station in the building. I have never heard of this group.”

Property manager of Court West building

Among several things, Park Public Radio’s petition says the FCC should have determined when KQEP-LP’s license expired as a matter of law before deciding that KPPS-LP’s application was filed too soon. It also alleges that the FCC contradicted itself by conceding that K250BY’s application may have also been filed too soon yet approving it after dismissing KPPS-LP’s application.

The petition suggests that the competing applications should go through a comparative process if an investigation finds that KQEP-LP was off the air for more than a year before the applications were filed.