The FCC has formally canceled the license of KQSP/1530 (Shakopee-Minneapolis) at the request of its owner, Nevada Radio LLC.
In a brief letter sent to the FCC on Wednesday, March 22, attorneys wrote that Nevada Radio “hereby turns in for cancellation the license of KQSP.” On Thursday, the FCC deleted the station’s callsign and dismissed its 2020 license renewal application, which was still pending after the FCC questioned the station’s operational status.
The station had most recently carried USA Radio Network, which was previously owned by Nevada Radio. The company’s managing member was Fred Weinberg, who died in September 2021.
Numerous listeners began reporting that they could no longer receive the station around the time of Weinerg’s death. The FCC said in its December inquiry that it had received complaints about KQSP being off the air and that a field agent was unable to receive the station during a June 2022 visit to the metro area.
The FCC later uploaded an attachment showing that the letter was returned with a yellow post office label indicating that a mail forward for the licensee’s address had expired.
Federal law stipulates that a station automatically loses its license if it is silent for more than a year.
KQSP’s towers and transmitter building, on Flying Cloud Drive in Chanhassen, are on land owned by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. The site is on the far northwestern corner of the Raguet Wildlife Management Area.
FCC records indicate the station first signed on as KSMM in 1965 under the ownership of Progress Valley Broadcasters, using 500 Watts daytime only.
It changed its callsign to KKCM in 1987, at which time the station ran brokered Christian programming. In 1988, the station upgraded to 8.6kW directional day, with nighttime power of 10 Watts added in 1995.
The station then went through a series of ownership and format changes over the past quarter century:
September 1998: Station returns to KSMM callsign and switches to Smooth Jazz with a regionally-syndicated afternoon talk show from market veteran Ruth Koscielak.
June 1999: Format change to a broad community-focused “non-format.”
Summer 2000: Las Americas Corporation of St. Paul purchases the station from North Star Broadcasting and switches it to a Spanish-language format as “La Tremenda” and “Radio Variedades.”
July 2002: Twin Hearts Media purchases KSMM and switches it to Spanish-language Catholic from EWTN’s “Radio Catolica Mundial” network.
May 2003: KSMM switches the newly-launched “Relevant Radio” Catholic network.
May 2004: Relevant Radio moves to WLOL/1330 and KSMM switches to Progressive Talk and AP All News Radio as “Straight Talk Radio.”
October 2004: KSMM switches to a mix of Contemporary Christian, Adult Contemporary, and Oldies.
September 2006: Broadcast One purchases KSMM and changes the station’s callsign to KQSP with a Tropical format called “La Picosa.”
June 2011: KQSP switches to R&B as “Magic 1530.”
April 2013: KQSP returns to “La Picosa” with a studio at the former KQRS building in Golden Valley.
November 2016: KQSP goes off the air citing financial problems
October 2017: Nevada Radio LLC purchases KQSP and returns it to the air carrying co-owned USA Radio Network.
September 2021: Nevada Radio’s Fred Weinberg dies.
KQSP is the third Twin Cities-area AM radio license to be permanently cancelled in the last two years. The license of KPNP/1600 (Watertown) was cancelled in 2021 after its owner did not seek license renewal, and the owner of KLBB/1220 (Stillwater) returned its license last year.