Aspiring talk stations hope to launch regular programming soon
After six years of jumping through regulatory, technical and organizational hoops, a pair of AM talk radio stations that hope to take on powerhouses CJAD and 98.5 FM are on the air and hope to begin broadcasting regular programming by the end of the year.
CFNV 940 AM, the French station, went on the air in November 2016, and CFQR 600, the English one, began testing in June, each just days before their deadlines — extended several times — set by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission. Both are broadcasting an automated music playlist while they await a simultaneous launch. (CFQR is no relation to the station that used to use that call sign, Q92, which now operates as The Beat under the call sign CKBE-FM.)
The stations, whose transmitters are along Highway 138 in Kahnawake, are owned by TTP Media, a partnership between three local entrepreneurs — radio executive Paul Tietolman, real estate agent Nicolas Tétrault and technology executive Rajiv Pancholy. (Tétrault’s real estate broker’s licence was restricted this summer by the Organisme d’autoréglementation du courtage immobilier du Québec after he declared a personal bankruptcy, but he insists it doesn’t affect his shares in the radio stations, which are done through a protected family trust.)
No on-air staff has been announced yet, though on-air testing messages were recorded by Jim Connell, former program director and announcer for 940 News, who appeared before the CRTC in 2011 as part of the station’s team.
A third licence, for a Frenchlanguage sports station at 850 AM, was abandoned after TTP Media could not solve technical issues with the use of that frequency.