QueenB Radio, licensee of KZZU-FM in Spokane WA, has not admitted to any wrongdoing. However, it has agreed to make sure that sponsorship identification rules are understood and carefully followed at its station, and it will also make a voluntary $12K contribution to Uncle Sam. For its part, the FCC has appended a reminder of the rules regarding dealings with record companies and independent music promoters to the consent decree agreement. As is usually the case in consent decrees, the company will be required to educate its staff, and its compliance plan kicks off with the heading, “Commitment to high standards on pay-for play.” The second attachment to the decree lists all the ways a promoter of one kind or another can provide items of value, cash or otherwise, that should be avoided, as well as those that are OK or OK within specified limits.
RBR/TVBR observation: The consent decree does not get into specifics. But we know this for sure: Nobody wants to fork over $12K to Uncle Sam. But that may seem like an entirely reasonable amount to those companies caught a few years back in the dubious dragnet of former New York AG and disgraced Governor Eliot Spitzer.
