There is only one buyer and one seller in the deal for WCKL-AM, located to the south of Albany NY and licensed to Catskill NY. But among the crowd paying close attention to the deal in addition to the main parties are an LMA holder, a broadcast engineer, Clear Channel and NABOB.
Let’s work our way through the deal. The station is being sold by Black United Fund of New York Inc., headed by J. Robert Williams. This is where the connection to the National Association of Black-Owned Broadcasters comes in. In point of fact, NABOB does not have a documented interest in the deal, but its leader, James L. Winston, is the legal representative of the seller via his other gig as attorney with the firm of Rubin, Winston, Diercks, Harris & Cooke LLP.
The buyer is Tammy Thayer’s Family Broadcasting and Media LLC.
FBM will pay the modest price of $25K for the station, with $1K coming in cash at closing and the rest being paid via promissory note.
However, FBM will continue to honor an LMA struck by the seller with Harvest Broadcasting Services Inc. that began 7/1/11.
HBSI is bringing more to the table than just a leasehold on the station – it is going to pay off some of the station’s debt. That’s where David Groth, Radio Engineer comes in – he’ll get $16K paid off by Harvest; and it’s also where Clear Channel comes in – Harvest will pay $80K to Clear Channel to settle late lease payments.
The station is a Class D on 560 kHz with 1 kW-D, 43 W-N, DA2. Its primary contour hits a good bit of Albany proper during the day, but misses completely at night.
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