Close encounter in NY Galaxy

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A major portion of a multipronged deal in the Utica-Rome NY market has come to closure. According to Kalil & Co., Ed Levine’s Galaxy Communications is now at the controls of WIXT-AM/WSKU-FM Little Falls, WSKS-FM Whitesboro, WADR-AM/WOKR-FM Remsen, WRNY-AM/WUMX-FM Rome and WUTQ-AM/WOUR-FM Utica. It acquired the stations from Clear Channel for 3.1M. Various spin-offs by Galaxy and other deals are associated with this. One of them, the sale of WRCK-FM Utica from Galaxy to Educational Media Foundation has also closed. Accfording to brokers John Pierce and Bill Schutz, that spin-off was valued at 1.224M. Pierce note that it’s the fourth station bought by EMF from Levine, along with one in Syracuse and two in Albany. For a detailed account of all the related transactions, read our write-up from 8/2/07 RBR #150, Utica-Rome wasn’t unraveled in a day.


In fact, it’s been over a month since we reported a nine-station, four-owner transaction which is sending stations spinning in all directions in the Utica-Rome market. Here’s the skinny. Kalil & Co. helped send WIXT-AM/WSKU-FM Little Falls, WSKS-FM Whitesboro, WADR-AM/WOKR-FM Remsen, WRNY-AM/WUMX-FM Rome and WUTQ-AM/WOUR-FM Utica from Clear Channel subsidiaries to Ed Levine’s Galaxy Communications for 3.1M. Galaxy already has WKLL-FM Frankfort and WTLB-AM/WRCK-FM Utica, so spin-offs are required. In a deal brokered by John Pierce and Bill Schutz, Galaxy will send its own WRCK-FM Utica to noncom religious specialist Educational Media Foundation for 1.224M, and in a separately-filed transaction, will also sell WOKR-FM Remsen to EMF for 350K, so a total of 1.574M is changing hands between those two parties. Finally, Galaxy is sending WADR-AM Remsen, WUTQ-AM Utica, WSKS-FM Whitesboro and WSKU-FM Little Falls to Ken Roser’s Roser Communications Network for 650K. Roser already owns WBGK-FM Newport Village in the Utica market, and incoming WSKU-FM will have additional overlap with his WBUG-FM Fort Plain, which is just outside the market’s friendly confines as defined by Arbitron.