Rockland radio station looks to relocate

ROCKLAND – The area’s low-power FM station that offers community-oriented radio broadcasting is on the move.

WRFR-LP, 93.3 FM in Rockland and 99.9 FM in Camden, hopes to relocate soon from its quarters in a converted garage studio at 20 Gay St. to a more spacious site at the Lincoln Street Center.

“We’ll be able to have live bands broadcast from a stage at the center,” station manager Cathy McGuinness said Monday. “The Watershed Community School is at the Lincoln Street Center, too.”

The station plans to transfer its license from its original owner, the Penobscot School, to the Lincoln Street Center as part of the agreement.

“We’re just outgrowing our space at the Gay Street studio,” she said. “This arrangement with the Penobscot School was always a marriage of convenience.

“It will be much better for us at Lincoln Street,” she added. “A classroom is a logical place to put the station.”

Her plans for the station include involving students from the local schools in broadcasting.

Moving, however, will require a few legal steps. Because a radio station is a utility and is not allowed in a Residential A zone, which encompasses the Lincoln Street Center, WRFR will have to get zoning change approval from the Rockland City Council.

McGuinness said she has talked with Code Enforcement Officer John Root and City Manager Tom Hall about the change. She expects the request to be on the council’s March 10 agenda.

The station celebrated its sixth anniversary Saturday with a party at the Lincoln Street Center gymnasium. WRFR’s Kyle Swan of “The Vinyl Hour” spun records providing dance music for couples of all ages until 9 p.m., while volunteers served food and refreshments.

In February 2002, WRFR-LP 93.3 FM was Maine’s only low-power station on the air. It now serves a small number of coastal towns, including Rockland, Thomaston, Rockport and Camden.

Station founder Joe Steinberger, co-founder of the Penobscot School which owns WRFR’s license from the Federal Communications Commission, said he got a second license three years ago for a translator, or repeater, transmitter in Camden. The translator allows WRFR’s community news and its variety of local music programs to be broadcast over a larger area.

Everyone involved in the station is a volunteer, including the manager. There is no paid advertising, although there are a few sponsors. WRFR from time to time has had grants to help.

“We got a $1,000 grant from the Unity Foundation for a program featuring local nonprofits,” she said. “I’ll use that money for software.”

She has a $10,000 grant application pending with the Maine Arts Foundation to help with the relocation.

McGuinness, 41, came to WRFR in January 2007 from a station in California and was named the local station manager last August. She said her experience in broadcasting was “trial by fire” in California, where she successfully put together a three-hour show in one day.

Local support for the station has been growing this past year, with 30 new programs done by people donating time, energy and money to get on the air, she said.

“We have such a variety,” she said. Bay Chamber Concerts are offered from 4 to 6 p.m. Sundays followed by “Exploring Opera” with Beaumont Glass from 6 to 7 p.m.

“He is a local octogenarian with 50 years’ experience in opera and a member of the local Shakespeare Society. He translates the operas for you,” she said of Glass.

“We have ‘It Takes a Village,’ featuring interviews with local educators, from 11 a.m. to noon on Monday,” She said. “We have a new poetry show with a local poet from Camden, Dave Morrison. He’ll be starting in March.”

She says community radio has the advantage of being able to give news and information tailored for a local audience.

At the same time, technology has enabled the station to broadcast around the world through a Web host with Midcoast Communications with a link on the Internet.

“People communicate with us from Australia,” she said.

gchappell@bangordailynews.net

236-4598