community radio

The American, Local Community Radio Act of 2009, is due for a floor vote in the House of Representatives tomorrow. The bill would pave the way for the creation of thousands more Low Power FM (LPFM) radio stations in the US operating in the up-to 100 Watt range.  The American campaign for this bill has been backed by a large efforts from musicians — established and developing artists alike — who have talked publicly and passionately about the importance of quality local radio to musicians and fans, and supported by many organizations like The Future of Music Coalition.

In NZ our LPFM has a power limit of a measly .5 Watts and is only available in a very small part of the spectrum. There has been some talk recently of reducing the amount of spectrum available for LPFM but possibly opening up some spectrum in the the 50 watt range for non-commercial purposes. While this does not go as far as many of us would like, the potential for a 50 watt transmission is appealing given the almost impossible task of creating a viable station on .5 watts given much of the terrain of NZ. But it would be sad to see this made only available at the sake of part of the existing spectrum available for LPFM. Given that previous administrations took much of their cue from US success with LPFM we can only hope that they're still watching. With increasing problems being faced by the Public Service Broadcasting sector in NZ it might be about time that a substantial review of community broadcasting be undertaken by the Ministry of Economic Development. Such a review of this sector is sadly lacking and policy around funding is reliant on descriptions that are now over 20 years old and hardly seem to reflect the diversity and success of the sector in NZ.