Community Rally to Save Only Black Radio Station in Town

This morning in Grand Rapids between 250 – 300 people gathered to march in support of the only radio station in West Michigan that primarily serves the Black community, 1140AM, WJNZ. People came together at Rosa Parks Circle in downtown Grand Rapids to march to the Kent County Courthouse where Judge Yates would be deciding on who legally has the rights to own the popular radio station.

Before marching WJNZ DJ Robert S. addressed the crowd. He said that it would be unacceptable for the city of Grand Rapids to lose the only Black radio station. “If African Americans lose their voice we will be set back 30 years in terms of our civil rights gains.” Robert S. spoke to the issue of how few Black owned stations there are in the country, but that cities like Lansing and Saginaw do, so Grand Rapids needs to keep this station a Black owned station.

Robert S. also said to the crowd, “What power exists in Grand Rapids that does not want us to have a radio station? You know that when you get to the top 1 percent of people who run this city you lose minority representation.” According to a 2007 report entitled “Off the Dial,” African Americans comprise roughly 13% of the American population, yet they only own 3.4% of all full-powered commercial broadcast radio stations. Comparatively, Whites in this country own 92.7% of all full-powered commercial broadcast radio stations.

The marchers then left Rosa Parks Circle en route to the Kent County Courthouse. Along the way they made an impromptu stop at a downtown branch of Huntington Bank, since they are the financial institution involved in the foreclosure of the radio station’s assets. Once the marchers arrived at the courthouse, most of them were directed to an overflow room so they could watch the court proceedings on a big screen.

The Judge hearing this case was Judge Yates. Those addressing the Judge were representatives of the receiver, the legal entity responsible for overseeing the radio station’s assets during the sales process, the creditor company, which would financially gain from the sale, and the three parties who had bid on the radio stations: Holy Family Radio, Praise Place, and the group that Robert S. was involved with.

Holy Family Radio says that they had the highest bid and made a formal contract with the receiver for the sale of the station. The group that Robert S. represented says that the bidding process was not fair and transparent and that they had made a bid just before the deadline that they were assured was the highest. The group Praise Place might also put in a separate bid, but said that they are for the most part acting in concert with the group Robert S. represented.

The court proceedings consisted of hearing concerns from all parties involved about the sales process and whether or not there were any irregularities. There was no agreement on this issue, so the Judge decided there will be a hearing in 14 days and that each party involved must submit legal briefs within the next 7 days as to their account of the sales proceedings.

The Judge also felt that in order for the group represented by Robert S. and Praise Place needed to put in escrow $315,000 to demonstrate that they could pay the amount they would have bid had the process been without irregularities. There was some back and forth discussion over whether or not Holy Family Radio would have to do the same, but in the end the Judge let them stick to the original $50,000 deposit they claimed was part of the contracted sale.

Holy Family Radio

Not much has been reported in the local media about the organization that is attempting to acquire WJNZ, Holy Family Radio. The Grand Rapids Press mentions a bit about the organization and printed a statement from a representative of the group, but there has been no real investigation into what interests they represent.

According to the group’s web page, they were formed in 2008 as an educational and evangelical outreach of the Catholic Church. They currently broadcast 6 hours of programming each week in West Michigan on WPRR AM and WTKG AM. One look at the programming offered by the station and you can get a sense of their politics.

One of the shows Holy Family Radio offers is hosted by Sr. Ann Shields, is part of a charismatic catholic group based out of Ann Arbor. The Catholic charismatic movement historically is very reactionary and conservative. Sr. Ann Shields show is syndicated through Ave Maria Radio, also a very conservative Catholic Radio group. Holy Family Radio offers other shows produced by Ave Maria Radio.

In addition they offer shows from EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network), which was founded by a woman named Mother Angelica, also associated with the conservative Catholic charismatic movement. The other programs that are offer are also syndicated, which means that none of the programming offered by Holy Family Radio is locally produced or has any direct connection to West Michigan. This is a notable difference to the current WJNZ programming which focuses hours of local talk/call-in radio for the Great Grand Rapids area.