Recently, I wrote about how the FCC has held up transfer of ownership of Morgantown radio stations WCLG AM/FM to AJG Corp., operated as a trust for the heirs of John and David Raese, until the company can show it operates truly independently of the Raese-owned West Virginia Radio Corp. network, and is not merely a front to evade FCC regulations imposing ownership limits in media markets.
For the Morgantown-Fairmont-Clarksburg market, the radio ownership limit is seven stations. If you buy complaints by critics that WVRC and AJG are effectively both owned by the Raeses, the WCLG acquisition would give them 11 stations in the market, essentially controlling most of the commercial radio stations of any consequence in the area.
An incident last month involving Laura Phillips, owner of the Phillips Group, a public relations and advertising firm based in Charleston, illustrates why that may be an issue.
Phillips placed a statewide radio advertising buy for the West Virginia AFL-CIO featuring three 30-second commercials opposing right-to-work legislation, each encouraging listeners to, "Tell your legislator right-to-work is wrong for West Virginia."
After airing statewide for about a week, Phillips said she got a call from Joe Parsons, WVRC general manager, advising that the ads were being pulled from WVRC stations and from statewide MetroNews programming because "corporate" had deemed them too controversial.
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Each ad had a theme: One declared, "the new legislative leadership is taking orders from out-of-state corporate CEOs," one talked about wages being lower in right-to-work states - something proponents of right-to-work did not dispute during interim meetings in November - and a third cited higher workplace injury and fatality rates in right-to-work states, asserting, "Doesn't that make it a right-to-die law?"
The latter ad apparently drew the most vigorous ire from "corporate," according to Phillips. She said Parsons decried that allegation in particular as being "inflammatory."
"I was flabbergasted. I've never had anything like that happen," said Phillips, who has been in advertising and PR for about 35 years.
Phillips said she's placed ads on controversial issues in the past, and in cases where station management have had objections to material in the ad copy, she said she's always been given an opportunity to edit or revise the commercial spots to satisfy those concerns. Sometimes, station management will demand supporting data to back up ad claims, she said.
This time, Phillips said there was no opportunity to revise or verify the commercials.
"I was told, "These ads are too controversial and we're not going to run them," Phillips said. "The decision was made to pull them off the air."
(Interestingly, the ads were not pulled from WKKW radio in Clarksburg, an AJG property, perhaps because ties between WVRC and AJG are under FCC scrutiny as Raese attorneys appeal the FCC's order delaying the ownership transfer of WCLG until it has proof the two entities operate entirely independently of one another.)
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Josh Sword, secretary-treasurer of the West Virginia AFL-CIO, said the union is weighing a possible legal challenge over having its ads refused.
"Nobody, not the Koch brothers or John Raese, should be able to control the airwaves," he said.
(Parsons - who was out of the office Friday and did not return my call - didn't tell Phillips who "corporate" was, but WVRC isn't exactly NBC Universal. Executives above Parsons consist of Dale Miller, president and CEO, and the Raeses.)
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Which gets back to why the FCC has rules intended to assure competition in all media markets, and why the purchase of WCLG AM/FM (currently operated by AJG under a management agreement pending the ownership transfer) deserves scrutiny.
Even with terrestrial radio not being what it used to be, if the AFL-CIO (or other entities in the future) is effectively blocked from the north central West Virginia radio market, where do they go to get their message out?
Broadcast TV is expensive, and frankly, most people up that way watch Pittsburgh stations. The cable TV audience is diffused over dozens of channels, and if they go with newspaper advertising, the Raese-owned Dominion Post newspapers could well have the same objections from "corporate" over running the ads.
While we can expect the various sides to take to the airwaves and newspapers during the next legislative session on partisan issues including right-to-work, prevailing wage, corporate tax cuts, etc., will there be a double standard? Will ads supporting right-to-work that make outrageous and unsubstantiated claims about miraculous job creation and economic growth be subject to the same editorial scrutiny as the banned AFL-CIO ads?
Phillips noted that, shortly after the AFL-CIO ads were pulled off the air, MetroNews host Hoppy Kercheval aired a commentary on right-to-work, noting that organized labor will go to the mats to fight such legislation next session.
(Which is true, but what if the mats are pulled out from under them by corporate media ownership?)
Reach Phil Kabler at philk@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1200, or follow @PhilKabler on Twitter.