ARCHIVED - Broadcasting Procedural Letter addressed to Robert Donald (WhiStle Community Radio)

Ottawa, 12 February 2016

By E-mail: donaldanddonald@sympatico.ca

Mr. Robert Donald
Committee Chair
WhiStle Community Radio
PO Box 59, 6379 Main Street
Stouffville, ON
L4A 7Z4

Dear Mr. Donald,

This is in reference to the application by WhiStle Community Radio to amend the licence of the low-power community radio station CIWS-FM Stouffville by changing frequency from 102.7 MHz to 102.9 MHz, which was published as a Part 1 application on 26 January 2016.

Procedural Request

1. In the application, you have requested that the Commission make an exception to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission Rules of Practice and Procedure (the Rules of Procedure) in the treatment of this application. More specifically, you have requested that the application be processed administratively (as described in Broadcasting Information Bulletin CRTC 2010-960).

As rationale, you have indicated that an administrative process is necessary to prevent CIWS-FM from going off the air. In support of your rationale, you have referred to Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2014-574 (Decision 2014-574) wherein the Commission approved an application from 8041393 Canada Inc., on behalf of a corporation to be incorporated, for a broadcasting licence to operate a new FM radio station to serve Scarborough on frequency 102.7 MHz.

Pursuant to Decision 2014-574, CIWS-FM is required to vacate frequency 102.7 MHz or find another technical solution that would enable it to continue using the same frequency and meet the Department of Industry’s interference protection requirements towards 8041393 Canada (OBCI)’s station.

Commission staff notes that you are accordingly requesting a change in your approved frequency as a result of this decision.
Given that the technical amendment proposed in the present application involves a change to CIWS-FM’s frequency, Commission staff is of the view that this type of request falls beyond the scope of an administrative route and that the public should be given an opportunity to file submissions as interveners or respondents. Therefore, your procedural request is denied and the application will be processed as a Part 1 application.

Respondents

2. Pursuant to section 22(1) b) of the Rules of Procedure, an application must be served on any respondent. A respondent is defined in section 1 of the Rules of Procedure as “a person that is adverse in interest to an applicant”. The onus is on applicants to clearly identify and provide service of an application to all respondents.

Paragraph 61 of the Guidelines on the CRTC Rules of Practice and Procedure, Information Bulletin CRTC 2010-959 provides a non-exhaustive list of parties generally considered to be respondents.

In the present application, you have indicated that no respondents have been served.

Given that your application proposes to make use of a first-adjacent frequency to 8041393 Canada Inc.’s new station, you are required to serve your application on 8041393 Canada Inc. by no later than 17 February 2016.

Note that a document is not served until it is received by the intended recipient. Therefore, if you are serving a person by mail, you must send it in time for it to be delivered on or before 17 February 2016.

Furthermore, please revise the chart below with the required information as stated in the Rules of Procedure.

Deadline for Response

The information requested herein should be received at the Commission by no later than 17 February 2016, failing which, your application may be returned to be completed and resubmitted with the Commission should you wish to pursue this proposal.

The Commission requires that your response and/or other documents be submitted electronically by using the secured service “My CRTC Account” (Partner Log In or GCKey) and filling in the “Broadcasting and Telecom Cover page” or the “Broadcasting Online Form and Cover Page” located on this web page. Also on this web page you will find information on the submission of applications to the Commission “Submitting applications and other documents to the CRTC using My CRTC Account.” 

A copy of this letter and all related correspondence will be added to the public record of the proceeding.

Sincerely,

John Fernandez
Analyst, Radio Policy & Applications

Date modified:

2016-02-12