A Federal Communications Commission judge has approved the sale of a Kansas radio station which had broadcast-racist and anti-Semitic programs.
Charles Babbs, owner of KMCS-FM, formerly KTTL-FM, in Dodge City, sold the station for $10,000 to the Community Service Broadcasting, Inc., the citizens group which has been trying for three years to get the license held by Babbs and his former wife, Nellie Babbs.
FCC Administrative Law Judge John Frysiak said last Thursday the agreement to sell the license for the radio station ended a controversy that became a national issue ever since CSB first challenged the renewal of the license to the Babbses in 1983.
The station broadcast anti-Black and anti-Semitic programs in 1982 and 1983. In 1985 the FCC refused to rescind the station’s license because the FCC said the programming was protected by the First Amendment.
However, since April the FCC was reviewing whether the transfer of ownership to Babbs from his wife, whom he has since divorced, was illegal. His wife was believed to have been behind the racist programs. Babbs sought to change the format and ceased broadcasting in June.
The Babbses’ application for license renewal had been opposed by the Dodge City Citizens for Better Broadcasting, the National Black Media Coalition, the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, the Jewish Community Relations Bureau of Kansas City, Mo., the Jewish War Veterans and Kansas Attorney General Robert Stephan.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
