Death of Local Radio at KABC?

With the announcement Monday that Don Imus is returning the airwaves on New York's WABC, concern among local radio fans is that morning radio man Doug McIntyre could be replaced by Imus at KABC, also owned by Citadel Broadcasting, owner of WABC. Given the reported payment given to Imus by Citadel its likely they'd want to recoup some of the investment by syndicating Imus.

Citadel doesn't necessarily have to wipe out McIntyre to get Imus in LA. One option is to give Imus the slot currently occupied by a rebroadcast of Peter Tilden's late night KABC program from 2:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m. Another would be to air Imus against McIntyre on their ESPN radio outlet down the dial at 710 am. This would not necessarily be unprecedented; for years Imus broadcast his show out of WFAN sports radio in New York. Should McIntyre be booted for Imus; outside of weekend programming, it would leave only Al Rantel's morning and evening shows as the only local programming on the station.

Besides McIntyre's fans, KABC might have trouble from another source opposed to Imus' return: African American activists who are still upset over remarks made by Imus that lead to his original firing; referring to a mostly African-American girls college basketball team as "...nappy headed hos."

Franklin Avenue Scoops Drudge; Is McIntyre on Way Out?

We mentioned it here but it looks like our favorite little bohemian eastside blog Franklin Avenue scooped mega linker Matt Drudge on the resurrection of Don Imus.

Drudge reports that the "I-Man" has inked a 10 figure multi-year deal with Citadel Broadcasting, the new owner of ABC Radio for a show on their new york outlet, WABC (apparently replacing morning hosts Guardian Angel founder Curtis Sliwa and civil rights attorney Ron Kuby).

The good news for Imus could be bad news for KABC morning man Doug McIntyre. KABC is also owned by Citadel.

We remember that Citadel went to the mat with KABC to bounce Marc Germain, formerly known as Mr. KABC, in order to air a two hour syndicated program from WABC hosted by right wing nutjob Mark Levin (I'm a hardcore Republican and even I don't find two hours of yelling at liberals or bashing Bill Clinton entertaining). As a domino effect this also led to the departure of Kevin James from KABC in order to air a syndicated and ill-fitting late night program by longtime morning man Peter Tilden.

Obviously Imus is a far bigger name than Levin and with a tens of millions of dollars on the line potentially, you've got to believe its only a matter of time before Citadel tells Doug McIntyre they're giving Imus his slot and if he wants he can have Al Rantel's 45 minute slot at 11:00 a.m. (maybe).

McIntyre - though hosting an intelligent, substantive and popular morning show - has never been able to break past the ratings behemoth that KFI's Bill Handel is. Handel has a years ahead jump on McIntyre on the slot and the benefit of a far more powerful signal that reaches most of Southern California as opposed to KABC's weaker signal that is concentrated on LA and most of Orange County. Though KABC's listeners skew higher demographically than KFI and gets them high end sponsors, Citadel still may find it more economically practical to air syndicated programming.

Companies like Citadel are turning to offering syndicated program on their local outlets as its more cost effective and can earn more profits. Nothing wrong with that and no we don't need a government solution for it.

What we can do is change the channel - and let KABC know that if McIntyre is let go, its hasta la vista baby. It probably won't work but they at least need to hear from us.