Air America, the liberal radio network yanked off the air in two
cities Wednesday in a dispute with the stations' owner, is back at
two-thirds power.
Chicago is now back on the air, though Los Angeles is still
silent. New York, the network's largest market, has not been
affected by the dispute, nor have its stations in six smaller
markets.
New York State Supreme Court judge Marylin G. Diamond
yesterday issued a temporary order that brought programming back
on the air in Chicago. A
full hearing will be held on Monday.
Air America was ordered to post a $156,000 bond in its dispute
with Multicultural Radio Broadcasting, the owner that unplugged
its stations in Chicago and Los Angeles.
The
judge ruled that Air America already had paid for the airtime on
Chicago's NTD 950 AM.
The
dispute over LA continues to fester,
however, with Multicultural charging that Air America still has not paid
for programming time for February, March and April.
Air America claims payment was stopped on checks to Multicultural
after it learned that the station had resold the February and March
airtime leased on Santa Monica’s KBLA 1580 AM before the liberal network’s March 31 launch.
It probably also will seek a restraining order to get the network
back on the air in LA, too, deciding what course to take in the next
three days.
But at this point it appears the dispute will not be resolved by any
means other than court intervention. The accusations of fraud and
cheating have been vocal, very public and very personal in nature.
On
the Air America web site yesterday there appeared, albeit briefly, a
rant directed at Multicultural owner Arthur Liu, calling him a
“Liu-ser” and “Liu-cifer” and saying, “What we’re
getting at is that we hate him.” The rant was taken off the site
later.
Multicultural stations in New York, where the company is based,
reported receiving threatening phone calls from Air America fans
yesterday, and one station manager told the LA Times that, “This
kind of ends any relationship we could have with them.”
Air America likely will begin looking for a new carrier in both
cities once the dispute is over, with chairman Evan Cohen telling
reporters yesterday that the network wants a “more responsible and
mature” partner.
Multicultural, for its part, began hinting yesterday
that the limited-carriage network has money woes.
On Wednesday, Multicultural locked Air America employees out of the
LA and Chicago stations, charging that the network was in default
for more than $1 million and had even bounced a check
That’s when Air America filed with the New York Supreme Court
seeking the restraining order.
