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TheBuzz Erika Engle |
DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hawaii Public Radio gets its name on its longtime headquarters.
Titterton’s
translators, transmitters
and tower, oh myThe oft-foggy town of Waimea on the Big Island is a sheltered community in many ways, but another facet of the outside world is a step closer to having a foot in the door.
Terrain provides some of that shelter, which prevents the signal from Hawaii Public Radio's KANO-FM 91.1from getting in. The station rebroadcasts the programming of KHPR-FM 88.1 in Honolulu.
Hawaii Public Radio's uncontested application to build a new translator to get its signal into the area cleared a regulatory hurdle with the Federal Communications Commission last week.
"Our D.C. attorney confidently expects it to be granted by October or so," said Michael Titterton, HPR president and general manager.
A wait of two months or more seems long, but "it's the blink of an eye for the FCC," Titterton said.
Since before KANO hit the airwaves in August 2000, HPR officials knew the Hilo signal would need a boost - and not just with funding. For once, that was the least of HPR's worries.
Dr. Earl Bakken, inventor of the heart pacemaker and Big Island resident, pledged thousands of dollars to bring the signal in to paniolo country. Big Island Friends of Hawaii Public Radio raised tens of thousands of dollars.
Bureaucracy has been the burden.
"The FCC has had a freeze on new translator applications for three years, although it seems like 10,000," Titterton said. "It's been doubly infuriating, since we've had the funding in place but we haven't actually been able to build it."
Once the construction permit is approved, "We'll be shopping for the toys," Titterton said, a reference to the translator equipment.
Until that project and a new transmitter site for sister-station KIPO-FM 89.3, HPR's signals are streamed over the Web at www.hawaiipublicradio.org.
No more egg cartons
Signs were erected yesterday officially naming the commercial building at 738 Kaheka St. the Hawaii Public Radio Business Plaza. The building's board voted on the name after years of merely referring to the structure as "the commercial building."It's not exactly a tower, as the headline implies, but the alliteration was irresistible.
The studios have been in the commercial building at 738 Kaheka St. since 1988, when they moved from the quarry on the Manoa campus.
Its digs now represent a far cry from its UH days, when studio soundproofing is said to have been provided by egg cartons affixed to the walls.
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
Erika Engle is a reporter with the Star-Bulletin. Call 529-4302, fax 529-4750 or write to Erika Engle, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., No. 7-210, Honolulu, HI 96813. She can also be reached at: eengle@starbulletin.com
