With the same energy it takes to light your table lamp, the new 10 to 100 watt low-power FM service will create radio for the people. Low-power FM will allow schools, churches and other local organizations to use the public airwaves to make their voices heard. In short, low-power FM enhances democracy on the dial: It fosters new opportunities for true community radio to flourish in an age marked by the increasing consolidation and homogenization of the industry and the marketplace of ideas.
So it comes as a sad but predictable development that the special interests opposing low-power FM--namely, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB)--have dispatched their high power lobbyists to prowl behind closed doors and use the Congressional appropriations process to quickly and quietly bury the program. This attempt to kill low-power FM is not about ideology--it's about money. Low-power FM has been embraced by the National Association of Evangelicals, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the National Education Association, and the National Council of Churches. Indeed, we have received more than 1,200 applications for low-power FM licenses in the 20 states from which we have accepted them. The only group siding against the establishment of low-power FM is big radio, who in a textbook case of protectionism are trying to use the government to smother any potential competition. As a smoke screen for their financial interests, incumbent broadcasters have consistently cited the remote possibility of signal interference as the reason to stop low-power FM. But this argument is disingenuous.