 |
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Hudson Bay celebrates 10 years of community radio
Hunters in tree stands just outside Hudson Bay, Sask., enjoy listening to community radio station CFMQ-FM 98.1.
They phone the morning show, Brann Flakes, on their cells to chat with show host Dan Brann, CFMQ’s manager, engineer, technician, writer, producer, and advertising salesman, whose ideas and enthusiasm engendered the award winning radio station 10 years ago.
“Just this morning I had a guy from Georgia up in a tree stand, hunting white tailed deer with outfitter Ron Tyacke. Hudson Bay has several outfitting companies, about 18 or 20, and we get a lot of hunters up here from all over North America and all over the province. The hunters like our radio station because we give them the official time for sunrise and sunset. Word gets around and they tune into us every day.”
That’s just one reason CFMQ-FM is popular; just one reason the non-profit radio station with a range of only 25 miles on average has survived to celebrate its 10th anniversary this fall.
“Our official launch was Oct. 26, 1994,” says Dan Brann, who along with his wife, Sherry, has nurtured the station through thick and thin, through local hockey games, talent shows, trade fairs, raging forest fires and Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) applications and license renewals.”
CFMQ-FM’s success is based on the philosophies of community, cooperation and participation, says Brann. In brief, everyone in town is part of the station. Hockey dads call the play-by-plays; the Grade Six class broadcasts from its own radio studio in the elementary school; and, on occasion, local teachers fill in as the station’s announcers and DJs. Brann’s sister, Heather of Saskatoon, fills in for a few days when Brann and his wife want to take a holiday.
The radio station covers everything that is of interest to Hudson Bay, population 2,000, and the surrounding district. And the community has a lot of interests. These include tourism, with outfitting companies and 600 kilometers of snowmobile trails; the wood industry with Weyerhauser’s OSB and plywood mills, and McGregor Hardwoods, which cuts rough timber for furniture; oil shale exploration; and, of course, agriculture.
Brann broadcasts agricultural features every day and often does lengthy interviews with the president of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, Neal Hardy, who is also the reeve of the R.M. of Hudson Bay, No. 394, and can drop by Brann’s studio for a chat.
“The station is a non-profit corporation and I’m the manager. I hired Ellen Kulyk, who does a weekly show called Saturday Morning Express, and also a few community people who cover evenings and events. My wife, Sherry, does the accounting, helps to write the commercials, does some sales, and we pay her when we can,” said Dan, who met his wife in Moose Jaw, while he was studying electronics there at the Saskatchewan Technical Institute (STI) in the mid-1970s.
“I’ve loved radio since I was a kid,” said Brann. After formal training at STI, Brann’s first job was as an engineer with CKRM/CFMQ Radio in Regina, followed by four years as chief engineer with CJWW in Saskatoon, and then several years with a private company building radio stations across Canada.
Brann knew all about radio when he moved back to his hometown of Hudson Bay, and that knowledge proved most beneficial when Hudson Bay made its application to the CRTC for a broadcast license.
“The CRTC wants to see community support for the radio stations, and our radio station board has that. There was fundraising involved, but we were up and running on less than $7,000. The tower, just under 100 feet, is behind my house. My Dad, Del, and brother, Mark, helped to erect it. And the main studio is in the basement of our house.”
When the station’s license was to be renewed in 2001, the CRTC’s renewal procedure had become even more stringent due to new regulations regarding children and advertising, said Brann. The CRTC required CFMQ-FM to detail in writing just what it had done for the community. “So, I went to the principals at the schools, and to the administrators at the town and the rural municipality and asked them to write the station letters of support. We added those letters to the application and the CRTC was pleased about the community support.”
Hudson Bay loves its community radio station. But, how does the station cover its costs?
Advertising, says Brann. The business community is generous. “And our rates for 30 seconds are reasonable. And sometimes we let them run on to 45 seconds, if they’ve got extra things to say.”
Over the years, CFMQ-FM and the Branns have won several awards for their service to the public as broadcasters. In 2003, they received the award as Honorary Fire Guardian #55 from Saskatchewan Environment for the station’s efforts to cover forest fires that came within 13 kilometers of Hudson Bay and destroyed 20,000 acres of forest. Another recent award was the Saskatchewan Snowmobile Media of the Year Award for supporting snowmobiling and for broadcasting trail conditions.
Print and broadcast media have featured the Branns’ success. Among many interviews, they were “On the Road Again” with CBC’s Wayne Rostad, on the front page of The Western Producer’s Western People Magazine, and thoroughly enjoyed being interviewed by the late Peter Gzowski on CBC Radio’s Morningside in 1996.
Parts of that interview can be heard on the CBC Web pages related to the national morning talk show, which Gzowski equated to CFQC-FM’s Brann Flakes, saying: “If you can’t beat the competition, interview them.”
|
|
|
|
|
