Supersized Update

As promised, here's our update that spans all over the map, and with updates on just about every subject area we cover. How big is it? Let's just put it this way...we're lucky Blogger doesn't charge at all, let alone by the kilobyte...

WVPX HD: Put on hold by Ion Media Networks' bankruptcy a while back, the HD upgrade at Ion's local owned-and-operated station is complete.

Over-air viewers of Akron-licensed WVPX/23 are now seeing an HD feed on 23.1, and viewers of Time Warner Cable will get the station on their HD cable boxes soon...if it has not happened already.

We can also pass along word that in the former Adelphia Cleveland-based system, those picking up clear QAM feeds can find WVPX's HD feed on RF channel 78.2.

Another oddity of the clear QAM feeds - though they do not appear on cable boxes in the Cleveland-based arm of the TWC NEO system, Western Reserve PBS' HD WEAO/49.1 and its subchannels are available to those picking up the QAM feeds, mapped to their over-air channel numbers.

WEAO's main feed is still available on analog cable channel 9 in the former Adelphia system, and WEAO/WNEO's HD feed and subchannels are on cable boxes in the "legacy" Time Warner Akron/Canton/Youngstown area systems. Time Warner lists the feed as "WNEO" even in the WEAO signal area.

Anyway, back to WVPX. We don't have a complete list of programming in HD, but it appears that prime-time off-network shows (such as "Ghost Whisperer") and at least some movies are in HD. Shortly after the launch, we saw an Ion movie in the daytime hours that was not only in HD, but using its original aspect ratio...which should make some movie buffs very happy...

YOUNGSTOWN HD/DIGITAL ACTIVITY: It seems the dust has settled, and Parkin/New Vision ABC affiliate WYTV/33 in Youngstown is now pumping out a million watts of power.

Viewers all over the Mahoning Valley and beyond report drastically improved reception from the new facility. (No, we can't get it from the OMW World Headquarters...but we also have trouble with New Vision sister CBS affiliate WKBN/27 from this far out on our modest setup. We imagine those in the far eastern suburbs of Cleveland and Akron should have a better shot at it.)

WYTV is indeed more powerful than WKBN, by a few hundred kilowatts, but the station's antenna is much lower than the WKBN antenna.

Elsewhere on Sunset Boulevard, the multi-station combo is preparing to add the Youngstown market's first HD newscasts.

It was supposed to happen back on April 19th, but viewers/OMW readers in the market, including PBRTV's Tom Lavery, tell us that newscasts on WKBN and its sister stations are still in SD.

We can't find a reference right now, but we seem to recall the update will also bring WYTV's MyNetwork TV subchannel (33.2) into the world of HD...

WIN IT FOR JOE: When will local sports radio legend Joe Tait hang up his headphones, and turn the Cleveland Cavaliers Radio Network microphone over to someone with very big shoes to fill?

We don't recall when he said it, but a recent profile of Tait in the Chicago Sun-Times -"Tait, as in great" - has this:

Tait, 72, has said that next season will be his last. If he sticks to that, the breed of working NBA broadcast greats will be down one.

We reported earlier that Tait's contract was renewed, indeed, through the end of the 2010-2011 season, thoguh even at age 72, Dan Gilbert is likely to keep the iconic Cavs broadcaster behind the microphone for basically as long as he wants.

Tait tells the Sun-Times:

''I feel old, fat and tired,'' the signature radio voice of the Cleveland Cavaliers said. ''Some days, I feel like I could go on forever. Other days, I'm not sure I'll make it past noon.''

and...

'In a year, the house will be paid off,'' said Tait, Evanston (IL)-born and a graduate of Monmouth College. ''Then all I want to worry about is taking care of Jeannie and enjoying the sunsets.''

Though he does sound like a man ready to retire after a long and illustrious career, he tells the newspaper he very much still enjoys his work...enjoyment, presumably, that will be magnified ten-fold if the Cavaliers manage to do what no Cleveland-based major professional team has done since 1964...win it all.

Win one for Tait, indeed.

By the way, tonight's Game 5 of the first round NBA playoff series against the Chicago Bulls will air on Fox Sports Ohio, and will also be simulcast on broadcast partner Raycom Media MyNetwork TV affliate WUAB/43. The WUAB broadcast of FSOhio games are also in HD, giving over-air viewers a chance to see the game in the crisper TV format.

And by the way again, we've confirmed through numerous sources part of an item we ran earlier: The Cavaliers Radio Network is indeed produced at Quicken Loans Arena, not at the facilities of flagship Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100. That means new Cavs Radio Network producer Marty "Big Daddy" Allen doesn't have to go back to Oak Tree for his new job.

We should have realized this, since the Cavs' post-game radio show gives 420-exchange phone numbers, the same exchange as used by the team and arena. WTAM uses the standard 578 exchange, an old "choke" exchange used by local broadcasters for years.

Back in the day, the 578 exchange was used so floods of radio contest and request calls didn't bring down other phone network users, though technology has rendered that problem obsolete...

WHILE WE'RE TALKING ABOUT OAK TREE: A former WTAM staffer is making quite a career change.

Former WTAM news director R.C. Bauer left the building in October 2006, taking a news management gig at sister Clear Channel talk WFLA/970 in Tampa FL.

He got a promotion to the top programming job at the successful Florida station in early 2009, after Gabe Hobbs felt the Clear Channel downsizing axe.

Bauer is leaving WFLA on his own...and to a higher "station" as it were.

Radio-Info.com columnist Tom Taylor provides us the confirmation of a tip we received late last week, in his column which landed in E-mail boxes Monday morning:

RC Bauer hears the call of the ministry and is leaving radio – and his job as Director of Information and Services and PD of talker WFLA, Tampa (970) – to become a full-time minister. RC’s departing the Clear Channel roster at the end of May to become executive pastor at the Generations Christian Church in Trinity, Florida.

Taylor notes that R.C. will remain on WFLA's local programming advisory board, and could even do some fill-in for the station once he moves to his new role as a pastor...

THE TRIBE IN THE 'BULA: That's Ashtabula, and the Indians are getting some FM air-time in that extreme Northeast Ohio community.

Media One Group features both the Indians and the team's nearby minor league affiliate, the single-A Lake County Captains, on sports WFUN/970 "ESPN 970".

Conflicts this year will push the major league club onto sister country WYBL/98.3 "The Bull", with the April Indians/WYBL schedule here.

Last Sunday was a conflict of particular note, with the Captains on WFUN, the Indians on WYBL, and the Cleveland Cavaliers on Media One's WZOO/102.5 "Oldies 102.5".

SPEAKING OF MINOR LEAGUE BALL: By the way, according to a Captains release, Spirit Media talk/brokered WELW/1330 Willoughby is resuming its role as the team's flagship outlet in 2010, with "selected games" on WFUN and WZOO.

Over in Lorain County, we neglected to inform you that the Lake Erie Crushers, the Avon-based independent minor league team, gets a partial broadcast presence this year, with Sunday afternoon home games heard on Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting talk WEOL/930 Elyria.

It's not the entire schedule, but the team had no over-air call in its initial season.

Former WOBL/1320-WDLW/1380 and Metro Networks staffer and voice of Oberlin College sports, Dave DeNatale, called the games online via SportsJuice.com. DeNatale was the afternoon sports update voice at Metro for Good Karma sports WKNR/850 "ESPN 850" in Cleveland, until the local Metro Networks operation closed its Independence facility.

For WEOL, staffers Tim Alcorn and Rob Polinsky are calling the Captains' Sunday afternoon contests...

TWC AWARDS: The local arm of Time Warner Cable picked up a lot of hardware at the Ohio Cable Television Association's annual award ceremony - for a number of programs on its Northeast Ohio Network (NEON) and associated Local On Demand (LOD) channel.

Here's the list, courtesy of a TWC release:

The 9 Awards:
Excellence in Local Programming – NEON/LOD programming
Education Outreach – Connect A Million Minds
Product Launch/Promotion – Viewer’s Choice LOD Contest
Community Outreach – Connect A Million Minds
Live Action Sports Programming – High School Football Game of the Week
Community Affairs Programming (2) – Helping Hands and Great Lakes Science Center Partnership
Entertainment Programming – Made Here
PSA/Promotional Message – Connect A Million Minds 30-second spot

The awards are called the "Image Awards", which are "established to honor OCTA members' efforts to build and enhance relationships with their customers and foster a positive image in their communities."

The local programming is part of the service's arsenal in competing against satellite and other multichannel providers like AT&T U-verse. Or as TWC VP/Communications and OMW reader Bill Jasso puts it:

“NEON and LOD are unique to Time Warner Cable, an added value only available to our customers.”

THE ZONE IS BACK: It had been speculated by many of our Toledo-area readers for some time, but Cumulus has indeed used an FM translator to bring back a format recently killed to give sports WLQR/1470 "The Ticket" an FM home.

As expected, W264AK, the former Cavalry Chapel-owned religious translator at 100.7 FM, has moved to a more centrally located facility in Toledo, and is now under Cumulus control at 100.9 FM - pumping out the "Zone" alt-rock format displaced by sports on the former WRWK-now-WLQR-FM/106.5.

Tom Taylor's Radio-Info.com column notes that the feed is coming from classic rock WXKR/94.5's HD2 channel, and that Cumulus did much the same in Atlanta for an alt-rock station there ("99X").

The Calvary Chapel folks, meantime, have completed their end of the swap with Cumulus, broadcasting the network's religious programming on 1560 AM. The station long held the WTOD call letters, but Calvary Chapel changed calls Friday to WWYC.

This page on the church's website incorrectly identifies the new station as being at 1590 AM, and incorrectly identifies the new WWYC as an FM station - though it also notes the AM station's daytime-only operation.

The station does have a construction permit for a whopping 3 watts of nighttime power, a level that might cover a few blocks around the transmitter - if the signal doesn't get clobbered by the skywave of Radio Disney's WQEW/1560 in New York City. (We're betting on the Mouse.)

As Cumulus' WTOD, the station ran a mostly syndicated talk format.

The WTOD calls are now being parked on a Cumulus station in Hartsville SC...

Unloading The Pile

Our stack of unfinished items has gotten so large, we're not sure we can fit it in one update. But... we'll try, working backwards from the present...and we could have another update soon, as we're not sure we have everything out of the backlog file yet...

ROMIGH IN: As previously posted on our Twitter account, Clear Channel talk WKBN/570 Youngstown has made fill-in Mike Romigh, the former CBS Radio talk KDKA/1020 Pittsburgh host, its new permanent morning drive host.

Quoting Clear Channel Youngstown market manager and OMW reader Bill Kelly in a release earlier today:

"Mike deserves this opportunity. He has done a great job filling in for us over the past several years and we have been searching for a place for him. This is THAT place. We are fortunate that a person of Mike's caliber was available and our listeners and advertisers will continue to benefit."

Kelly adds that Romigh becomes just the third morning drive host on WKBN since 1980.

He has taken the place of Robert Mangino, the New Castle PA native who now does evenings on Romigh's old home station, KDKA. The other host, of course, was long-time WKBN morning man Pete Gabriel, who finished out his career as the morning driver at sister standards WNIO/1390.

Romigh's addition to the permanent WKBN lineup will be from 6-9 AM weekdays. Midday host (and Clear Channel Youngstown operations director) Dan Rivers adds an hour to his show, and will be heard from 9 AM to noon...

MARCH MADNESS: On our Twitter account, we passed along a link to a Cleveland.com/Plain Dealer item on Raycom CBS affiliate WOIO/19's Thursday NCAA tournament broadcast schedule.

We don't have the station's schedule of other NCAA broadcasts, and can't find a schedule on either the "19 Action News" site, or the site of Youngstown's CBS affiliate, New Vision's WKBN/27.

We also won't be able to track this on a daily basis, sorry...

TWC LINEUP CHANGES: Time Warner Cable's massive Northeast Ohio system is in the middle of its "HD Made Easy" channel lineup change, which will scoot the system's HDTV channel lineup up into the 1000s.

At the same time, the system is pushing out the newer style "Navigator" cable box program guide into the former Adelphia areas in greater Cleveland.

TWC's Travis Reynolds tells OMW:

The channel and new Navigator migration is going well. We are on schedule to complete this by the end of the month.

As a general rule, anyone who already had the new Navigator, or those who've been transitioned to it in the past few days, should have the new lineup. As boxes migrate to the new Navigator, they'll then get the new channel lineup with the HDs in the 1000s, the 'Free 400s' and On Demand Offerings in the 500s.

That meshes with some reader feedback we've gotten, with word that the "legacy" Akron and Canton area systems, those in the original Time Warner footprint, have the new lineup.

Those in ex-Adelphia land will have to wait until the Navigator conversion takes place, and we've heard from readers that the conversion is apparently taking place box-model-by-box model. One reader in the former Adelphia area tells us he has one cable box model converted to Navigator, and another that hasn't undergone the conversion.

It'll apparently be a bumpy ride for some of the ex-Adelphia folks, but we're only halfway through March, the conversion target date set for the end of the month...

WEARIN' OF THE GREEN: St. Patrick's Day, and the annual parade, is a big deal in Cleveland, and Time Warner Cable's Northeast Ohio Network (NEON) is once again covering the parade live.

From a TWC release:

Parade coverage, which will air on NEON for the 8th consecutive year, starts at 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 17th, with a pre-event show featuring parade officials and hosts. The official parade step off is 1:04PM.

The parade will also be available beginning March 19 on Time Warner Cable’s Local On Demand (LOD) channel 411.

It'll also repeat frequently on NEON itself, starting Wednesday night at 7 PM...

THESE STATIONS CAN BE YOURS: If you have some money, that is.

OMW has dutifully reported that the Beacon Broadcasting chain, which has 5 stations along the Ohio/Pennsylvania border, is up for sale after the passing of Beacon owner Harold Glunt.

An OMW reader found the official description of the sale, with the asking price.

Are you sitting down?

Yes, for a cool $1.25 million, you, too can own five small stations in a below-top-100 market with a depressed economy, when the prices for radio stations have fallen through the floor due to the down national economy.

No, we're not making that figure up, and it's not a typo: one-and-a-quarter million dollars for sports WANR/1570 Warren and its daytime simulcaster, WRTK/1540 Niles, classic country combo WLOA/1470 Farrell PA and WGRP/940 Greenville PA, and the class A FM in the group, Christian/eclectic rock/talk WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA.

In case a million and a quarter is too rich for your blood, the stations are also helpfully priced by state - the Ohio stations, WANR and WRTK, are listed for $400,000, and the Pennsylvania stations, WLOA, WGRP and WEXC, are priced at $850,000, both prices in cash (as is the overall price).

The stations' owned land and owned transmitter sites are included in the deal, and leased land and facilities are priced out in the listing, which also notes the recent format change at WRTK and notes revenue at all five stations at "approx. $12,000 a month".

All five stations together do not approximate full coverage of the Youngstown market (particularly much of Mahoning County). But we know that Glunt put some money into equipment upgrades early on.

To put some of this in perspective: Remember that CBS Radio sold its full market FMs in Denver, a market much larger than Youngstown, for $19 million. It'll be interesting to see how much the Beacon stations go for...

Shakeups And Awards

IMPORTANT UPDATE: - 7/22/09 7:35 AM: OMW has received some new information calling the accuracy of the first part of this report into question. We have removed that portion of the report, which cited financial-related rumblings linked to the CBS Radio cluster and its employees in Cleveland.

In addition, though it appears the rest of the item is accurate, it may have taken place a little less recently than believed...a few weeks ago, as opposed to in the past few days.

At OMW, we're the first to jump out there and let you know when we "get it wrong", even when going with information provided by usually reliable sources.

We apologize for the inaccuracy. We try very hard to hold to reporting standards, even though we technically are not a "news organization"...we're a blog with a mix of "news and musings".

Though we don't like having virtual egg on our virtual face any more than most people do, we believe correcting inaccurate information is important.

The rest of our item, including edits to correct that inaccurate information, is below...

--The Management

-------------

CBS RADIO SHAKEUP: OMW hears that there's a recent management restructuring at CBS Radio Cleveland, with the dual general manager structure no longer in effect.

We're told that WNCX/08.5-WKRK/92.3 general manager Tom Herschel has given up those duties to the other GM in the building, WDOK/102.1-WQAL/104.1 general manager Chris Maduri...who will now head up all four stations.

Herschel has not left the building, from what we hear...he moves into a new position as sales manager for the four properties....

TWC QUESTIONS: An OMW reader checks in to ask about the status of Time Warner Cable's HDTV situation in the Mentor/Willoughby area.

The area is part of the former Comcast system, which reached Lake County and nearby, along with the Elyria area. It has lagged in additions of new HD channels compared to, well, the rest of us in the Time Warner Cable Northeast Ohio empire.

One big reason, we've presumed, is the lack of Switched Digital Video in that part of the now-multi-headed hydra run by the cable TV giant.

Well, we wish we had any updates...but, we don't at this time.

We've checked with our contacts at TWC, and we've been told there is not currently any update for the poor folks in the ex-Comcast areas, who now have something like a dozen less HD channels than their TWC brethren in both the "legacy" Time Warner areas like Akron, Canton and Youngstown, and in the former Adelphia/Cleveland-based system....which serves the OMW World Headquarters.

We're promised that when there IS something to tell the ex-Comcasters, we'll be able to pass that word along to you, our readers...

MARCONI AWARDS: Yes, we've heard...Clear Channel Cleveland talk WTAM/1100 afternoon driver Mike Trivisonno has indeed been nominated in the NAB's Marconi Awards - for "Large Market Personality of the Year".

It's not Triv's first go-round at that nomination. In the time we've been doing the Mighty Blog of Fun(tm), he's been nominated for the same award twice before.

He hasn't won yet, and competed with (and lost to) someone else at Oak Tree in 2007 - country WGAR/99.5 afternoon drive mainstay Chuck Collier won it that year.

Another nominee in that same category works for the same employer as Triv.

Clear Channel talk WLW/700 Cincinnati star Bill Cunningham is also up for "Large Market Personality of the Year".

"Willie", of course, also hosts Premiere's nationally syndicated "Live on Sunday Night", which is heard on Triv's home station, WTAM, along with sister talkers WHLO/640 Akron, WKBN/570 Youngstown and other stations in Ohio...but he's up for his role hosting his long-running midday local flagship show on WLW.

Hmmm. Triv vs. Willie. We'd almost pay to hear that one.

Elsewhere, in Tri-State Media Watch territory, two other Ohio stations are represented in the nominations - Clear Channel rock WTUE/104.7 Dayton afternoon driver John "B-Man" Beaulieu is up for "Medium Market Personality of the Year", and Bonneville country giant WUBE/105.1 "B-105.1" Cincinnati is vying for "Country Station of the Year"...

Gazette Consolidation Response

Our earlier item on the conslidation between the co-owned Medina County Gazette and the Elyria Chronicle-Telegram got a lot of response.

But we've now received a "letter to the editor" from Chronicle-Telegram managing editor Julie Wallace, and we've given her the opportunity to respond directly in a new item...

------------------

I would like to comment on the merger of the Elyria Chronicle-Telegram and the Medina Gazette.

Earlier this month, we – as in, Lorain County Printing and Publishing Co., the parent of both papers -- moved production of The Gazette to the Elyria location. That means copy editors for the news and sports side as well as production for other departments – advertising and classified – moved, too. We did not move the reporters out of Medina – that truly would have been silly. And Liz Sheaffer, the managing editor at The Gazette, still is in Medina to guide them.

We did all this with a reason that should be clear to anyone in our industry: to save money.

Given the state of our economy, and the even worse state of our industry overall, we’d be crazy to continue to operate the papers independent of one another as has been the case since the Hudnutt family bought The Gazette in 1964. We wanted to find ways to save money so we could continue to provide our readers with what they’ve become accustomed – insightful stories by award-winning sports writers, hard-hitting news stories by writers who know the area and top-notch photography. For fairly small papers, we’ve got pretty tremendous staffs, and we’re proud of them both.

We definitely don’t want either paper to go away or their independent identities, either. In fact, we want to find a way to strengthen both papers and emerge even stronger when this terrible period in our industry comes to an end.

I guess what bothers me about what has been said in some of the comments is that they imply Elyria is running the show for The Gazette. That’s not the case. The Medina professionals who moved to the Elyria locale are laying out the paper (albeit with a Chronicle designer doing or directing Page 1 layout, which admittedly looks different than it used to) and Liz Sheaffer continues to decide what stories will be written and where they’ll appear in the paper. She was making those decisions before, and she’s still making them.

Yes, an Elyria story did appear in one paper, but that was only because a family member involved in the story was from Medina County, and that happened to be the day of the switchover, which obviously created some upheaval and doesn’t constitute a normal day by anybody’s definition.

Thursday's Here

We've been in one of those writing moods...where we put everything in one daily bag. And it continues...

PAUL HARVEY'S NON-REPLACEMENTS: ABC Radio Network has announced the names of the two men who will not replace Paul Harvey.

We say that because conventional wisdom would tell us that the late commentator, who passed away Saturday in Arizona at the age of 90, won't actually be replaced permanently.

But ABC Radio says the network's Gil Gross and Doug Limerick will provide feeds in the former Paul Harvey News time slots starting next Monday.

Gross will take the "News and Comment" time slots - the five-minute morning drive and 15 minute midday (weekday and Saturday) broadcasts. He's been handling the network's week-long tribute to Harvey this week.

Northeast Ohio listeners may remember Gil as the host of CBS Radio's "Gil Gross Show", which was carried in late nights in the 1990s on Media-Com talk WNIR/100.1 "The Talk of Akron". And until recently, he was the evening (Eastern) anchor on ABC News Radio's Information Network.

Limerick will fill the time formerly occupied by "The Rest of the Story", weekday afternoons and Saturday mornings, with a combination of news and "folksy stories"...not in the "Rest of the Story" format.

Both voices are very familiar to long-time Paul Harvey listeners, as regular fill-ins for the man over the years.

There's the assumption, at least from this corner, that both Gross and Limerick will keep their "day jobs"...Limerick is the ABC Information Network morning drive (Eastern) anchor, and Gross is now a local talk show host for ABC/Citadel talk giant KGO in San Francisco.

We're also assuming that ABC will eventually shut down the Paul Harvey News franchise, but is giving its 900 affiliates time to find something else...we presume they'll push Gov. Mike Huckabee's "The Huckabee Report" hard, but Gov. Huckabee is not really a fit for PHN affiliates which aren't conservative talk stations.

This announcement just came out last night, so we have no idea what the current Paul Harvey affiliates in Ohio plan to do with Mr. Harvey's former time slots, or how many of the stations will cintinue to carry Gil Gross and Doug Limerick.

As near as we can tell, that Northern Ohio Paul Harvey station list includes, but is not limited to: Rubber City Radio oldies/news WAKR/1590 Akron, Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting talk WEOL/930 Elyria, NextMedia talk WHBC/1480 Canton, Clear Channel standards WNIO/1390 Youngstown, and Cumulus country WKKO/99.9 "K100" Toledo. (If we missed one, let us know.)

In Central Ohio, Columbus lost its long-time Harvey affiliate recently, as Clear Channel talk WTVN/610 just dropped the program.

We find it hard to imagine that the non-talkers in that list would be happy with Mike Huckabee...and we imagine that music stations are going to move pretty quickly to end the Harvey broadcasts, no matter who ABC would offer...

BYE, MR. COSTAS: Bob Costas is once again leaving radio.

The popular NBC sportscaster - who once hosted the syndicated show "Costas Coast to Coast" - has been hosting the Premiere-syndicated show "Costas on the Radio". The latest show airs on weekends on some 200 stations, including Good Karma sports WKNR/850 "ESPN 850" Cleveland, and Clear Channel talkers WHLO/640 Akron and WKBN/570 Youngstown.

Like "Coast to Coast", the show often features a mix of guests from the world of sports, and guests on other topics.

A Premiere statement says Costas has "decided to step down" from his radio gig so he can focus on "upcoming projects".

We presume his new role with baseball's MLB Network, which includes an interview show and some live play-by-play work, would be one reason for his radio exit. (Of course, he also continues his busy NBC Sports schedule, including football and Olympics hosting work.)

Premiere says its syndication of "Costas on the Radio" and its associated short form features will end on May 31st.

Costas voiced promos for his show on WKNR humorously noting his time slot on the Cleveland sports station - "Sunday at 6 AM - 6 AM???"...

LOCAL RADIO SYNDICATION EXEC HONORED: We've actually been handed a segue here that we didn't realize we had.

Costas, like many broadcasters who gained major fame, went to Syracuse University...and another Syracuse alumnus who has become a broadcasting executive in Northeast Ohio is getting honored. And he's also involved in syndicated radio.

Envision Radio Networks' president/CEO Danno Wolkoff has been named one of the first four members of the "WJPZ Hall of Fame". WJPZ is the student-run station at Syracuse University, which moved from carrier current to over-air FM in 1985.

Quoting a press release from the Beachwood-based syndicator:

The ceremonies were held during The 24th Annual WJPZ Birthday Bash, which featured legendary syndicated radio personality Elvis Duran as this year’s special keynote speaker.

Wolkoff commented on the honor, “I am truly honored to be inducted into the WJPZ Hall of Fame with friends and colleagues I worked with at the radio station. Rocco Macri, Rob Berrell and Professor Rick Wright are truly successful and accomplished people. To be recognized with these other professionals for my work in radio is the best compliment of all.”

And the final Cleveland-area connection in this story - Duran's syndicated show is heard locally on Clear Channel top 40 WAKS/96.5 "Kiss FM"...