Translator Update

Radio Assist Ministry has submitted a number of translator applications to the FCC. We are now seeing many of those applications being granted! Below is map of translator applications that have been granted or we expect to be granted soon.

March 2006

Wow what a year! It seems like only last month when we posted an update. We’ve been busy!!! So, here’re some highlights and milestones for RAM and our sister organization Edgewater Broadcasting since our last update.

• With only days remaining before the license was to expire Edgewater took responsibility for WLOG, a station in the mountains of Pennsylvania and began its first broadcast. The beginnings were meager with only a 150 watt transmitter located in something resembling a rabbit hutch. There was no line of sight to the studio and the phone lines were down. Needless to say we were scrambling but God provided. As it turns out, the internet service provider for the area was owned by a group of Christians that was located only a little over a mile away. As a matter of fact it’s the only techy business within 40 miles and they offer services nationwide. Wow, talk about providence. The folks at Vita-Link have been wonderful. Without a program schedule or any real production, EDGE was forced to begin its first broadcasts ahead of schedule with CDs and a computer. To borrow a phrase also used in computing, it’s been something akin to pulling your self up from your "boot straps" or "booting up."
  
• RAM also begins broadcasting. Located in the middle of the triangle of San Antonio, Houston and Corpus Christi. KTLZ began its first broadcast to the city of Cuero, TX with the potential to reach into the surrounding communities including Victoria and Corpus Christi.
  
  
• One of RAMs big successes this year has been in the area of “assisting” and providing support to other groups in their radio outreach efforts. These include:
  
• The Horizon Broadcasting Network (HBN): Located mainly west of the Mississippi, Mike MacIntosh, the founder of HBN and Horizon Christian Fellowship wants to reach the lost, the dropouts, and as he says “those that are hiding.” What a heart of gold. If their growth continues at its’ current pace they may dwarf some of the larger Christian broadcasters. They are reaching out into areas previously not covered by Bible teaching programming. Go for it Mike!
  
• REACH FM: With their headquarters located in South Florida Bob Coy, the senior pastor of one of the largest Calvary Chapels in the country, wants to reach his Jerusalem. The number of people that this Florida Christian network will have within its listening range is staggering. Pray for Carl and the neat Christians working toward this goal at Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale! They stepped up in a big way financially and have helped RAM through the lean times. Thank you Bob, Carl, and Paul. We love you guys!
  
• RAM and EDGE have also continued to fulfill their mission of assisting existing Family Oriented and Christian Broadcasters. We have gifted FM translators to like-minded organizations enabling them to provide such programming in many new communities across the country. Recipients include: American Family Association (AFA), Educational Media Foundation (EMF), Highline Radio, Immaculate Heart Radio and Northwest College (Skylight) to name a few. 
  

• Pray for workers.
  • We are looking for people that are gifted in a variety of backgrounds to join us in an advisory capacity on our Advisory Board.
    
  • We need a grant writer familiar with Christian Radio. 
  • With the move into broadcast we need announcers for news, weather and PSAs etc. 
  • We are looking for retired volunteers with an electronic background that are willing to travel to oversee and install translators around the country. The project is huge, quite impossible and can change a nation!
• Pray God gives us direction in programming. I know God will show us as we go forward how to reach out. There are hurting people out there that He wants to reach with words of encouragement and “A Word In Season”. I have seen the changed lives and felt the warmth of a word spoken in time. Radio reaches into homes, prisons, and places we can’t go. Pray God leads us to speak a message good for the soul and mind that will encourage, edify, and instruct. 
• Pray that He directs us as we go forward. So far we have traded, donated and sold broadcast facilities based on our best judgment on how to proceed and a variety of other criteria. But mans best judgment is weak at best. It is our desire to see an explosion in Christian Radio and to make sure the abuses that have plagued some media outlets are avoided. Pray God directs the Directors and has His way in and through the decisions they make.
• Pray God provides the funds as He sees fit. As we move forward, along with broadcasting original programming RAM and EDGE will bring existing regional broadcasts to communities that can’t receive them now and expand Christian radio and Traditional Family Values programming like never before.
  

March 2005

Radio Assist Ministry is pleased to announce the inauguration of its first originated programming in the states of Texas and Tennessee. With the help of World Radio Link, Inc. a related broadcasting and engineering firm, Radio Assist Ministry will begin its first official broadcast service in the communities of Cuero Texas and Benton Tennessee this spring. Please pray for these stations and for the continued roll out of a considerable number of translator services to communities, areas and regions throughout our country.

On another note, a great deal of thanks needs to go out to the FCC for opening this window of opportunity for the first time in six years for translators to offer service in the FM band on the frequencies from 92.1 FM through 107.9 FM. This window allowed Radio Assist Ministry, other groups and individuals to apply for applications in communities throughout America and will enable a diversity of programming never before realized on such a scale. Bible Teaching, Talk, Family, Youth, Spanish language, Contemporary, Inspirational and Praise and Worship music networks to name a few will either be established or expanded through these efforts.

With over 13,000 applications filed in this past window, the FCC received a clear message that translator service is a viable and much needed vehicle, which enables non-profit organizations to place their signals into communities which otherwise would never receive such service. In the past many other groups have had the opportunity to apply for license in this band including the newly created Low Power FM service. We look forward to continue to work with all in the development of these stations.
Radio Assist Ministry is pleased to announce the inauguration of its first originated programming in the states of Texas and Tennessee. With the help of World Radio Link, Inc. a related broadcasting and engineering firm, Radio Assist Ministry will begin its first official broadcast service in the communities of Cuero Texas and Benton Tennessee this spring. Please pray for these stations and for the continued roll out of a considerable number of translator services to communities, areas and regions throughout our country.

On another note, a great deal of thanks needs to go out to the FCC for opening this window of opportunity for the first time in six years for translators to offer service in the FM band on the frequencies from 92.1 FM through 107.9 FM. This window allowed Radio Assist Ministry, other groups and individuals to apply for applications in communities throughout America and will enable a diversity of programming never before realized on such a scale. Bible Teaching, Talk, Family, Youth, Spanish language, Contemporary, Inspirational and Praise and Worship music networks to name a few will either be established or expanded through these efforts.

With over 13,000 applications filed in this past window, the FCC received a clear message that translator service is a viable and much needed vehicle, which enables non-profit organizations to place their signals into communities which otherwise would never receive such service. In the past many other groups have had the opportunity to apply for license in this band including the newly created Low Power FM service. We look forward to continue to work with all in the development of these stations.