Rumor I started being reported as fact

["Dan Strassberg" <Dan.Strassberg@worldnet.att.net>]

What goes around comes around, I guess. A rumor that I started right here a
month or more ago was reported to me yesterday as if it were true by a
friend in the Washington DC area. Remember, I'm not now and never have
reported this as fact--only as my own speculation. But the speculation part
seems to have been stripped away during the story's month-long round trip
from Boston to DC and back.

I took a couple of pieces of information from this group (one factual, the
other itself a rumor) and synthesized my own credible rumor, but I didn't
expect to hear it reported as fact--unless, of course, my speculation turned
out to be true. At this point, I have no confirmation that my rumor is true.

I speculated that WKOX had resurrected its failed plan to move its TX to
WEZE's Wellington Circle site (and most likely to change its COL from
Framingham to Malden) as part of its long-delayed plan to increase to power
to 50 kW-U.

The Wellington Circle idea had died the first time around because the
engineers who drew up the application for modification of WKOX's CP
apparently completely overlooked WESX 1230 in Salem, with which WKOX's
proposed Wellington Circle operation would have produced substantial
prohibited overlap. WKOX's current CP for 50 kW specifies use of the
station's existing site at 100 Mt Wayte Ave in Framingham. That site may no
longer be workable, however, because WMEX 1060 is now diplexing from WKOX's
two 440' towers. WKOX had expected to demolish the 440' towers to make room
for the three 195' towers proposed for its 50 kW-U operation. It's unclear
that the site is large enough for the two existing towers plus the three
proposed new ones. In addition, getting permission from the town of
Framingham to replace the two tall towers with three shorter ones had proven
to be quite a challenge four or five years ago, so its difficult to imagine
that, even if the site is large enough for five towers, the town would agree
to having them there. Also, WKOX has made no bones about its desire to move
to a site closer to Boston, which would greatly increase the station's
economic value.

It's a fact that, as reported here, WKOX did propose to change its COL to
Newton and move to the WUNR site on Saw Mill Brook Parkway there, although
I've never spotted such an application in the FCC's daily reports. Recently,
notice of an application for a _minor_ modification to the existing CP did
appear, but no details were provided.

I therefore assume that the Newton site turned out to be a non-starter (for
whatever reason). To come up with the rumor I posted, I combined this
thought with a rumor posted here that WESX had been sold and would flip to
Spanish. My rumor is that WESX has been sold but won't flip to Spanish; it
will go dark to make room for a WKOX move to Wellington Circle. The Spanish
part of the rumor comes from another story, now well over a year old--that
WKOX was being sold to Radio Unica. Fairbanks (the current owners) had filed
for a transfer of control--not to Unica, but to a company headed by an
individual who had previously been associated with Unica. Unica currently
leases much of the time on WKOX. That proposed sale apparently collapsed
because of problems finding a suitable site at which to build the 50 kW CP.

Anyhow, the DCRTV newsgroup apparently is now reporting that WKOX and WESX
have been sold to Unica and that WESX will go dark so that WKOX can move to
Wellington Circle. As far as I can tell, the DCRTV report started right
here. Now you know how I came up with my story.