Intervenor Wants In on Entercom KDND License Renewal Case
An ownership dispute involving another Entercom station entitles Edward Stoltz to be a party in the FCC proceeding (see 1610280058) on Entercom's KDND(FM) Sacramento license renewal application, which the FCC designated for hearing over a 2007 radio contest that led to the death of a listener, Stolz said in opposition filings posted in docket 16-357 Wednesday. Set to be heard by Administrative Law Judge Richard Sippel in July, the case has entered its discovery phase, according to filings with the FCC. “Entercom argues that Stolz engages in a ‘twisted chain of logic,’” Stolz said in his filings appealing his exclusion from the case by the FCC. “This is comically ironic, since Entercom is the twisted party here,” Stolz said.
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The proceeding concerns KDND's license renewal applications for 2005 and 2013 and petitions to deny by the family of 2007 victim Jennifer Strange and public interest entity the Media Action Center. The FCC is questioning whether KDND was operated in the public interest because of the death of 28-year-old Strange, who died from water intoxication after participating in KDND’s on-air water drinking contest. Other petitions to deny were filed against KDND and several other Entercom stations by Stolz over alleged ownership violations, but the FCC threw out the Stolz petition for lacking standing when it issued the hearing designation order. Entercom, the FCC and the Media Action Center didn’t comment.
Stolz has an ongoing court case disputing the ownership of Entercom’s station KUDL Sacramento. If Entercom is found unfit to be a licensee of KDND, it also may lose the KUDL license, which would then revert to Stolz, he argued in his opposition filing. “Stolz has a financial interest in the outcome of the KDND proceeding,” he said.”There is nothing twisted about this.” Stolz’s claim doesn’t rise to the level of “likely financial injury" that would be required for him to have standing and is “highly contingent and speculative,” Entercom said in its response to Stolz’s petition to deny. “It bears noting that Stolz has previously been declared a ‘vexatious litigant’ by a California Court,” Entercom said in its filing. The standard for an intervenor is lower, and allowing him to intervene in the case would serve the public interest, Stolz argued.
Stolz’s petitions to be allowed to intervene in the case have been fully briefed, so it's up to the FCC whether his request would be granted, said an attorney familiar with FCC procedure. There's no set timeline for the commission to make a decision. The case is scheduled for a monthly status conference on Feb. 28, said an order issued by Sippel.