Lease to Own: Tampa's Greatest Black Owned Radio Station May Soon Be Black-Owned No Longer

As is often the case with such stories, it started with a rumor: Glenn Cherry wasn't running WTMP-1150 AM anymore.

That was a blockbuster notion, mostly because Cherry had been serving as general manager of Tampa's largest black-owned radio station since his family-owned company bought it in 1997, pressing their vision of a radio station which would serve as the voice of Tampa's black community.

Tampa's black-focused newspaper, the Florida Sentinel Bulletin, first reported on the issue. But it turns out there was more to the story; all nine of the radio stations owned by Cherry's Tama Broadcasting company have been leased to another company controlled by a white-owned investment firm in New York City. See my story in Saturday's Times here.

Cherry described the lease as a "kick the tires" arrangement allowing the leasing company to manage Tama's stations with an eye toward purchasing them. If that happens, WTMP would become the latest local station to join a chain run by an out of town corporation, and the city's biggest black-focused "heritage" or "legacy" radio station would be owned by people who are not black for perhaps the first time in its 50-plus-year history.

Ironically, the lease and possible sale was initiated by Cherry's investment partners, the Black Enterprise/Greenwich Street investment fund, a $91-million pot created in 1997 to help grow minority-owned businesses. According to Cherry, the fund -- established by the biggest black-focused economic magazine in the country, Black Enterprise -- wanted to get the $16-million or so it invested in Tama out of the company, and decided this was the best tack.

What I couldn't find out Friday and hope to resolve soon: What are the new lessor's plans for WTMP? Will the radio stations actually be sold? And why did Tama have so many problems meeting its obligations to the Black Enterprise fund?

Comments

[Robin 'Roblimo' Miller]

Remember that sham FCC "public hearing" we both went to a few months ago?

Cherry talked from the stage about how his station had trouble selling ads against chains that had multiple stations catering to multiple audience niches in the local market, while he could only offer one segment.

Tampa still has WBTP for the African-American crowd -- a station owned by Clear Channel, not some little family-owned company that doesn't mean spit in the larger scheme of things.

The only color any of this is about is green.

American radio, as part of our local community scene, has died as surely as our manufacturing economy.

And now the Greeds are attacking Internet radio with insane licensing fees.

Grr.........

[Eric Deggans]

The only thing more alarming than all the trends and truths you've pointed out, Robin, is the fact that people don't really seem to care that much about any of it....