Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1976 [PAGE 324]

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1975]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

313

8. Test Tube Washer — Toshiro Nishida, Professor of Food Science, Urbana, inventor. University Patents, Inc., recommended that the rights of the University in this invention be returned to the inventor because it is doubtful that the University would be able to recover patent costs from royalty income. I concur in these recommendations.

On motion of Mr. Livingston, these recommendations were approved.

Application for AM Broadcasting License in Chicago

(16) For more than twenty years, the University has recognized the need for operating a high-powered radio station in Chicago to give Chicago citizens the same kind of service supplied since 1922 by WILL-AM-FM to other areas of the state. WILL-FM does not reach metropolitan Chicago, and WILL-AM does not supply more than a peripheral service. The problem has been studied repeatedly, but AM frequencies have not been available and FM frequencies only with ten watts of power. Such an FM station has been authorized at the Chicago Circle campus, but its coverage is restricted to a one-mile radius. Through unusual circumstances, a frequency has now become available for a 1,000-watt station with the power to offer excellent AM radio service to the metropolitan area. The station, formerly occupying the 1450 frequency, was for sale at a price of $1.3 million, but the Federal Communications Commission required the owner to relinquish the license when he purchased another Chicago station; a proposed buyer did not meet qualifications of the F C C . Thus, the license is now available to any qualified applicant. The University broadcasting staff believes that there would be strong support from listeners for the proposed station and that substantial grants from government agencies would provide a major share of the equipment costs, plus a contribution to the continuing operating costs — estimated at approximately one-half cent per listener-hour. (A summary of the projected costs and sources of support is filed with the Secretary of the Board for record.) The Director of Broadcasting at the Urbana-Champaign campus has developed a proposed program format which would offer a unique broadcast service, based on the general University mission of teaching and service, to a much larger proportion of the people of the state. Substantial economies of scale could result. Many programs now developed for W I L L could be available to the new station, and the unique resources of the Chicago area could be brought reciprocally to WILL listeners. Virtually all administrative costs and some technical and legal costs could be shared by the two facilities. T h e coverage area of the proposed station would include not only the City of Chicago, but a radius including Lake Forest, Elgin, Aurora, Joliet, Monee, and Gary, Indiana, on its perimeter. The station would operate at reduced power at night, but would still reach several million people. The President of the University, with the concurrence of the appropriate administrative officers, recommends that the Comptroller and the Secretary of the Board of Trustees be authorized to submit to the Federal Communications Commission applications for a construction permit and a license to broadcast, for the assignment formerly held by WVON, and to expend funds therefor, not to exceed $10,000. O n m o t i o n of M r . L i v i n g s t o n , a u t h o r i t y w a s g i v e n a s r e c o m m e n d e d by t h e following v o t e : A y e , M r . H a h n , M r . H o w a r d , M r . L e n z , M r . L i v i n g -