CKLN-FM - Reaction To Loss of Licence

Reaction To Loss of Licence

On April 18, 2011, in his inaugural television broadcast on Canada's Sun News Network (also published in the pages of its sister newspaper outlet) conservative columnist Ezra Levant claimed the CRTC's decision on CKLN was just another oppressive example of arbitrary government bureaucracy and interference into the lives and businesses of ordinary Canadians.

Toronto city councillor Adam Vaughan said: “It's just astonishing that the CRTC can do this to a station that's been true to its mandate, that's sustained its commitment to community-based programming, the damage it does to communities served by this station, you couldn't even begin to quantify.” Vaughan told the Toronto Star that "It's very sad that the CRTC couldn't sit down and work with this clearly volunteer organization and give them the benefit of the doubt and help them solve the problem rather than simply render a very tough decision against them."

Referring to previous boards of directors, outgoing Ryerson Students Union president and CKLN director Toby Whitfield observed: “There's been so much infighting for so many years, people lost sight of the purpose of the station. The privilege of having a license is amazing, and I think that's what was missing,” adding that the current board had gotten more students involved.

Barry Johnson, a former CKLN director and host of Calypso Fusion said: "It is very sad that it has to come to this,' claiming that "(Ron) Nelson and the (CKLN) board could have taken measures to satisfy the CRTC, but they miscalculated...The CRTC offered reasonable measures that could have been taken, but the station did not have the proper management. They tried to hang on to something that just wasn't there.”

Jacky Tuinstra-Harrison, who was station manager at the time, responded to Johnson's claims by saying that the CRTC failed to follow its own policy of graduated discipline: "The CRTC could have followed their own policy, but did not; they did not pursue avenues such as warnings, fines, mandatory orders or other options against CKLN, but moved directly to the most serious of measures- revocation. We were not at any point offered alternatives" and that the claim that "CKLN’s 'demise' could have been avoided is an admonishment, which could have been made to any of the last six CKLN boards, including the two on which Mr. Johnson sat."

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