WKZY - History

History

The station signed on as in 1987 as WDFL-FM from the tower of then sister station, WDFL (now WZCC) in Cross City. It was originally a Class A FM station with 6,000 watts of power broadcasting a satellite-fed country format on 106.7 MHz. It took several years for then owner, Women in Florida Broadcasting, to upgrade the signal to a C1 and move it to its current transmitter site, about 2 miles west of Trenton. In doing so, however, the station changed its frequency to 106.9 MHz, to avoid conflicts with Orlando-area station WXXL, which also broadcasts on 106.7 FM. Upon the frequency change, WDFL-FM became WKZY ("Cozy") and its format changed to Adult Standards, fed via satellite from Westwood One.

It was sold to Pamal Broadcasting in late 2000, and in April 2001 launched a Soft Rock/Adult Contemporary format as "Lite Rock, 106.9 KZY." This format never did well, mostly because it was going up against heritage WKTK which had a better signal over the Gainesville metro. Pamal moved the studios from a single wide mobile home at the Trenton transmitter site to the studios of WLUS (now WDVH) on the east side of Gainesville. From that location, the station consistently had trouble delivering a reliable program feed to the transmitter site.

In 2003, Pamal changed format to Adult Hits as "106.9 KZY." In October 2005, WKZY along with Pamal's other Gainesville stations moved to a new studio facility in the Sunshine Broadcasting Building, located at 100 NW 76 Street, in the Tower Hill Office Park where they operate from today. In order to comply with FCC 73.1225(a) (main studio rule), the station still maintains its main studio at the Trenton Transmitter site.

In December 2007, 106.9 KZY transitioned to Hot AC (adult contemporary) and more recently to an Adult Top 40 with a rhythmic lean.