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TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS BEFORE
THE CANADIAN RADIO‑TELEVISION AND
TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
TRANSCRIPTION DES AUDIENCES DEVANT
LE CONSEIL DE LA RADIODIFFUSION
ET DES TÉLÉCOMMUNICATIONS CANADIENNES
SUBJECT / SUJET:
Various broadcasting applications /
Diverses demandes de radiodiffusion
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Quartz Ballroom Quartz Ballroom
Matrix Hotel Matrix Hôtel
10001-107th Street 10001-107th Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
June 2, 2008 Le 2 juin 2008
Transcripts
In order to meet the requirements of the Official Languages
Act, transcripts of proceedings before the Commission will be
bilingual as to their covers, the listing of the CRTC members
and staff attending the public hearings, and the Table of
Contents.
However, the aforementioned publication is the recorded
verbatim transcript and, as such, is taped and transcribed in
either of the official languages, depending on the language
spoken by the participant at the public hearing.
Transcription
Afin de rencontrer les exigences de la Loi sur les langues
officielles, les procès‑verbaux pour le Conseil seront
bilingues en ce qui a trait à la page couverture, la liste des
membres et du personnel du CRTC participant à l'audience
publique ainsi que la table des matières.
Toutefois, la publication susmentionnée est un compte rendu
textuel des délibérations et, en tant que tel, est enregistrée
et transcrite dans l'une ou l'autre des deux langues
officielles, compte tenu de la langue utilisée par le
participant à l'audience publique.
Canadian Radio‑television and
Telecommunications Commission
Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des
télécommunications canadiennes
Transcript / Transcription
Various broadcasting applications /
Diverses demandes de radiodiffusion
BEFORE / DEVANT:
Elizabeth Duncan Chairperson / Présidente
Rita Cugini Commissioner / Conseillère
Candice Molnar Commissioner / Conseillère
ALSO PRESENT / AUSSI PRÉSENTS:
Cindy Ventura Secretary / Sécretaire
Lyne Cape Hearing Manager /
Gérante de l'audience
Véronique Lehoux Legal Counsel
Conseillère Juridique
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Quartz Ballroom Quartz Ballroom
Matrix Hotel Matrix Hôtel
10001-107th Street 10001-107th Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
June 2, 2008 Le 2 juin 2008
- iv -
TABLE DES MATIÈRES / TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE / PARA
PHASE I
PRESENTATION BY / PRÉSENTATION PAR:
Guldasta Broadcasting Inc. 926 / 6084
Multicultural Broadcasting Corporation Inc. 977 / 6480
CIAM Media Broadcasting Association 1049 / 6964
Frank Torres (OBCI) 1091 / 7266
Black Gold Broadcasting Inc. (OBCI) 1155 / 7636
Edmonton, Alberta / Edmonton (Alberta)
‑‑‑ Upon resuming on Monday, June 2, 2008 at 0930 /
L'audience reprend le lundi 2 juin 2008 à 0930
6058 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the second week of this public hearing.
6059 My name is Elizabeth Duncan, and I am a CRTC Commissioner for the Atlantic Region. I will be presiding over this hearing.
6060 Joining me on the panel are my colleagues Rita Cugini, Regional Commissioner for Ontario, and Candice Molnar, Regional Commissioner for Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
6061 The Commission team assisting us includes Hearing Manager Lyne Cape, who is also Manager of Radio Operations and Policy, Véronique Lehoux, Legal Counsel, and Cindy Ventura, Hearing Secretary.
6062 Please speak with Ms Ventura if you have any questions regarding hearing procedures.
6063 The first part of this hearing was held last week, at which time we considered radio applications for the Drumheller and Red Deer markets.
6064 During the second phase the panel will examine 11 applications to operate an FM commercial radio station in Edmonton.
6065 We will also study an application to operate an FM Type B community radio station in the same market, as well as an application by the Native Type A station CFWE‑FM to add technical facilities at Edmonton and Fort McMurray.
6066 Finally, we will look at an application to operate an English‑language FM commercial radio station in Leduc.
6067 All of these applications will be treated as competitive radio applications for Edmonton.
6068 I now invite the Hearing Secretary, Cindy Ventura, to explain the procedures that we will be following.
6069 THE SECRETARY: Thank you, Madam Chair.
6070 Before beginning, I would like to go over a few housekeeping matters for the benefit of those who were not in the room last week.
6071 Le service d'interprétation simultanée est disponible durant cette audience. Vous pouvez vous procurer un récepteur auprès du technicien à l'arrière de la salle. L'interprétation anglaise se trouve au canal 1 et l'interprétation française au canal 2.
6072 When you are in the hearing room, we would ask that you please turn off your cell phones, beepers and BlackBerrys, as they are an unwelcome distraction and they cause interference on the internal communications systems used by our translators.
6073 We would appreciate your cooperation in this regard throughout the hearing.
6074 Starting tomorrow, we will begin each morning at 9 a.m. We will take an hour for lunch, and a break in the morning and in the afternoon. We will let you know of any schedule changes as they may occur.
6075 The Amber B Room will serve as the examination room, where you can examine the public files of the applications being considered at this hearing.
6076 As indicated on the agenda, the telephone number of the examination room is 780‑429‑7498.
6077 There is a verbatim transcript of the hearing being taken by the Court Reporter sitting at the table in front of me. If you have any questions on how to obtain all or part of this transcript, please approach the Court Reporter during a break.
6078 Please note that the full transcript will be made available on the Commission's website shortly after the conclusion of the hearing.
6079 Now, Madam Chair, we will proceed with Item 13 on the agenda, which is an application by Guldasta Broadcasting Inc. for a licence to operate an FM commercial ethnic radio programming undertaking in Edmonton.
6080 The new station would operate on Frequency 98.5 MHz, Channel 253B, with an effective radiated power of 7,300 watts, non‑directional antenna, antenna height of 247 metres.
6081 Appearing for the Applicant is Gursharan Buttar.
6082 Please introduce your colleagues. You will have 20 minutes to make your presentation.
6083 Mr. Buttar.
PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION
6084 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Madam Chair, Commissioners, and CRTC Staff, good morning.
6085 My name is Gursharan Buttar, and I am leading my team in our presentation to the CRTC for an application by Guldasta Broadcasting Inc. to obtain an ethnic licence for the Edmonton South Asian community.
6086 We have a family business, and I will first introduce the many Buttars of our delegation.
6087 Beside me is my wife of 24 years, Guppreet Buttar. President of Guldasta Broadcasting, Guppreet has been a resident of Edmonton for the past 26 years, constantly working in all of our family businesses. She is the boss at home, too.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
6088 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Beside Guppreet is our oldest child, Sharnpreet Buttar. Sharnpreet is completing his degree in business at the University of Alberta, and acts as a company financial planner.
6089 At the far end of the table is Sapreet Buttar, our daughter, who is enrolled in the business program at the University of Alberta, and has been involved in our youth programming for the past four years.
6090 Both of our children are life‑long residents of Edmonton.
6091 On my left is Rajwinder Klair, Sur Sangam's Marketing Manager. He has been with the station for the past four years, on the air, and involved in an increasingly responsible management role with this station.
6092 Beside Rajwinder is Shabir Pathan, who has been a broadcast host to the South Asian community for more than 25 years in Edmonton, and one of the city's pioneers of South Asian broadcasting. He acts as a program director for our Hindi and Gujrati programming.
6093 In the second row, starting from my left, your right, we have our corporate accountant, Mel Bhatia, a Certified Management Accountant, who has represented us for the past five years.
6094 Next to him is our corporate legal counsel, Barinder Pannu, who served for 27 years as a Crown prosecutor before moving to his current private practice. Mr. Pannu is one of the most widely respected lawyers in Edmonton.
6095 Next to Mr. Pannu is Saira Qureishy, an on‑air personality with Sur Sangam since the very beginning. Saira is our Pakistani Program Coordinator.
6096 Sanjivan Atwal is one of our youth program hosts, and beside her is Lovepreet Sangha, an on‑air host who specializes in Bhangra, Bollywood and Punjabi music programming.
6097 Finally, in order to demonstrate our commitment to diversity, we introduce to you our two visible minorities, Tamison Bencz, from the Edmonton Food Bank, and Matthew McBride, who has travelled from Vancouver to assist us in our appearance before the Commission today.
6098 I will now begin with our opening presentation.
6099 Madam Chair and Commissioners, welcome to Edmonton, the city of champions, the capital of Alberta, and one of the most progressive communities in the nation.
6100 Edmonton is home to 730,000 citizens, and has grown by almost 10 percent in the past five years. Of these residents, an estimated 10 percent are of South Asian origin. The community is one of the rapidly growing sectors of the overall community profile, which reflects the growth of the South Asian population in every province in Canada.
6101 Guldasta Broadcasting is applying to the CRTC for a licence to serve this community with a conventional over‑the‑air radio service, a radio service dedicated to a specific market segment that makes up to 10 percent of the local population.
6102 Our application is the product of years of service to the South Asian community on the CKUA sub‑carrier.
6103 Operating as Sur Sangam Radio, we have been producing a wide range of programs and services for our target market for over six years. Our application proposes to continue our long and dedicated service to our community in the same manner that most Edmontonians are able to receive radio service by the free over‑the‑air radio service.
6104 With this application we wish to grow our established service using our existing studio facilities in order to maintain our long relationship with the Edmonton South Asian community as their preferred option for radio communication.
6105 Our application is for an ethnic licence, and in keeping with the guiding principles of the radio Act and CRTC directions, we propose to serve a number of ethnic groups, in a variety of languages, while at the same time keeping a focus on the broad range of South Asian listeners. This range includes people with their origins in Indian, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Sri Lanka, for example, in a blend of Hindi, Punjabi, Urdu, Tamil, and Bengali, to name some of our proposed language services.
6106 While this application is for a new FM radio service, Guldasta Broadcasting is no Punjabi come lately. Our station and all of our programming is based in and originates from the City of Edmonton. We are 100 percent local, dealing exclusively with local issues, events and interests, and we have been doing so on Sur Sangam and on TV for almost a decade.
6107 In order to demonstrate the depth of our community commitment, and the duration of our proven service and dedication to the City of Edmonton and all of its residents, we would like to present a video that tells our story in the words of the community.
6108 Please roll the video.
‑‑‑ Video presentation / Présentation vidéo
6109 MR. SHARNPREET BUTTAR: In order to continue our long service to Edmonton's South Asian community we must expand. For this reason, we are before the CRTC today to apply for an ethnic licence to carry on a broadcast undertaking on 98.5 FM.
6110 This expansion of our reach will allow us to continue to serve all Edmontonians with our mix of music, cultural and current affairs coverage, in a medium and method that more appropriately reflect the way our current audience would prefer to obtain their radio services.
6111 Our service includes 2,778 minutes of spoken word programming weekly. This includes 2,316 minutes of structured spoken word, and an estimated 462 minutes of DJ ad lib content.
6112 We play at least 900 songs weekly, of which at least 90 will be emerging Canadian artists, and a minimum of 108 songs, or 12 percent of our total playlist will be Canadian content.
6113 Our plans for an over‑the‑air service include a major expansion of our existing broadcast facilities. We intend to double the square footage of our studios, adding an additional full guest studio, a new recording booth, and expanded office space for staff and guests.
6114 In addition to studio expansion, we intend to upgrade and modernize our entire air chain with the latest studio software and broadcast equipment.
6115 Our proposed radio station will operate on 98.5 FM, from a tower site southwest of Edmonton, operating at 7,200 watts of effective radiated power.
6116 We have agreed to work closely with our consulting engineers and interested parties to ensure that our signal will not encroach on any existing services.
6117 To ensure the highest level of technical quality possible, we will be acquiring new, state of the art transmitting equipment that meets or exceeds today's technical broadcast standards.
6118 In January, prior to filing this application, we conducted research to determine the viability of expanding our existing SCMO service to a conventional radio station service.
6119 Our research involved extensive reviews of our several years of historical records to validate financial patterns. We conducted individual interviews with over 200 existing and previous advertising clients to gauge not only the acceptance of the proposed service, but the anticipated level of revenue that we may expect should this licence be approved.
6120 We also evaluated the existing media landscape for South Asian interests. Our community is a heavy consumer of media, with many newspapers and magazines circulated weekly.
6121 In the case of the broadcast services available, none are truly dedicated to the South Asian community. In some cases, the programming available to the South Asian community comes from outside sources, such as Vancouver's controversial South Asian broadcast ventures.
6122 There is no single, truly dedicated, over‑the‑air radio service that reaches all of the South Asian community, and our application proposes to fill that gap. Our proposal aims to create a radio station that will serve our target audience in the same manner that others in Edmonton are served.
6123 Guldasta proposes a radio station, delivered over the air, that serves its market in a conventional manner: a morning show featuring news, sports, weather and local surveillance material; locally produced spoken word programming; a heavy emphasis on community involvement and visibility; and local studios that produce this content 24 hours per day.
6124 Any Edmonton resident can wake up in the morning and turn on their favourite station, one dedicated and targeted toward them. We propose exactly the same idea for Guldasta Broadcasting, a radio station clearly targeted toward a specific market segment, which delivers entertainment and information that appeals to that market.
6125 The market we are targeting, incidentally, is South Asian. It makes sense for Guldasta to target the South Asian market with an ethnic licence. This licence accepts and provides for some of the challenges related to Canadian music resources for ethnic groups. It provides us with the flexibility to broadcast in the multiple languages that encompass the broad description of "South Asian", and it allows us to compete side‑by‑side with other members of mainstream Edmonton broadcasting.
6126 Ultimately, that is what Guldasta has aspired to do all along ‑‑ to be able to participate as Canadians in the Canadian broadcast industry, bringing our unique culture to others, and open‑heartedly inviting others to participate in our own culture.
6127 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Madam Chair and Commissioners, our assembled team here today welcomes the CRTC's examination of our application.
6128 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much, Mr. Buttar.
6129 I will be conducting the initial questioning, and then the other Commissioners will very likely have questions as well.
6130 I would first like to confirm that you are willing to accept a Condition of Licence requiring you to devote 100 percent of your total programming during the broadcast week to ethnic programming.
6131 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6132 THE CHAIRPERSON: Also, are you willing to accept a Condition of Licence requiring you to devote at least 90 percent of your total programming provided during the broadcast week to third‑language programming?
6133 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, ma'am.
6134 THE CHAIRPERSON: I am just confirming those. Thank you.
6135 I would like to confirm that, as per your deficiency response of February 29th, you are willing to accept as a Condition of Licence a minimum level of 12 percent Canadian content for Category 3 music throughout the broadcast week.
6136 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6137 THE CHAIRPERSON: I am wondering now, because it is important to us to consider diversity in the market and how that is going to be achieved, if you could describe for us the differences and similarities between the service you are proposing and what CIAM Media Broadcasting Association is proposing, and if you could explain why you believe that your application is better suited to serve this market.
6138 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: First of all, we are local, and we have been running the SCMO service for the last six years.
6139 In addition, some of my team members have been involved in local media for over 25 years, and myself for the last 12 years. We know and live in this community. We are the pulse of the community, and we think that we could service much better locally, and we will concentrate on the issues that are more important to Edmontonians.
6140 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6141 I have a similar question with respect to the competing application by the Multicultural Broadcasting Corporation. I am interested to know, again, what you consider the differences and similarities to be, and why your application would be better suited to serve the market.
6142 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: There is one thing with my experience in serving the South Asian community. What I find now is that the South Asian community has grown to the extent where it can support its own media outlet.
6143 We have many, many languages, and that model has existed at CKUA, in our community, for the last many years, and that model existed 25 years ago.
6144 Today is a new age. The community has grown quite a bit since that time, and our team feels very strongly that the South Asian community will be served properly if they have their own media, which will include all of those languages ‑‑ Tamil, Gujrati, and a few other languages ‑‑ which are not included anywhere else in the media.
6145 Bringing in all of these smaller groups with the bigger communities, like Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu, will mean that the South Asian community will be able to support a media outlet at this time.
6146 THE CHAIRPERSON: Can you highlight for me again which of the languages ‑‑ you are proposing seven principal languages, as I understand it. Which of those would be unique to your service?
6147 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We will have Punjabi, Hindi ‑‑
6148 THE CHAIRPERSON: But Punjabi and Hindi, are they unique to your service, or are they also available on the other services?
6149 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: They are also available on the other services.
6150 What are unique are Myanmar and Tamil, and Gujrati, which has not been anywhere until now.
6151 THE CHAIRPERSON: I have more questions along this line, but rather than lose my flow, I will ask them later. Thank you.
6152 Already their exists in the community Rogers CKER‑FM, and I am wondering how your proposed service would bring added diversity to the market, given that their service offers 97 hours of South Asian language programming and 24 hours of Chinese.
6153 I know you are not proposing Chinese, but how will yours be different from the 97 hours offered on CKER?
6154 MR. GURSHARAN: That 97 hours offered ‑‑ first, it just started a few months back. Before that it was not there. On the 1st of October they started with 76 hours. Before that it was only 14 hours ‑‑ 13 to 14 hours per week.
6155 On the other hand, they are starting at seven o'clock at night, and running all night, including all of those hours. Our application is focused on more prime time, daytime listenership, when they need the radio the most ‑‑ driving trucks and taxis and other walks of life. They need the programming at that time.
6156 It is our proposal to have a 24‑hour dedicated service to the South Asian community.
6157 THE CHAIRPERSON: Your service will be live?
6158 I understand that there will be 126 hours of local programming, and 112 hours live‑to‑air?
6159 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6160 THE CHAIRPERSON: The remaining 10 hours, would they be voice‑tracked or pre‑recorded?
6161 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Pre‑recorded.
6162 THE CHAIRPERSON: Done by yourself?
6163 Prepared by yourself?
6164 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6165 THE CHAIRPERSON: In your brief you describe a daily talk show that will be a mix of languages that serve the South Asian community, primarily Hindi and Punjabi. This program, you say, will occupy 560 minutes in each week, which is a substantial programming block.
6166 I am wondering if you could explain how that appeals to all of the other ethnic groups that you are serving ‑‑ the five other groups that you are serving.
6167 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: This is a unique application. All of the South Asian community ‑‑ they are from different cultures and different languages, but we are all used to living together for years and years, so, somewhat, we understand each other.
6168 And with my experience and our team's experience, and with our daily approach ‑‑
6169 South Asians accept these languages. Even if it is not one of their own languages, they will still listen to it.
6170 Music is very common.
6171 THE CHAIRPERSON: Music is common, but would people understand all of the different languages?
6172 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Not 100 percent, but they can pick up some parts of it.
6173 Especially when there is some English, like one or two words ‑‑ when English comes into our conversation, people pick those up and they can relate to that.
6174 THE CHAIRPERSON: You wouldn't expect, then, to lose a portion of your audience every day for that. You think that people would stay tuned, anyway, for the music.
6175 Is that what you are suggesting?
6176 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6177 THE CHAIRPERSON: Will you be doing any exchange of programs with other ethnic broadcasters?
6178 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No.
6179 THE CHAIRPERSON: I would like to talk about the CCD commitment ‑‑ Canadian Content Development.
6180 First of all, I would like to know if you are willing to accept the imposition of a transitionary Canadian Content Development Condition of Licence, which will expire when the amendments to the Radio Regulations come into force.
6181 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6182 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6183 Now, I am a little confused about the amount of your CCD. I will point to all of the areas where I see it is slightly different.
6184 In your March 13th response you indicated that you would make CCD contributions annually in line with the policy, $500 to FACTOR. In that response you indicated that you wish to exceed the minimum requirements.
6185 That is in your March 13th letter, if you are trying to find it, in Section 8.1.(d).
6186 And then you indicate that you are willing to pay additional amounts of $14,500 in every year of the term of the licence.
6187 However, in your response to Question 5 on February 29th, you refer to $500, plus $15,000 in over‑and‑above.
6188 Also, in Section 3 of your supplementary brief you mention a performance subsidy of $1,500 in cash payments that would be made to local artists, increasing by 5 percent annually.
6189 This subsidy is addressed again in your February 29th letter; however, it is not clear if the $1,500 is included in the $14,500 or the $15,000.
6190 I think I could have asked this question in a more direct manner.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
6191 THE CHAIRPERSON: Just bear with me, it's written this way.
6192 Then, on your financial projections it shows as $16,500.
6193 So why don't you just explain to me what it is, and that will answer the question.
6194 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: The $1,500 is not included in the $15,000.
6195 THE CHAIRPERSON: Not included?
6196 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: It's not.
6197 THE CHAIRPERSON: Not intended. Okay.
6198 And the total then...?
6199 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: $16,500.
6200 THE CHAIRPERSON: $16,500.
6201 And that is all over‑and‑above?
6202 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6203 THE CHAIRPERSON: I should have just asked you that straight out.
6204 Could you identify, then, the CCD initiatives that you will be supporting?
6205 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We contacted NAIT, the northern technical institute, and they accepted our offer. We will be sending them money.
6206 And they have already accepted a condition where they will spend that money according to CRTC rules.
6207 THE CHAIRPERSON: You are going to give, I assume, the 20 percent to FACTOR that is required, and the balance will go to NAIT?
6208 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: The balance is going to NAIT, yes.
6209 THE CHAIRPERSON: And you are not increasing your $16,500, it is straight across each year?
6210 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No, it will increase 5 percent each year.
6211 THE CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps what I will ask you to do, if you wouldn't mind, say, by the end of the day on Wednesday, if that is possible, to just give us a little table that sets out your CCD, and that ties into your financial statement.
6212 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Sure.
6213 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6214 We want to make sure that it ties into the financial statements, so if it's different, I will get you to amend your statement as well.
6215 Okay?
6216 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Sure.
6217 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6218 You were originally going to give some funds to the Sikh Federation of Edmonton, but that's not the case any more.
6219 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6220 THE CHAIRPERSON: Not the case.
6221 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's not the case any more.
6222 THE CHAIRPERSON: All right. Thanks.
6223 Do you have a confirmation from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology?
6224 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, we do.
6225 THE CHAIRPERSON: Will you file that with the Commission?
6226 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Will do.
6227 THE CHAIRPERSON: Wednesday, as well, if that's possible?
6228 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Sure.
6229 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6230 I am curious to know, on an ongoing basis, what you will do to ensure that NAIT uses those funds in accordance with the policy.
6231 In other words, will you be in contact with them each year to ‑‑
6232 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6233 THE CHAIRPERSON: I want to get a little more information on your advisory council.
6234 You gave us some information in your February 29th response, where you indicated that you will have a chair and seven delegates, each representing a different ethnic community, a family and community advocate, and a Canadian Content Development advocate.
6235 You describe the role of the delegates, that their role will be to ensure that their specific communities are fairly represented in programming and advertising opportunities, and that the advocates will be responsible for promoting the interests of their specific interest area.
6236 I understand that they will meet quarterly.
6237 Is that correct?
6238 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6239 THE CHAIRPERSON: How will the chair be selected?
6240 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We will give a voting right to all of the councillors, and we will elect our chair to direct the council.
6241 THE CHAIRPERSON: So the chair would not be an additional position, then, it would be someone from within?
6242 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: From the seven.
6243 THE CHAIRPERSON: Will it be from the seven or the nine?
6244 Will it include the other advocates?
6245 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Right now we have seven, and we are still debating. We have commitments from the other groups. They even stated that in their letters of support. We requested them to be part of our advisory council, and they accepted that.
6246 And we are waiting for their response and the name of the person who they would like to send us.
6247 THE CHAIRPERSON: You are still considering seven languages, seven ethnic groups, seven delegates represented ‑‑
6248 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6249 THE CHAIRPERSON: The other two, the family and community advocate, and the Canadian Content Development advocate, would they be voting on the chair as well?
6250 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6251 THE CHAIRPERSON: And could they possibly be voted the chair, either one of them?
6252 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, they could be.
6253 THE CHAIRPERSON: What criteria were you intending to use to select the delegates?
6254 I was curious if you were just inviting suggestions from each community.
6255 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Actually, most of the communities have different organizations, where they have a cultural director, or where they have a language director, and we will ask specifically for one of those people who are directly working either with the culture or with the language program, and they will be designated on our advisory committee.
6256 THE CHAIRPERSON: How long a term would you see each delegate serving?
6257 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Two years.
6258 THE CHAIRPERSON: Would they be eligible for re‑election or reappointment by their communities?
6259 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: It would depend on their own community council's rules and regulations if they would elect them again. If they would like to send the same people to us again, we would consider them.
6260 But, according to their constitution, if they don't allow them to serve over two years, then we will have to change to a new council, according to their terms and conditions.
6261 THE CHAIRPERSON: I was curious if you could describe for me in a little more detail what the family and community advocate and the Canadian Content Development advocate would be doing.
6262 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: They will be monitoring and making suggestions about the content and the music selection, and about the talk shows, and the different community concerns, and we will take their considerations into account and decide from there.
6263 THE CHAIRPERSON: Are there any specific responsibilities for the Canadian Content Development advocate?
6264 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, there will be.
6265 All of the emerging artists and all of the Canadian content, they will be looking after that part, as well, for us.
6266 THE CHAIRPERSON: So, as a group, they are going to bring to you ideas for programming.
6267 I was curious to know how you will decide which programs will make it to air.
6268 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We have a very strong team working with Radio Sur Sangam, and they have lots of experience. Mr. Shabir Pathan has been doing this work for 25 years.
6269 And we have been working for years and years with the community, and we have some ideas.
6270 We will work with them closely, and it will be a mutual understanding with them, but the final decision will be ours. We will decide what to do and where to go from there.
6271 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6272 This is going back a little bit to your opening comments, with respect to the ability of the market to support more than one ethnic radio station.
6273 The 2006 census recorded 14,000 South Asians identifying Punjabi as their mother tongue. You indicated in your deficiency response that there are an estimated 80,000 persons of Punjabi/Hindi origin, and an additional 30,000 persons of South Asian ethnic groups.
6274 Today I think you referred to ‑‑
6275 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Eighty.
6276 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. You reference your source for the information as the City of Edmonton Staff, in consultations you had with them.
6277 I am wondering if there are any studies publicly available to support the numbers.
6278 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: First of all, I would like to explain about the Punjabi‑speaking population. Lots of people, even if they are Punjabi, they don't put in the census that they are Punjabi, they just put that they are an English‑speaking family, and this is a new change as a Canadian.
6279 So those numbers are not correct numbers.
6280 And being in the media ‑‑
6281 Since 2006, until now, there has been lots of migration to Edmonton.
6282 Even according to the 2006 census, the South Asian community grew by 35 percent in the country and in the city, which is bigger than any other community.
6283 And that growth, plus newcomers after 2006, who migrated from Winnipeg, or Vancouver, or Toronto. There are lots of people here who are travelling with their families from India, from Singapore, from Malaysia, who are Hindi/Punjabi‑speaking.
6284 And thousands of people are on permit right now, and they are working in Alberta. They are not part of the census.
6285 So, collecting all of those numbers together, they add up to somewhere near a population of 80,000 people who understand and speak Hindi, Punjabi, Urdu, or other languages.
6286 THE CHAIRPERSON: But you wouldn't have a publicly available study to support it, would you?
6287 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Actually, before we submitted the application we made a phone call to the Government of Alberta, and this is an unofficial report given to us by them.
6288 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. Thank you.
6289 You did some research, you mentioned. Would your research have given you any idea?
6290 It would be pretty hard to tell from that anyway, I would think.
6291 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6292 Actually, in the last six years ‑‑ and I have been in the business for 12 years ‑‑ research is ongoing every day.
6293 And over 20,000 radio sets have been sold into the South Asian community; not only the South Asian community, only Hindi and Punjabi‑speaking people. And, in 20,000 households, maybe some people have two or three radios in their homes.
6294 Right now Rajwinder and myself are working with the client lists and the prospects for our advertising. There are over 700 South Asian businesses in the community, which could generate lots of revenue to support the radio station.
6295 Plus, our estimate is pretty accurate, according to us, that there are 80,000 people living in the metro Edmonton area who are South Asian.
6296 THE CHAIRPERSON: You are saying that there are 20,000 radios or receivers that have been sold.
6297 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right, in the last 11 years.
6298 The SCMO has existed since 1995 in Edmonton.
6299 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6300 I was curious to know, as well, if you had a population breakdown by ethnic group of the seven groups that you are proposing to serve.
6301 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: I don't have anything ready at this time, but I have most of the figures, which we can work on, and we could file that on Wednesday with the other documentation.
6302 THE CHAIRPERSON: That would be good.
6303 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6304 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay, thank you.
‑‑‑ Pause
6305 THE CHAIRPERSON: In your deficiency response February 29th to question 21 you indicated the sources of your projected Year 2 revenues. That was in a response to a question we would have asked.
6306 I'm wondering what percentage of your revenues you think would come from CKER‑FM. You didn't indicate any on your table and I'm just wondering, do you think that none of your revenues would come from CKER?
6307 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No, none of them.
6308 THE CHAIRPERSON: Is there a reason that you think that? They haven't been at it as long? You are saying they have only just recently increased the hours of programming they do?
6309 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: SCMOs, there is three SCMOs in our community and they are holding the most of the business in South Asian communities, for years and years. CKER more rely on national accounts and on the bigger accounts like Wal‑Mart and other outfits. And hardly anybody from South Asian community advertise on CKER.
6310 THE CHAIRPERSON: Actually, I had a question here about the other SCMO services in Edmonton. They are all as well doing South Asian?
6311 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: They are doing South Asian but we are the ones who started the local programming and still there is SCMO who broadcast outside sources from Vancouver for more than 20 hours per day.
6312 THE CHAIRPERSON: Sorry, I didn't understand.
6313 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Most SCMOs in our city ‑‑
6314 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes.
6315 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: ‑‑ they only produce three to four hours local programming in the evening.
6316 THE CHAIRPERSON: Oh, I see.
6317 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Most of the programming comes from Surrey, B.C.
6318 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay.
‑‑‑ Pause
6319 THE CHAIRPERSON: I notice ‑‑ let me ask you this first. Do you expect that your advertising rates will increase substantially from what you are currently charging on your SCMO service?
6320 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6321 THE CHAIRPERSON: You do. And as part of your research and polling your existing clients, and you mentioned you were also talking to previous clients of your SCMO, did you discuss rates with them as well?
6322 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6323 THE CHAIRPERSON: So you don't expect that's going to be ‑‑
6324 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Most of them even stated in their letters that we are willing to support, continuous support with the FM station.
6325 THE CHAIRPERSON: So you are expecting 30 percent of your Year 2 revenues will come from your current station?
6326 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6327 THE CHAIRPERSON: So I was just curious to know what percent of your current advertisers do you expect will make the move to the FM service?
6328 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: I'm very ‑‑ in discussion with them and relationship established with them for years and years, I would say at least 80 percent.
6329 THE CHAIRPERSON: 80?
6330 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6331 THE CHAIRPERSON: And you are forecasting a 1 percent audience share, 12 plus audience share in Year 1, increasing annually by a quarter of a percent over seven years. I'm just wondering how does that 1 percent share for Year 1 compare to your current audience? Do you have any feel for that?
6332 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That will be a very big growth on our part.
6333 THE CHAIRPERSON: Will it?
6334 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: It will be very big.
6335 THE CHAIRPERSON: Even in Year 1?
6336 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6337 THE CHAIRPERSON: And your SCMO service, would you just discontinue it completely?
6338 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We will still keep the SCMO service.
6339 THE CHAIRPERSON: You will still be operating it?
6340 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: SCMO, yes.
6341 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes. So if I have an SCMO receiver can I receive all of the SCMO services offered in the community, pickup all of them?
6342 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Most of. Not every SCMO server, most SCMO servers are setup that way. We are going to receive all the SCMO services.
6343 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. So I'm wondering then ‑‑ well, I will come back to that.
6344 I'm wondering how many people you will employ and what will be the composition of your staff.
6345 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We will have five to six fulltime employees and eight part‑time employees to start with.
6346 THE CHAIRPERSON: And how will they be assigned, you know sales, admin, marketing?
6347 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6348 THE CHAIRPERSON: How many ‑‑ how will that breakdown, your news department in particular?
6349 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We have big news staff. We will have three people working in the city in the news department and we have a team of newscasters working in other ‑‑ New York City, countries in India, Pakistan. They are directly employed with us, Guldasta Broadcasting. So including them we are the team of 12 to 13 people even right now and we will be growing to 15 or so in the near future if we have this approved.
6350 THE CHAIRPERSON: So your international correspondents, if you like; is that what you are saying, working in ‑‑
6351 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: That's right.
6352 THE CHAIRPERSON: And how many of those would you have?
6353 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: We have 11 right now.
6354 THE CHAIRPERSON: And so they bring you breaking news items ‑‑
6355 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Breaking news, yes.
6356 THE CHAIRPERSON: ‑‑ that kind of thing?
6357 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6358 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes.
6359 I had a question here. I noticed that there is a considerable difference between your financial projections and those of the Multicultural Broadcasting Corporation. I don't know if you had a chance to look at their application?
6360 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6361 THE CHAIRPERSON: So they are proposing Year 1 revenues of 815,000 growing to 2 million and 60 over the seven‑year period annually for a total of 10 million, 154 and you are proposing 430,000 Year 1 growing to 682,000 in Year 7 for a 3.8 million total for the seven years.
6362 So your projected revenues are about 38 percent of that that's projected by Multicultural Broadcasting and similarly with your expenses. They are about 36.5 percent. So I'm just wondering if you would care to comment on the significant difference.
6363 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, with our experience of this market and working with them years and years this is a very commonsense business plan we have. It's achievable. And we know it's very modest and we can grow even bigger than that. But this is achievable commonsense business plan we put forward to the Commission at this time.
6364 THE CHAIRPERSON: So I understand that to be conservative. So how conservative is it? Do you think it's 80 percent of what you might achieve or 60 percent or you don't even think of it in terms like that?
6365 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Actually, at this time I know we can do better than this but 80 percent I cannot comment at this point.
6366 THE CHAIRPERSON: Then can I gather from that you are not expecting it to be significantly different? You are comfortable with what you have? You don't have to give me a number if you don't ‑‑
6367 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: With the growth consideration at this point if it keeps growing at the same pace it will be a considerable difference.
6368 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay.
6369 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: But if there is no growth still with this number we are safer to say that even, you know, like if we don't have the same growth continue for coming years we will still be comfortable with the numbers, what we just put forward to the Commission.
6370 THE CHAIRPERSON: All right. Thank you.
6371 I notice that your Year 3 expenses as a percent of your total revenue looks odd compared to the percent of revenue for Alberta, and also as well as forecast by the Multicultural Corporation. I don't know if you would have had a chance to look or to do that kind of a comparison.
6372 But for example ‑‑ I suppose you are not ‑‑ it's not actually the ‑‑ the Multicultural Corporation is 97 percent expenses of the revenue, their operating expenses total and yours total 91.6. I suppose that's not such a significant difference percentage‑wise. The difference is just in the quantum.
6373 But I notice your payroll and benefits, 50 percent of your revenues ‑‑ or sorry, your payrolls and benefits would be at 50 percent of your revenues and you have broken that out on a separate line, whereas normally it's allocated to programming, technical, sales; promotion. Are you able to tell us how that payroll and benefits would split up, like if we wanted to add it to the programming line? For example, your programming expenses are 8 percent of revenue whereas for the Province of Alberta it's 37.6 percent of revenue and for Multicultural it's 41.6.
6374 Are you able to break your payroll and benefits down? And actually, you wouldn't even have to do it right now if you could just give it to us with your undertaking.
6375 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Sure, thank you.
6376 THE CHAIRPERSON: That gives you a chance to look at it.
6377 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Thank you very much.
6378 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay.
6379 And I notice in particular that your programming expenses are $21,300 compared to $460 for multicultural broadcasting in Year 2. So I understand that yours is on a different scale but once you reallocate your expenses that number I expect will come up, because I would assume all of your salaries are in the one line.
6380 We will see when you do it, and I think that will answer that question that I had.
6381 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Thank you.
‑‑‑ Pause
6382 THE CHAIRPERSON: Given the strength of the competitive environment in the Edmonton market, what will be the effect on your business plans if the results are not as you projected and you incur larger losses for a longer period of time ‑‑ and for a longer period of time?
6383 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Can you repeat that, please?
6384 THE CHAIRPERSON: Sure. I'm just wondering if you don't achieve the results that you have forecasted and if I see that you have forecasted a negative PBIT for the first two years and Year 3 you are looking at a positive, but if it's longer, if it takes three or four years to turnaround what are you prepared to do?
6385 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6386 THE CHAIRPERSON: Are you prepared to put in additional funds?
6387 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: First of all, with this business plan we are very confident that this will work. And if it's not we are all prepared for it and we have some ‑‑ we will have some funds allocated in that case. If that happens we will have funds to subsidize.
6388 THE CHAIRPERSON: Would you consider reducing operating expenses, in particular programming expenses, to make up for any shortfall?
6389 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No, actually, I am a very big believer in team work and a proper team can take you towards your goal and cutting back on the team is not a good business plan ‑‑ according to me.
6390 THE CHAIRPERSON: All right.
6391 I'm wondering, how many new licences do you think the Edmonton market can support?
6392 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: In the ethnic?
6393 THE CHAIRPERSON: Both actually, I was going to ask of you. Ethnic is part B but you can do whichever you like.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
6394 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6395 At this point I think one licence will be well supported and maybe two, and what ‑‑ South Asian community at this point can support one more licence, that's for sure. And I cannot comment on the other communities.
6396 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay.
6397 So your projections are based on one South Asian ‑‑ one ethnic community, like one ethnic licence?
6398 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: One ethnic licence.
6399 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay, good enough. Thank you.
6400 All right. I will just see if my any of my colleagues ‑‑ Commissioner Cugini.
6401 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: Thank you, Madam Chair.
6402 Good morning.
6403 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Good morning.
6404 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: I just have a couple of follow‑up questions.
6405 In your discussions with Chair Duncan you did talk about mother tongue and ethnic origin and it's often a conversation that is had with ethnic media. I would like you to tell us and expand a little bit on why you think it's important that we consider ethnic origin as well as statistics related to mother tongue and why it's particularly important for the South Asian community.
6406 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: South Asian community has grown very fast in the past few years and they all bring their culture and their values with them. And it's very important for them to diversify the Canadian society to welcome the other cultural values and their beliefs into all cultures and at the same time have our cultural values and our customs to be shared by the other communities.
6407 Radio and this media is very important vehicle to diversify the community and be part of the bigger communities, like all the other Canadian communities and communication and diversify it and to know the others and tell about us to the others. This will be very appropriate vehicle for that.
6408 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: But ethnic origin statistics capture second, third, fourth, fifth generation South Asian Canadians, any second, third, fourth or fifth generation immigrant population. Is there enough of an audience base to keep ‑‑ to sustain a radio station going forward that has dedicated almost 100 percent to South Asian programming?
6409 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, there will be.
6410 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: And for generations to come. In 20 years do you have enough of a population base that is going to sustain this radio station?
6411 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes, yes. There is two reasons for that.
6412 One, we have a third or second, fourth generation coming up in Canada. At the same time, we are the biggest growing community with the immigration, new immigrants from India and from other parts of the world.
6413 And on the same note, second or third generation even though they are Canadians and we are proud to be Canadians and English is our first language, more radio stations ‑‑ and communication is a very important part to learning and keeping in touch with our culture, our roots and our language.
6414 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: And the fact that you have some younger South Asian people on your panel is not lost on me. So thank you for that.
6415 Again, following up on the conversation with Chairperson Duncan regarding the similarities and differences with other applicants, if we look specifically at the application by Multicultural Broadcasting they are including more languages in their application but the languages that you are targeting they have also included, I think, if my math is correct, to a total of about 45 hours. You are 100 percent South Asian.
6416 My question to you is this: In a community like ‑‑ in a market like Edmonton where as great as it is that South Asian isn't the only ethnic community, why should we consider your application to better serve the Edmonton market rather than that of Multicultural broadcasting which has a wider scope and will therefore appeal to a wider audience and more language groups?
6417 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: With my broadcasting experience that model is already existing in our community with the CKER and that model is very old when the community was only in the hundreds, maybe in thousands at that time, and now the community has grown and only radio services are profitable these days where they don't lose the audience all day around.
6418 And to keeping that in mind, focusing on one community and one group or similar communities is the way of broadcasting at this area. That's what I believe in.
6419 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: Well, thank you very much and thank you for your responses this morning.
6420 Thank you, Madam Chair.
6421 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Commissioner Cugini.
6422 Commissioner Molnar.
6423 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you, good morning.
6424 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Good morning.
6425 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I just have a couple of questions as follow up.
6426 You mentioned to Chairperson Duncan that you would plan if you were successful in this licence to retain your SCMO service.
6427 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6428 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And I wondered if you could explain to me why you would retain that? What's the benefit of that service in addition to this?
6429 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Since there is the news and there is a discussion in the community that we are applying for an FM station, we have been approached by some of the communities which cannot afford FM station at this time. They cannot support ethnic station at this time. And they are already inquiring about adding those communities onto SCMO.
6430 I feel that with the diversity there is a chance to bring other languages who can benefit from that. That is the main reason for me to keep that SCMO with the FM station.
6431 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Sorry, just so I understand, because you are broadcasting outside of Edmonton as well as in Edmonton with that SCMO?
6432 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No, I only broadcast into Edmonton with that SCMO. Communities within Edmonton approached us for the SCMO service, if they can add their language and their programming onto SCMO if we have FM station approved.
6433 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. So you would see potentially changing the makeup of what's in that SCMO. So you would use this FM station to focus on your South Asian, the seven groups. I think it was seven targeted groups within the South Asian community, and you would expand the SCMO to different communities ‑‑
6434 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: I will ‑‑ I will explain that again.
6435 What it is ‑‑ South Asian community, I'm including seven languages. But if you know South Asian origins there is 41 languages, more than that, and some of that is not even included in this application. They are small groups like 1,000, 800 some other people, and their languages will be added into SCMO and their programming will be added into SCMO.
6436 It will be South Asian. It will be ethnic, but totally different languages, small groups where there needs some programming and some community voices to be broadcasted and it will be focused on those languages.
6437 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay, thank you.
6438 Will it be operated entirely separately or will you have some synergies with the FM radio station
6439 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Separately.
6440 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Separately?
6441 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6442 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay.
6443 Just one more question. Obviously, I take ‑‑ well, I take ‑‑ I shouldn't say obviously but I take from the video that you provided that you are very successful with a broad audience appeal and a successful outreach to the community. And I wondered what you felt might be the impact upon your SCMO if the successful applicant here was not yourself, if we had ‑‑ one of the other ethnic applicants were to achieve a licence, would that have ‑‑ what sort of impacts would that have on your company?
6444 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: It will have a big impact. Like any other city we are ‑‑ it's a record we have ‑‑ vendor licence where there is open frequencies. SCMO don't exist in similar languages. That's why I was discussing to switch the SCMO services to different languages if we have the FM licence.
6445 If this licence is given to somebody else our SCMO subscribers will be affected very badly.
6446 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: So where you say that there is capacity to licence another applicant, there is capacity to licence another applicant and keep your SCMO healthy and whole or not?
6447 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No.
6448 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: So there isn't capacity?
6449 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: There isn't a ‑‑ because we will be competing in similar languages, similar cultures. There is a capacity if we change the direction of the SCMO just their viability, but if we are focussing in the same community like right now I'm serving Punjabi, Gujarati, Hindi and Urdu‑speaking and if a licence is granted for the similar languages to another licence it will affect the SCMO big time.
6450 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay, thank you. I understand.
6451 Those are my questions.
6452 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
6453 Mr. Buttar, Commissioner Molnar's question reminded me of one that I overlooked asking.
6454 I just wanted to know, since you are going to be continuing the SCMO operation if any of the programming done for that station will end up on your FM service?
6455 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: No, there is a totally different format for the FM station.
6456 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. No, that's great. That concludes our questions.
6457 Legal? Yes, Legal.
6458 MS LEMOUX: Thank you, Madam Chair.
6459 I have one follow‑up question on the CCD contributions. So in response to a question asked by Madam Chair you have agreed to a transitional condition of licence for the CCD contribution regime.
6460 However, I would like a confirmation from you that you also agree to have your over and above contributions of $16,500 for each of the seven years of operation imposed by condition of licence.
6461 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Yes.
6462 MS LEMOUX: Thank you.
6463 THE CHAIRPERSON: This is ‑‑ we have sort of gotten into this little custom of giving you two minutes, if you like, to tell us why Guldasta Broadcasting should be granted the licence.
6464 MR. GURSHARAN BUTTAR: Sapreet.
6465 MS SAPREET BUTTAR: Members of the Commission, first, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. Edmonton's entire South Asian community is excited at the opportunity to obtain a full service radio station they can receive over the air without the need of special equipment.
6466 Guldasta Broadcasting has been a champion of this community for many years and have been deeply committed to community service as a way to strengthen our own culture, to share our cultures with others and to discover other cultures that surround us. We have extensive experience in serving this community and extensive experience in running a radio station from a business and a financial point of view.
6467 We have an excellent highly‑trained staff in all positions ready to take on this exciting new challenge. As you can see, our family is entirely committed to our business plan. The successes we have shared in the past are our strongest point in planning and forecasting the future.
6468 We are Edmonton all the way. We share not only our family and community culture but the lifestyle and culture of any Canadian family, hot summers, cold winters and diehard support for the Oilers add an exciting and positive hope for the future.
6469 Our future is one in which we aspire to continue what our family has done for so long and which our community wishes for us to continue.
6470 We have a strong financial base to start from, excellent support from our professional advisors and massive community backing, as indicated in the interventions filed on our behalf by not only the South Asian community but members from across Edmonton's ethnic and cultural spectrum.
6471 It is a privilege to appear before you today to present our proposal for a new FM radio station for Edmonton.
6472 The entire Guldasta team thanks the Commission for their consideration of our application and, as well, we look forward to having you here for some butter chicken for our launch party.
6473 Thank you.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
6474 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. We will take a 15‑minute break.
6475 I don't think I have got the right time. I'm on Toronto time there. What is it? 11:00, thank you.
‑‑‑ Upon recessing at 1047 / Suspension à 1047
‑‑‑ Upon resuming at 1109 / Reprise à 1109
6476 THE SECRETARY: We are ready to begin with Item 14 which is an application by Multicultural Broadcasting Corporation Inc. for a licence to operate an FM commercial ethnic radio programming undertaking in Edmonton.
6477 The new station would operate on frequency 95.7 MHz (channel 239B) with an average effective radiated power of 10,600 watts (maximum effective radiated power of 20,000 watts/antenna height of 175.5 metres).
6478 Appearing for the applicant is Bijoy Samuel. Please introduce your colleagues and then you will have 20 minutes to make your presentation.
6479 Mr. Samuel.
PRESENTATION / PRESENTATION
6480 MR. SAMUEL: Thank you.
6481 Good morning, Madam Chair, and members of the Commission.
6482 I am Bijoy Samuel, General Manager of ReD‑FM. I have been associated with the company for five years.
6483 Seated next to me is Kulwinder Sanghera. Kulwinder is the President of ReD‑FM and was honoured as the business person of the year in 2006 by the Surrey Board of Trade.
6484 We have developed a strong local team. Here are the members of our panel.
6485 Kulmit Sangha has lived in Edmonton for 31 years. He is a respected radio host and started his radio career many years ago at CKER‑FM. Kulmit presently operates his own SCMO in Edmonton and will be part of our team providing strong, local programming.
6486 Suknit Lamba joined us as a host when we started ReD‑FM in Vancouver and she relocated to Edmonton about a year ago after getting married. Upon moving to Edmonton Suknit re‑established her radio career and she hosted Punjabi and Hindi shows on CKER‑FM.
6487 Our Chinese host, Catherine, is not here. But in her place Pan is here with us today. Pan Zhang is a Mandarin host and she has been living in Edmonton for the last 10 years and has hosted shows on CKER‑FM for many years. Pan was also a radio host in China.
6488 Tina Tolvay is a Filipino host. Tina has lived in Edmonton for more than two decades and has a rich experience of hosting Filipino shows on CKER‑FM. Tina was instrumental in organizing local Filipino talent contests and one of the winners in fact went on to participate in the Canadian Idol.
6489 As you can see, we have an excellent team, rich in local radio experience and they are well known to Edmonton radio listeners.
6490 Harjinder Thind is a news director and talk show host in Vancouver. He also co‑hosts on national television show Des Pardes. Harjinder is legendary with fan following amongst South Asians across Canada. His talk shows are on current affairs and provide an intelligent forum for discussion. Until a few months ago his radio program was broadcast in Edmonton and he has a huge following in Edmonton.
6491 Michael Pedersen is our technical director and is responsible for many key initiatives like the ReD‑FM Run and the Surrey Food Drive.
6492 Mark Lewis is our broadcast lawyer and a partner at Lewis Birnberg Hanet LLP. He has worked with us since we applied for a licence in Vancouver.
6493 Kerry Wicks is the President and CEO of Mediastats Incorporated. She has personally handled our project and her company has conducted research for us in Edmonton.
6494 We will now start our presentation.
6495 Canada has opened its arms wide to immigrants from many countries. Our policies encourage multiculturalism. Today, the world views Canada as a true multicultural country and as citizens of this beautiful country we are very excited to be here today, expressing the urgent need for an ethnic radio station to serve Edmonton, and we thank you for giving us this opportunity.
6496 You may know that the last ethnic commercial radio licence was granted 28 years ago in 1980. That's true. It's been a long time. It's exciting because we believe it's about time that the ethnic population of Edmonton gets another ethnic radio station. Hopefully, the Commission will also share our excitement.
6497 Another reason for our excitement is because we are well positioned to take this responsibility and passionately reflect the growing ethnic diversity of Edmonton.
6498 The big questions are: How has the population grown in 28 years? What are their unmet needs? How are we addressing them? Why are we the best applicant to take this responsibility?
6499 So let's look at the first question, how has the population grown? Over the years, growth in infrastructure, economy and population have made Edmonton an excellent market to establish a new ethnic radio station and to cater to the increasing number of immigrants whose mother tongue is not English or French.
6500 Since 1980 Edmonton's ethnic population has more than doubled to 189,775 people and the face of Edmonton has changed drastically. It is now home for many ethnic communities that have grown enormously in size; South Asians, Chinese, Filipinos are the top three ethnic groups that have come in large numbers to Edmonton.
6501 MR. SANGHERA: Need for a new ethnic radio station: The population growth has created a wide gap between the ethnic radio service available and diverse need for many growing ethnic communities. While there are 17 commercial English‑language radio stations serving the mainstream market, even after 28 years only one commercial radio station is catering to the needs of 20 percent of Edmonton's population. Many ethnic groups do not have radio service while others have a minimum service.
6502 The Commission is likely aware that on a population per station basis the Edmonton ethnic radio market is underserved. Other Canadian cities and towns have per capita more ethnic radio service than Edmonton. In Vancouver, two Canadian, two American ethnic radio stations serving the South Asians for 200,000 people. Recently, the Commission granted an ethnic radio licence in Windsor, Ontario to serve an ethnic population of 75,000. Large multi‑station ownership groups collectively command an audience share of 84.2 percent of Edmonton's radio.
6503 It is noteworthy to emphasize that just one company owns 100 percent of commercial ethnic radio and ethnic television station in Edmonton, plus English‑language TV, television and radio stations. This is a highly concentrated media market.
6504 The licensing of ReD‑FM will bring balance and diversity of voices in the market.
6505 MS WICKS: The survey conducted by Mediastats revealed many interesting facts about the need for a new ethnic radio station. Only 30.75 percent of respondents indicated that they were very satisfied with the existing radio stations. For those respondents who were less than very satisfied with available programming, their reasons were diverse, not enough or no programming available in their home language, or the program not being very appealing accounted for their top responses.
6506 These sources again point to a high language retention factor which corroborates our notion that the market is in need of more and diverse ethnic programming to serve its new and expanding immigration population.
6507 In terms of respondents preferences regarding types of programming 65.5 percent of those surveyed were very interested in news from their home country and just under 60 percent were very interested in news from their community in Edmonton.
6508 While 54 and a quarter (54.25) percent of the respondents do not at all frequently listen to CKER‑FM, only 23.25 percent said they do listen very frequently to CKER‑FM. A high total of 88 and a quarter (88.25) percent responded that they would listen to our new ethnic radio station.
6509 Again, these results provide a strong suggestion that additional ethnic radio programming is in almost urgent need in this growing market. The urgency to address this need is accentuated by the fact that the current immigration pattern is rapidly increasing the ethnic population in Edmonton.
6510 MR. SANGHERA: ReD‑FM shall fulfill this need by catering to 16.2 percent of Edmonton's population in 20 different languages targeted toward 23 ethnic groups. We will now present a brief video.
‑‑‑ Video presentation / Présentation video
6511 MR. SANGHERA: ReD‑FM also meets a broad service requirement settled in the Ethnic Broadcast Policy. We understand the need to nurture programming directed towards some other ethnic communities so that they too can have a voice. We have the resources and experience to give voice to the truly underserved groups in Edmonton.
6512 MS LAMBA: So how are we fulfilling their needs through ReD‑FM? ReD‑FM will provide a distinct radio service through the local reflection of ethnic communities with special emphasis on local and regional news, local community information as well as intelligent talk shows that stimulate debate and community participation and, of course, great music.
6513 We will increase choices in music for a growing and diverse ethnic population.
6514 We recognize that each community has different needs, interests and capabilities and ReD‑FM shall play a very unique role in strengthening ethnic communities in Edmonton.
6515 Many new immigrants find radio to be a great source of learning and information as they integrate into a new environment. ReD‑FM will be their primary resource.
6516 MR. THIND: ReD‑FM believes that the value of talk show is imperative and shall engage its audience with well‑researched topics. Our talk shows will be community driven and shall encompass a wide range of social, political, health, cultural and economic issues with high local relevance.
6517 ReD‑FM is a strong advocate of feminine issues and topics such as equality in the workplace, balancing careers and family, and domestic violence will be discussed.
6518 On youth talk shows we will discuss topics such as identity crises, gangs, positive role models and lack of quality time between parents and youth.
6519 The reality check talk show will encourage cross‑cultural understanding and multiculturalism. We shall have open line shows to provide an interactive forum to encourage discussions and debate on issues important to our diverse ethnic communities, thus providing Edmonton's ethnic communities exposure to various points of view and allowing them to conduct intelligent discussions and make informed decisions.
6520 Two informative 90‑second features will be produced per day on a variety of topics, including health, active lifestyle, job availability, local artists, role models, word on the street and festivals.
6521 In news programming, as stated earlier, according to the survey conducted by Mediastats, a majority of the respondents are interested in news. Our analysis determined that most of the news available on ethnic radio consists of international news, much of it homeland news.
6522 Internet has made the world a global village, and for the internet savvy news from back home is available easily on the internet. But radio still excels in providing live immediate local news as it happens, and that's exactly what we will do. ReD‑FM shall fulfill the unmet needs for news with a strong emphasis on local news with 87 newscasts during our Punjabi, Filipino, Hindi, Urdu, Mandarin and Cantonese programs, 14 community updates with news from back home in 14 different languages on the weekend.
6523 Whereas most new English‑language FM stations commit to approximately 15 hours per week of spoken word programming mainly on weekdays, our proposal delivers a large amount of spoken word content seven days a week. News and intelligent spoken word programming are at the heart of our proposal.
6524 MS LAMBA: Music plays a very important part in the lives of her listeners. Music is key to the retention of cultural heritage. ReD‑FM's music shows will create a good environment for an ethnic population as the drive to work in the mornings. And while they are at work ReD‑FM shall adopt the role of a background radio station, providing great music. For those coming back to their homes from a hard day's work, ReD‑FM will help them unwind.
6525 ReD‑FM will play a wide variety of music that appeals to target audiences. To be successful today in ethnic radio we know that we must provide micro‑niche formats and cater to the tastes of listeners of different ages. We have been successful in providing specialized music programs for younger listeners as well as more traditional music which encourages entire families to listen to radio together.
6526 ReD‑FM will commit by way of a condition of licence to 10 percent Canadian music content on a weekly basis.
6527 MR. PEDERSEN: Canadian Content Development: Our Canadian Content Development plan is designed to achieve the following; creation of audio content for broadcasting, fulfilment of objectives set out in the Broadcasting Act through the airplay of Canadian music which provides a showcase for the work of Canadian artists.
6528 ReD‑FM shall direct its basic annual CCD contribution of $13,301 over seven years to Grant MacEwen College to be used for bursaries for students enrolled in music programs.
6529 ReD‑FM shall direct $351,494 over seven years as contributions over and above our basic annual CCD contributions. This money will be disbursed as follows: $28,000 over seven years to the University of Alberta, School of Journalism for bursaries to students enrolled in journalism programs; $21,000 over seven years to FACTOR; $39,000 annually on three local music talent contests for Filipinos, South Asians and Chinese artists. Winners will be given an opportunity to work with music composers to produce their work at recording studios and 500 CDs will be produced for distribution to ethnic radio stations.
6530 $29,494 over seven years to the South Asian Lyric Society and the Chinese Lyric Society.
6531 Amongst the ethnic applicants ReD‑FM has committed to spend the highest amount of money on well‑targeted CCD initiatives. In just two years talent contests sponsored by ReD‑FM Vancouver have generated hundreds of entries. Successful contestants have not only received the support of their community in Canada but one contestant has gone on to compete internationally.
6532 We would like to show you a quick video clip illustrating our first two successful talent shows.
‑‑‑ Video presentation / Présentation vidéo
6533 MR. PEDERSEN: In our experience, talent competitions unite communities and are catalysts for community building. We propose to do the same in Edmonton.
6534 Thank you.
6535 MR. SAMUEL: Business plan: The radio market in Edmonton is very strong and has grown tremendously over the last 28 years. Total revenue for all Edmonton radio stations increased from 48.3 million in 2002 to 70.9 million in 2006 with an average growth rate of 10.1 percent.
6536 We have a strong business plan with well‑calculated conservative sales estimates and a format that is very much needed.
6537 The influx of various ethnic groups has led to an increase in ethnic businesses. These businesses constantly need advertising and many have submitted support letters indicating their intention to advertise on our radio station.
6538 The beauty of radio is that it's live, local and immediate. This is a big advantage for many advertisers. A safe strategy is to encourage advertisers to explore the potential of this powerful medium but keeping the pricing of our ads affordable. Positive developments like national advertisers focusing more on reaching ethnic populations and a projected growth in Edmonton of 107,000 people by 2007 to 2012 backup our business plan.
6539 We will increase new radio advertising revenue and create new broadcasting jobs locally while achieving financial success with minimal impact on other broadcasters.
6540 Now, let's discuss why are we the most suitable candidates to operate the new station.
6541 The ReD‑FM advantage: We thank you for granting us the licence in Vancouver. We would like to share with you what we have done with the responsibility with which you entrusted us.
6542 Last year we commissioned a survey through BBM Analytics and you will be happy to know that ReD‑FM was the number one radio station amongst the U.S. and Canadian South Asian ethnic stations this year.
6543 Solutions Research Group conducted the second annual survey, known as Diversity in Canada (Wave 2), and ReD‑FM again was the number one South Asian radio station in Vancouver.
6544 This success is driven by many factors. We are passionate about ethnic radio and put our heart and soul into making ReD‑FM Vancouver an exemplary multicultural radio station. While we expect our listeners to listen to us, it begins with us listening to our listeners and catering to their needs.
6545 Community involvement: Our philosophy is by the community, for the community and we translate this into reality everyday by taking up projects that benefit the community. As you saw in the video, the best part is that the community gets involved with us and we partner together for success. It is no longer just a ReD‑FM initiative but rather the entire communities.
6546 ReD‑FM has also helped many social and cultural organizations to promote their events and give exposure to their initiatives. In fact, Kulwinder is a member of the city's multicultural advisory board and is presently helping the city organize Fusion Festival as part of its cultural capital of Canada celebrations, built upon credibility and trust and news.
6547 One thing that ReD‑FM has truly earned is the trust of our community. The community now has a credible source of local news and information they can trust and rely on. We have successfully competed in a region served by two unlicensed Canadian broadcasters who utilize U.S. transmitters to beam into Canada. Neither broadcaster adheres to Canadian broadcast regulations or Canadian broadcast standards and there is the difference.
6548 We truly believe that audience acceptance of our programming is based upon playing by the rules, providing balanced, intelligent, well‑produced programming and giving back to the community we serve. ReD‑FM Edmonton will be built upon these principles.
6549 MR. SANGHERA: We believe that our application for a new ethnic radio service will force the market demand by increasing the programming for many underserved groups, providing distinct, independent news voices, increasing music choices, all of which benefit the local communities while achieving the objectives of the ethnic policy and the Broadcasting Act.
6550 To us it is about being locally relevant to our audience. After all, it is all about the people we serve and in Edmonton we shall do as we have done in Vancouver, succeed with hard work, passion and dedication. We have been highly privileged to have earned your trust. We thank you for listening to us and our team is ready for your questions.
6551 THE CHAIRPERSON: Commissioner Molnar will begin the questioning.
6552 Thank you.
6553 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Good morning.
6554 I assume you have been here for the first presentation that we heard from Guldasta this morning?
6555 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, please.
6556 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes.
6557 My questions will follow very similar to those that we shared with Guldasta. So let me begin by asking about your condition of licence. So the ethnic broadcast policy, as you know, may impose upon you a condition of licence regarding your proposed levels of ethnic and third language programming.
6558 MR. SAMUEL: Yes.
6559 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: You have proposed 100 percent of your total weekly programming be devoted to ethnic programming and at least 96 percent of all your weekly programming be third language programming.
6560 MR. SAMUEL: We take condition of licence for 90 percent for the third languages.
6561 MR. SANGHERA: Yes, third language. Yes.
6562 MR. SAMUEL: It's 90.
6563 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I'm sorry, 96 percent?
6564 MR. SANGHERA: Nine‑zero (90).
6565 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: 90 percent will be third language?
6566 MR. SANGHERA: Yes.
6567 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. I'm just going to refer then ‑‑ I have a schedule of your ethnic and third language programming that shows you ‑‑ do you have that schedule in your brief?
6568 MR. SANGHERA: Yes, please. In our schedule it's 96 percent, but we will take a condition of licence at 90 percent.
6569 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And what is your planned change from your schedule?
6570 MR. SANGHERA: Planned change for schedule ‑‑ as you know, Canada is a multicultural community. We have a third and fourth generation. We may need to increase a little bit more English in order to target our youth.
6571 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay, okay. So I'm going to leave that and our legal counsel may have more questions on that, but 90 percent for English or for ‑‑
6572 MR. SANGHERA: Third language.
6573 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Third language.
6574 As you pointed out in your brief, you are very aware that Edmonton is currently served by an ethnic language station, CKER‑FM and there is the three ethnic SCMOs operating in the region.
6575 Can you tell me, and we will maybe take these one at a time, if you could explain to us the similarities and differences between the station you have proposed and that, for example, of Guldasta that was before you?
6576 MR. SAMUEL: Sure, please.
6577 I will start and others will join in, please.
6578 If you would look at the broad service requirement while the South Asian community has grown tremendously, the fact of life is that other communities have also grown and they do merit more radio programming. We understand that and we are providing services for bigger communities as well like Chinese and Filipino communities who need it. So while we agree that South Asians do need radio programming, we also think that the Chinese and Filipino and the other communities need it.
6579 If you would look at it, we are providing more local programming from ‑‑ I mean we have local news whereas Guldasta has more of international news. They have said previously that they have too many international staff reporting, whereas we have many more local reporters because our whole emphasis is on local relevance.
6580 In terms of business plan, well, I tried understanding their business plan but my capacity is limited to what I could understand in it. From our perspective, if you would look at it, our programming costs ‑‑ their programming costs are around $20,000 whereas ours are at $489,000. We just don't know how we could run a quality radio station on $20,000.
6581 So to provide quality service you do need the right infrastructure, you do need the right people to be available and you have to invest in your people, and that is what we are when you compare with them.
6582 MR. SANGHERA: As compared to the CKER when we designed our schedule ‑‑
6583 MR. SAMUEL: In our ‑‑
6584 MR. SANGHERA: Sorry. When we designed our schedule we looked at CKER. CKER was not serving ‑‑ CKER was serving groups but there ‑‑ a lot of other groups were left over. So when I designed the schedule we added six more groups that was not getting their airplay.
6585 How are we going to be different? When we competed in Vancouver against two American stations we know we had challenges so we worked as a team and we focused on our talk shows that have local relevance. We know the immigrant community needs information. That is very important because they are newly settling in Edmonton. So our talk shows are intelligently discussed and at the end we give a lot of information that is needed to the community.
6586 And when it comes to the music we will play music from regional CDs that is a quality sound that will attract the people on FM dial. People expect quality.
6587 So I think when you play music, music has to appealing to the audience and we do ‑‑ our music does appeal to the audience.
6588 MR. SAMUEL: And if I can go back to the business plan that I was referring to, there are two points.
6589 One is Guldasta has higher than the national average for national revenues from its first year of operations to the seventh. But if you would compare ours, our national revenue is a little bit lower than what is the trend around.
6590 And in terms of achieving the business plan that we have, we have a wider advertising base as compared to ‑‑ so we have the advantage of the South Asian market that was so rightly expressed as quite big and can support the programming, but we also have the Chinese community who is equally big. So our advertising base is almost double than what is of Guldasta.
6591 And going back to CKER of what Kulwinder was mentioning, often times of what we've observed I guess sometimes their Punjabi radio programming doesn't even originate from their station.
6592 To us it is very important that what programming we do is under our control, it is originating from our station.
6593 We know that CKER has programming presently from SCMO known as Radio Punjab. That, again, I think is a very big difference because it's all about the community you want to serve and reflect.
6594 I think from my side ‑‑ CKER has another thing, if I can go on. There's volunteers. They have too many volunteers working for them, and we don't believe in volunteerism. When it comes to commitment to do a radio program there should be money invested and seeing that they can do the program properly. There should be resources available so that they can do their programs.
6595 That is a big difference between CKER and us.
6596 Suknit, would you like to add something.
6597 MS LAMBA: To add on to the CKER programming, mainly the South Asian side, of course with all the other ‑‑ there's a lot of volunteers, as it was mentioned by Bijoy, but the South Asian programming Bijoy already mentioned that it doesn't even come from the station, it comes from an SCMO station.
6598 Also the quality of programming. Since I worked with ReD‑FM in Vancouver and moved here about a year ago, I think the quality of the programming is really different as compared to ReD‑FM.
6599 ReD‑FM's quality programming is really high and it also caters to the younger audience which I personally, being a young person, hopefully, I don't think I would listen to that kind of talk shows because 90 per cent of the time they talk about what's happening back home and not what's happening here locally.
6600 So, local news is absolutely not there, there's no local news in South Asian languages, all the news is either back home from India or Pakistan.
6601 And Kulwinder mentioned about music quality which I would like to add into.
6602 I listen ‑‑ I worked at CKER as well and I hear a lot of dead air and I think that's because the music doesn't come from original CDs, it comes from some pirated websites.
6603 So, that is something ReD‑FM has never done. I've worked with ReD‑FM for over a year and we were not allowed to play music from anywhere else except original. And the quality of programming was really better at ReD‑FM as compared to CKER.
6604 Thanks.
6605 MR. SAMUEL: Mike, would you like to add?
6606 MR. PEDERSEN: I would also like to add, if I could, I've been with ReD‑FM in Vancouver for two and a half years and right from the get‑go it was made apparent to me that our objective was to create a multicultural station that sounded like English FM stations. That was very important to them and that's a model that we've built upon.
6607 And getting into the sell‑vision environment, we had to retrain a lot of our clients about making commercials and about quality and delivering a product.
6608 And in the last two and a half years everyone has really come around and we believe that we can generate a product in Edmonton, the same as we do in Vancouver, and we think that we'll have a great response from our potential clients for that reason.
6609 You know, we try to emulate FM that is predominant in the English world and we think it's quite effective when we apply it to our multicultural model.
6610 MR. SAMUEL: And while we have the opportunity of getting an ethnic licence, it's also important that the smaller groups who do not have any radio available to them also have at least minimum coming in for them.
6611 That is what is the major difference in our application and Guldasta.
6612 Sorry, we've been going between Guldasta and CKER, but I hope that answers your question.
6613 MR. PEDERSEN: I should add one more thing, I'm sorry.
6614 As far as our weekend programming goes in Vancouver, and the model would remain the same for Edmonton, with the smaller groups, we also provide a service to them. To promote them we do their station imaging and their show imaging as well as all the commercials, so they have the opportunity to promote their own show and to find their own sponsors and we have a model to build commercials for them to encourage their own programming.
6615 MR. THIND: I want to say something about this Edmonton audience, because really the people of Edmonton never really tasted the flavour of real radio station. They've been served in, you know, hits and misses. You know, sometimes American radio is being broadcasted from Vancouver, SCMO in, you know, bits and pieces.
6616 You know, our proposal provides for 24 hour, a full‑time radio station that will really enhance the fabric of the society here in order to provide more information, current affairs and that will really strengthen the economic, political and social structure in the community in Edmonton.
6617 MR. SAMUEL: I would end that our schedule complements with CKER.
6618 Thank you.
6619 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I'm sorry, what did you say your schedule complements?
6620 MR. SAMUEL: Yes. Our programming schedule complements the programming schedule of CKER.
6621 The on‑air programming schedule complements the programming schedule of CKER.
6622 MR. LEWIS: Perhaps I could comment.
6623 When the research was done and the application was filed, it was shortly after CKER had changed its programming schedule and dropped some hours of ethnic programming.
6624 So, the schedule has been designed two ways. One is that the concept being, a member of the South Asian community only has a limited hours of programming that they can receive on that station, on CKER.
6625 We're not programming head‑to‑head in South Asian hours, it's counter programming, so that there would be Chinese programming when they're in South Asian, so that the listener, as you may have heard on the video, can access programming during a wider period of the day or evening in their own language by tuning to two stations in the market, or more, or SCMO as well.
6626 MS ZHANG: May I just add a comment. Right now with CKER from Monday to Saturday, they provide Chinese radio program broadcasting to the Chinese community here which is one to five o'clock in the afternoon.
6627 Now, the Mandarin program lasts about an hour and 15 minutes. Now, when ReD‑FM come in we'll be able to complement the CKER program by broadcasting at a prime time in the evening.
6628 We plan to do three hours Cantonese broadcasting and three hours Mandarin broadcasting a day.
6629 MS TOLVAY: Can I add also. For the Filipino program, we only broadcast two hours every week and that's on Saturday and we would like to expand by broadcasting every day, Monday to Friday.
6630 So, the newcomers, the Filipino nurses ‑‑ there are Filipino nurses recruited by Capital Health coming, there are 600 people coming. And other companies like Tim Horton's in Fort McMurray, for instance, they have workers that are coming from all over the Philippines as well as in Europe, and they have no access to a Filipino program except that two hours on Saturdays.
6631 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. Thank you.
6632 MS TOLVAY: Thank you.
6633 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I'm a bit afraid to ask, but would you like to comment on how your format and station compares to that that's being proposed by CIAM as well?
6634 MR. SAMUEL: CIAM is proposing ‑‑ there's a big difference. CIAM is more on ‑‑ it's a community radio station; whereas we are a commercial radio station.
6635 CIAM has programming towards the Chinese community but, again, this would be like what Guldasta Broadcasting is saying, let's do just Punjabi; CIAM is saying, let's do Chinese majority.
6636 But here we are saying that Chinese have grown, Filipinos have grown and so has South Asian. So, we think that the need is not just limited to one community, the need is wide spread. So, that would be one.
6637 And would someone else like to add anything?
6638 MR. SANGHERA: I think the frequency they're proposing is 250 watts. I think they will not be able to serve the entire demographic population.
6639 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Just a couple of follow‑up questions.
6640 You mentioned CIAM is focused upon the Chinese and Guldasta was focused on South Asian and you cover a wide target audience, I think 23 communities in 20 languages.
6641 The applicant before you mentioned that that's an old model. Would you like to comment on that at all?
6642 MR. SAMUEL: Certainly. I don't know what's old about it. I understand the community is growing. The needs have changed, the needs are there for 23 different groups. I don't know what's old about it.
6643 Maybe he was referring to the model of how the programming was administered to these groups. We feel that we need to provide ‑‑ that's what it's all about, provide programming to as many languages as possible.
6644 MR. SANGHERA: And we have a similar model working in Vancouver. We just started two years ago and we have been very successful.
6645 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay.
6646 MR. LEWIS: If I could just add something. I will be brief, but ‑‑
6647 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Is this related to CIAM?
6648 MR. LEWIS: Yes.
6649 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. Thank you.
6650 MR. LEWIS: There are two issues that we face. One is, CIAM is a voluntary radio station, it doesn't appear to have any paid staff and there's a major difference in terms of people who are coming in voluntarily to do a community program versus people who are paid to be there to research their programs, and that's a big difference.
6651 The second thing that I think we have to take into account is the fact that ReD‑FM doesn't use ‑‑ and this is getting back to the old model ‑‑ we don't use a brokerage model. In other words, the other language groups who constitute the balance of the week, the smaller groups who have a few hours a week of programming are not brokers, they're not paying the radio station and buying the air time, they're part of the radio station and they have a relationship.
6652 And, as Mr. Pedersen indicated earlier, the radio station provides the production services for them and they're involved in the production of programs, the staff ‑‑ those producers come in and they understand broadcast standards, we have courses for them, they understand what is required under the Broadcasting Act in terms of balance and the nature of the programming they're producing.
6653 And that's a very, very different divide compared to community broadcasting.
6654 And I'll just leave it at that, but it's a totally different, I think, dynamic in terms of the way in which ReD‑FM approaches radio.
6655 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6656 I'd just like to go back to something mentioned. You mentioned that you will be broadcasting to six groups that are not getting air play today; is that right?
6657 MR. SANGHERA: At the time when I designed the schedule, we monitored the CKER programming and at that time we were including six more groups to provide them the service.
6658 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay.
6659 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, unique.
6660 MR. SANGHERA: New groups.
6661 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Would you be able to just quickly point out which of those groups will be newly served by your market?
6662 MR. SANGHERA: Korean, Bujurati, Urdu, Vietnamese, Farsi.
6663 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Sorry, I think I missed it. Could you do that again.
6664 MR. SANGHERA: Okay. Korean.
6665 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Korean, yes.
6666 MR. SANGHERA: Farsi, Bujurati, Urdu and Vietnamese.
6667 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6668 Sorry, just one more question regarding the existence of the incumbent station and adding a new ethnic station.
6669 Can you tell me why it is you believe that the South Asian and Chinese communities are large enough to support the addition of another ethnic station?
6670 MR. SAMUEL: Kerry, would you like to answer that?
6671 MS WICKS: Sure, I'll start off and then you can jump in.
6672 According to our statistics, and we started with Statistics Canada numbers, the groups in total that we're planning to serve, which are our top 18 lines on our model but they include the 23 groups, are 163,158 people.
6673 Now, that sounds lower than perhaps some of the other numbers you've heard in other applications and we do agree that, to a large extent, some of these numbers are under reported. You would probably be safe to say the market is more like a couple of hundred thousand.
6674 And this is based on information from the City of Edmonton on the fact that as our previous ‑‑ the previous applicant mentioned, not everybody accurately reports their ethnic origin and then, of course, there has been additional immigration and growth in the community since 2006 when these figures were calculated.
6675 So, for a group of a couple of hundred thousand people spread across these groups, if you divide them between the two mainstream stations, not counting some of the other media outlets, that's a hundred thousand potential listeners per group.
6676 And if you take the number of mainstream radio stations on the air serving Anglophones, you're down around 30, 40, 50,000 potential people or audience per station.
6677 So, we think that's a healthy market.
6678 Our research ‑‑ our consumer research also supports that there is an interest in the programming, in more types and diverse types of programming.
6679 MR. SAMUEL: And if I could add. If we take you back to Vancouver market, it's a population of 200,000 people approximately which are being served by two American radio stations and two CRTC licensed radio stations catering to the South Asian community.
6680 Now, if we divide those 200 ‑‑ and many more SCMOs.
6681 If we divide the 200 into all of this, you could say that about 50,000 per say could be for each radio station and if each of the radio stations are able to survive with more than 7‑million, I think Edmonton is a better picture here.
6682 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: So let me just throw it out there. Do you think there's room for more than one additional ethnic radio station?
6683 MR. SAMUEL: I definitely ‑‑ I definitely believe that there is room for one more additional radio station, and especially with us, because we are able to target two of the growing communities which have two separate advertising base, that just helps achieve better results.
6684 At the same time, probably CIAM, since it's a community‑based station, it wouldn't be affecting our business model.
6685 MR. PEDERSEN: Could I also add one point about revenue. With the previous applicant, he made it apparent that his revenue would come from his single community, but because of the standards we adhere to at ReD‑FM in Vancouver, not only do we do advertising for South Asian businesses, we also do advertising for the English market, the Government of Canada, utilities, telecommunications.
6686 They come to us now when they want to market to the South Asian community, and I think that's another form of revenue that we could develop here in Edmonton.
6687 MR. SAMUEL: And I think 28 years is a long time with an audience growing for another ethnic radio station, yes, certainly.
6688 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6689 I'd just like to refer back to the research you were speaking of and just ‑‑ I want to receive some clarity as it regards whether or not we're speaking of a population ‑‑ are you speaking of the full population, the full ethnic population, are you speaking of new immigrants, or are you speaking of people who can speak the language?
6690 MS WICKS: Are you asking about the ‑‑ in terms of quantifying the number of potential listeners, or are you asking about the consumer research when we phone and talked to people? I'm not sure.
6691 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I'll refer you to page 12 of the supplementary brief.
6692 Sorry, it doesn't appear to be page 12. Perhaps page 17.
6693 MS WICKS: So, you're referring back to the population figures?
6694 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Right. And I'm assuming that you're using these population figures to support the population base for your target audience?
6695 MS WICKS: Yes, Ma'am. These figures ‑‑ these figures are from Statistics Canada. We derive them from casting our projected contour over ‑‑ we use a geocartographical software and we project it over the population within our projected service area.
6696 So, it's not the exact Edmonton CMA, if anything we under estimate to some extent because we are only capturing figures within the proposed contour not the greater Edmonton area.
6697 So, the figures in our original submission, the figures on this chart summarize just the households that would be found within that contour.
6698 So, people who live outside of Edmonton and drive in to work during the day or migrant workers, anybody who's arrived, as I mentioned before, after the census was taken, none of this is included in our written population numbers.
6699 That's why when the gentleman said earlier this morning he was estimating South Asian population that was quite a bit higher, I said that we do support that because, if anything, we under count our figures.
6700 MR. SAMUEL: As well as ‑‑
6701 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And just so that we understand the basis of this, this is the full ethnic group population. So, is it anticipated that they all are able to speak in the ethnic languages that you're proposing to broadcast in?
6702 MS WICKS: Well, there's ‑‑ and I think you posed this question of the earlier group as well. There's different ways of counting "ethnicity".
6703 There's your ethnic origin where you come from, which casts a wider net, if you will, regardless of whether you speak the language of where your family came from.
6704 Then there's mother tongue which tightens the sample a little bit, because it assumes at some point in your life you spoke that language, whether you use it actively now. Those people would certainly be eligible for an ethnic service, ours or anybody else's because they would have the knowledge of that langauge.
6705 And then there's home language, which is the smallest way of defining the group, because those are people actively using the service right now.
6706 It's our view that we are serving potentially all of these people. We have programming in language. We have, as Kulwinder noted earlier, some English, cross‑cultural programming.
6707 And the other thing is, in some of these groups, South Asian is one example, there are people from one background who speak and understand the languages of the other backgrounds.
6708 So, potentially, if you're looking at the whole target market, some of these people that we surveyed or that you see in the census, self identify with more than one group and, therefore, they're eligible to enjoy, listen to, participate in the programming targeted at different groups.
6709 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6710 MR. SAMUEL: Can I add that since the time we applied until now, if you would see how the population has changed, so many migrant workers are coming in because there's a big labour shortage here.
6711 We have heard from Tina who said that more than 500 nurses came in ‑‑ 600 nurses actually came in for Capital Health. Tim Horton's recruited in a big way, Flint Energy. They include ‑‑ Suknit was telling ‑‑
6712 MS LAMBA: About 400 people from Philippines, which are still not here but they are in the process of coming here.
6713 MR. SAMUEL: So the population is ever growing.
6714 MS WICKS: I should actually just add one more point of clarification. The original criteria we used ‑‑ I mean, when you're choosing your groups and your programming you go through many layers and many models, many conversations, but the criteria we started with was the home language which is, as I mentioned a minute or two ago, the smallest ‑‑ if anything it gives you the smallest possible sample, so you don't over inflate your expectations when you start looking at programming to the different groups.
6715 Then you add on ‑‑ or you can go to mother tongue to add on additional people if you choose. You look at new immigration as the previous applicants mentioned.
6716 And then there are many other sources, the city itself, the province and so on as well.
6717 But the original counts and the original totals, which come to the 160‑ish thousands is based on the home language within the contour only.
6718 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. Thank you.
6719 I'd like to move on to ask a couple of questions related to synergies with your Vancouver station.
6720 I note from your application that you're proposing 116 hours of local programming in Edmonton and 10 hours originating from your Vancouver stations.
6721 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, please. Sorry.
6722 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: So, that is one of the synergies, you'll be taking programming produced in Vancouver and moving it here to ‑‑
6723 MR. SAMUEL: Yes. And the reason for that, while we believe strongly in localism, why did we propose 10 hours from outside of Edmonton per week. There's a big reason.
6724 We have two hosts who are famous across Canada. When people from Edmonton visit Vancouver and when they listen to them they want something similar in Edmonton.
6725 When they watch ‑‑ when people from ‑‑ relatives come and talk about, you know how good Harjinder Thind is, he spoke about something which I never knew. He educated.
6726 Harjinder Thind is sitting with us and he could react to it.
6727 But what we bring to Edmonton with just those 10 hours of programming is, it will be in two programs, one is a talk show for one hour and one is a music show. Both Harjinder Thind and Baljinder Atwal are on this produced television that has been going across Canada for the longest time, it's about 15 years plus and people in Edmonton have been watching them.
6728 People call us for our television shows and say, what you spoke is relevant, I'm happy that you spoke about it, it happened in my family.
6729 There are many examples I think which Mr. Thind can also add to it.
6730 So, that is the reason why we are bringing in these two shows because we want to add to Edmonton. As Mr. Thind rightly said, they need to see what radio really is, they need to experience, they need to get excited about radio.
6731 If you come back to Vancouver and talk to anyone on the streets about ReD‑FM, people are excited about it. They feel that they're part of the radio station. We want to bring the same thing here.
6732 And that is the only reason why we want to do these two programs from Vancouver.
6733 I would ask Mr. Thind to add.
6734 MR. THIND: There are a lot of commonalities, if you really observe, of a community in Vancouver and Edmonton. Those commonalities, like, we're talking talk shows, we have common problems, we are trying to educate them or create awareness in certain things, integration in the society, new immigrants coming in. I mean, we have a lot of things in common which we are already doing successfully in Vancouver, we want to implement here.
6735 And those are the commonalities. That's why these 10 hours are added.
6736 So, because they're successful there, they like them.
6737 We have experimented broadcasting my talk show from Vancouver to here in Edmonton and people of Edmonton participated in it, they loved it, they liked it because we were talking those things which are common here and in Vancouver.
6738 So, that's why these 10 hours are added.
6739 MS LAMBA: And ‑‑
6740 MR. SAMUEL: And if I can add ‑‑ and if I can add, and I'll let Suknit answer it. Once this program was on, people got so excited about it, they were so involved in the discussions and then they asked a big question, and I'll ask Suknit to tell what was the question that they were calling in to Suknit and asking.
6741 MS LAMBA: When Mr. Thind's program was taken off air, I was on the air at that time when he was supposed to be and I got 100 calls not saying, why you are here, but saying where is Mr. Thind?
6742 So, just wanted to mention that people in Edmonton already know him and love him and they would love to have him on air again here.
6743 MR. SAMUEL: And our answer would be, here he is on 95.7.
6744 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. Thank you.
6745 In addition to the 10 hours, I understand that ‑‑ I want to make sure I pronounce this correctly ‑‑ Mr. Sanghera; is that right?
6746 MR. SANGHERA: That's right.
6747 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: That's right. You're the owner of the South Asian Broadcasting Corporation and it's indicated in the brief that the South Asian Broadcasting Corporation will cover the pre‑operating costs of the proposed station; correct?
6748 MR. SANGHERA: Yes.
6749 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Are there any other anticipated synergies with the South Asian Broadcasting Corporation, anything else we'll see?
6750 MR. SANGHERA: Production. As Michael said, what we want to do, we want the ethnic station to sound like a mainstream station and what we will do is use Michael's expert ‑‑ and he's an expert in commercial imaging and we will use that.
6751 MR. SAMUEL: And if I can add. Radio is all about theatre of the mind and we want to create the right theatre of the mind for people.
6752 I wouldn't say whether they have expressed whether they've got it or not, but I would say we would be able to bring that.
6753 And, so, from Vancouver the synergy would be, we have a big team of people working with us under Michael's supervision who would be able to produce the right kind of ad for people here in Vancouver (sic) so that businesses flourish with response.
6754 So, that is one of the synergies that we would bring on the production side of it.
6755 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6756 And, you know, I heard about the great quality programming you'll bring and the high quality production in commercials and so on, and I'm an accountant and so I need to ask you about the cost side as well.
6757 Is there anything you would see as it relates to synergies on the cost side from having this station as well as those in Vancouver?
6758 MR. SAMUEL: Definitely, yes. What we find is, for example, with two ‑‑ when we have a larger creative base in Vancouver we would not ‑‑ we would not need too many creative people in Edmonton, we would have one copywriter and one production person helping us.
6759 So, we could ‑‑ on a cost side, it would help us to ‑‑ how should I say ‑‑ rightly spread our budget. So that would be one that we would save on.
6760 Anything else that you could add?
6761 MR. SANGHERA: Plus from the management, myself and Bijoy will manage Edmonton station. There will be no management fees initially.
6762 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And those synergies are reflected already in the financial projections that you provided?
6763 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, please.
6764 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6765 I just want to clarify your Canadian content development proposal.
6766 There were some discrepancies within the different parts of your application regarding those.
6767 Now, what I would like to do, if I could, is I noted in your opening statements you did detail your over and above CCD contributions and they are $351,494 over the seven‑year term as detailed here.
6768 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, please.
6769 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And, so, this is your commitment to over and above CCD?
6770 MR. SAMUEL: Yes.
6771 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And will you accept that as a transitionary condition of licence too?
6772 MR. SANGHERA: Yes.
6773 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
6774 I'd like to move on to the issue of your advisory council. You indicated that you'll establish an advisory council consisting of seven members selected from different ethnic groups served by your station.
6775 Could you please tell us who will be responsible for selecting the initial seven members.
6776 MR. SAMUEL: Kulwinder and I would be responsible for meeting with various community leaders, actually going and finding out who the right people are who could be selected.
6777 So, it wouldn't be just coming across a name and then saying can you be on our advisory, it's going to be talking to different people and finding out whether the person will reflect the community or not.
6778 So, the representation that we would have on the advisory would be broad based and selection would be done after careful consideration within the management.
6779 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I'm sorry, just to be clear, so they would propose to you ‑‑
6780 MR. SAMUEL: No, that's what I ‑‑
6781 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: ‑‑ persons from the ‑‑ okay, go ahead.
6782 MR. SAMUEL: Sorry. What we've done, throughout the process of the application here, as well as in Edmonton, we have gone out on the street, met people, discussed their needs and, in doing so, we've come to know who the right community‑minded people are.
6783 So, it's not just a name that we are putting on the advisory, but a person who truly believes in serving his or her community.
6784 So, we would actually go out into the communities, find the right people and then select them.
6785 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: So, you would select the members?
6786 MR. SAMUEL: Yes, the management would.
6787 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Will those members serve for a specific amount of time?
6788 MR. SANGHERA: Yes. They'll ‑‑ maybe two‑year term. Every two year we'll change the advisory.
6789 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you. I just want to talk about new media distribution platforms.
6790 You note in your application that you intend to do Internet streaming. Can you elaborate what or how you would propose to use the Internet or other alternate forms of new media distribution ‑‑ or new distribution platforms to complement your service?
6791 MR. SAMUEL: Definitely. One of them being ‑‑ new media, one of them being the Internet.
6792 ReD‑FM, if you look at what we're playing right now in Vancouver ‑‑ I got an e‑mail Tuesday morning from our hostess saying, you'll be happy to know Singapore ‑‑ people in Singapore have called in and said that you have an amazing program going on. That's the power of Internet, it's all around.
6793 So, in Edmonton as well we would be airing ‑‑ streaming on the Internet, so that people who have different lifestyles and are not able to reach our radio station on 95.7 can still have access to good quality programming.
6794 So, yes, we would be using Internet, as well as we'll be using Internet for another thing, station contests. Station contests is another big area where the Internet could be involved with.
6795 So, here we have a contest which says ‑‑ we recently did this in Vancouver. We said, give your mommy some money, it was Mother's Day. We wanted people to participate and help win a prize.
6796 So, I will let Michael talk about the contest, please.
6797 MR. PEDERSEN: Actually, the Internet is a big part of our program in Vancouver. We do use it for all of our contests, not just giving out rules, but also for participating in contests, but we also appreciate that not everybody has access or knowledge about the Internet, so we always try to incorporate systems that allow people to participate over the phone, radio, or Internet.
6798 It is definitely a major tool for us. As well as our streaming audio, we have online polls that we do with questions for our talk shows. We also periodically post shows where, you know, a chef has come in and given recipes and people say, oh, I want that show.
6799 So, we have a system to post popular shows. Sometimes Mr. Thind interviews people and people want to get clips of it.
6800 It's definitely an integral part. I mean, the Internet is here to stay, so we definitely embrace it in our system.
6801 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.