Desiree DeCoste
Beaver Staff
Year after year for the past 15 years Amherst Island Radio/CJAI FM has been growing.
With the approval from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) they will be building a new 130-foot tower, boosting their signal to reach more radio listeners.
The new power provides far greater reach to their FM signal and the CRTC has now approved their official mandate to cover the entirety of Loyalist Township.
Amherst Island Radio, which is 100 per cent volunteer run and 100 per cent non-profit, is building a $200,000 telecommunications tower site on Amherst Island along with a massive increase in power from their current 250 Watts to their new 4,800 Watts.
“It’s a massive boost really because our current transmitter is operating at 250 Watts and the new boost is 4,800 Watts which means like Napanee and all the surrounding areas we’re at will be crystal clear to hear no matter where you are in the area,” expressed Eric Tremblay, President and brand manager at Amherst Island Radio, to The Beaver. “This is a huge deal to us because we’re a community radio station, we have no paid staff, zero and it’s just the community, people from the communities like Napanee, Harrowsmith, Odessa, just regular people who get together and have been running everything around this radio station for the last 15 years and it’s a bit nuts to think a bunch of volunteers can operate a radio station that complies with all those federal regulations and that is judged to be responsible enough to get a signal boost by the federal regulators, so I’m still a little bit in shock really.”
The radio’s new signal will reach the northern-most areas of the Township and it will also provide better reception to the neighbouring communities of Napanee, Kingston and Picton.
The frequency will be switching from 92.1 to 101.3 FM to accommodate the new power boost and will be in partnership with Kingston Online Services who will be installing new modern internet equipment on the same tower to bring better quality internet to Amherst Island, including the south shore.
With $70,000 still to raise of the $200,000 construction project the radio station launched their annual Fun Drive on Monday. With last year’s event cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year is a two-for-one drive.
“Last year we had to cancel our Fun Drive,” Tremblay stated. “We do a fun drive once a year only, we had to cancel it last year as it was in April and it was right in the middle of the initial pandemic crisis and it just wasn’t fair to anybody to run a fun drive. So we cancelled the whole thing and so this year it’s kind of like two fun drives in one, because we doubled our goal, we basically need to raise $70,000 in one year in order to have the remaining funds available to complete the $200,000 construction project. We launched it on Monday, we were biting our nails off waiting for the approval and we got the approval on Thursday and then wham, we had everything all prepared and we launched on Monday with an ambitious goal to raise the remaining $70,000 to boost the signal and build the tower.”
Tremblay added how the number one piece of feedback from people in the community he receives, whether they be business leaders, community leaders or just members of the community, people wish they could hear them wherever they’re driving in the region.
“The number one piece of feedback I get from people when I’m out in the community, because I do talk a lot with people in the community whether its business leaders, community leaders, or just members in the community,” said Tremblay. “The number one piece of feedback I get is ‘oh I love your station, it’s full of crazy people,’ and I love that kind of feedback but they say, ‘I just wish I could hear you everywhere in the region, because if I’m driving north of the 401 sometimes the signal gets sketchy’ for example, or ‘if I’m going to Gananoque the signal gets sketchy as soon as I’m about halfway through Kingston,’ and now all that awkwardness is going to go away because that won’t be the number one piece of feedback anymore, the number one piece of feedback is going to be, ‘I hear you everywhere, you guys are a bunch of crazies and we love it!,’ and that’s what we want, we just want that little awkwardness to go away.”
For more information on Amherst Island Radio/CJAI FM, or to listen live visit https://www.cjai.ca
To donate to the project visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/build-the-tower-amherst-island-radio?utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=customer&utm_campaign=p_lico+share-sheet