Since 1975, KOTO has been licensed by the Federal Communications Commission to broadcast on 91.7 out of Telluride, Colorado. The original antenna was strapped to the roof of the Miners Union, and, at 10 watts, the signal barely reached Society Turn.
This week, the station reached a milestone when it added its second transmitter, expanding its signal north over the Sneffels Range into Ouray County.
Nearly three years of planning came together over three days high on a ridge-line above Highway 550.
“It takes a while. It takes a lot of planning,” says longtime station manager Ben Kerr. “You have to apply for a permit with the FCC, and get permission.”
The idea of piping KOTO into Ouray actually goes back to the station’s founder.
“Jerry Green was the one who said: ‘you know, we should really expand and get over that direction,’” Kerr recalls. “You can't [broadcast this far] with the main transmitter; the mountains are in the way. So you've got to kind of work through the valleys and get around. Putting different translators and transmitters up so that you can service other communities.”
Translators carry the signal from Telluride west to Norwood, but jumping the Sneffels range required a full transmitter, which meant applying for a new license with the FCC and adding a second set of call letters: K-O-O-K.
The transmitter site induces vertigo. Regional TV and radio towers create a cliffside cluster accessed by a long mountain road. Ridgway lies in a haze to the north. To the south, the gridded streets of Ouray fill the canyon floor. This morning, engineers, station staff and climbers have assembled for the final install.
Axel Koch is a volunteer DJ at the station and a retired marine engineer. He researched radio technology in order to lend his hand to the project. Gesturing to the set of radio equipment around him, Koch explains: “we have two elements, [positioned] 98 and a half inches apart, which is three quarters of a wavelength for 90. 3, which is our frequency for this transmitting site!
“We have to be exact,” Koch says.
Also on the team is radio engineer Scott Henning, who has 30-years experience working as a broadcast technician in the state’s Southwest. What makes this project stand out?
“Well, it's in the mountains of Colorado,” says Henning, looking around at the dizzying site. “But, then again, they're all in the mountains of Colorado! Being non-profit, of course, makes it special, in my opinion, he adds. “I really like non-profit radio stations because they exist for the right reasons.”
The project involved pouring concrete pads and installing towers to hold the broadcast antennas and equipment in place.
Mason Osgood spoke with the station's Director, Cara Pallone, about the process.
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Tuesday afternoon, Pallone was ending a long day at site, still without a broadcast.
“I left and I was headed down Gold Mountain and I didn't make it but maybe one minute before I got a phone call. So I stopped, slammed on my brakes and it was Claybrook [KOTO’s Assistant Station Manager]. And she was like: ‘turn on 90. 3 and tell me if you hear anything.’ And I turned it on and coming through the speakers was Yo La Tango with Moby Octopod!”
“And I thought, this can only be KOTO,” recalls Pallone.
Sure enough, it was the High School Radio Club coming through the airwaves. The many hours of hard work paid off just in time as an incoming rainstorm drove the rest of the KOTO crew out of the mountains above Ouray.
This project, Pallone says, started three years ago when Kerr alerted her to an FCC opening in Ridgeway. She says it aligned with the station’s mission: “and we have the perfect mission statement. We've never had to change it. I think what we need to do now is adapt and find ways to better fulfill it. So when I think of communities, I don't just think of Telluride, I think of the region, really. We have so many people who have moved to Norwood, to Ridgway, who are our friends, our neighbors. They work here, they're invested in Telluride.”
Pallone says the next steps will be slow, thoughtful and sustainable
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For those dedicated to the station. The project was a no-brainer. As Koch says, “I love KOTO. I probably listened to it when I first came up to Telluride skiing in ‘78. I just love the radio station and it's because of the people. It's the voice of the valley.”
With the final install complete, that love of KOTO now becomes the love of KOOK as well, reflecting the voices of the region however, that region may be bound.