KZIZ (1560 AM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Pacific, Washington, United States, and serving the Seattle–Tacoma market. It carries a South Asian format known as “Radio Punjab,” with affiliated stations in San Francisco, Sacramento and other West Coast markets. The station is owned by Charanjit Singh Batth, through licensee Akal Media, Inc, and has a transmitter sited in Auburn, Washington.
History
On October 1, 1965, the station signed on as KDFL, licensed to Sumner-Puyallup, Washington, airing religious programming.[2] In the 1970s, it switched to Big Band music. The station was sold to Kris Bennett Broadcasting in 1986, becoming KZIZ, simulcasting the Urban Contemporary format of then-sister station KRIZ. In 2001, it switched to urban contemporary gospel.
KZIZ flipped to Smooth Jazz on May 24, 2013. The move returned the Smooth Jazz format to analog radio in Seattle/Tacoma for the first time since KWJZ-FM’s switch to KLCK-FM in December 2010.
Until 2016, KZIZ was one of three stations in the Puget Sound region that made up The Z Twins, serving the African American communities of King and Pierce County, Washington with a diverse R&B, black gospel music and talk format as well as Hispanic programming.
On March 6, 2016, KZIZ flipped to a South Asian format as “Radio Punjab.” Effective June 7, 2016, XL Media Inc. acquired KZIZ for $680,000.[3][4] Effective August 10, 2017, KZIZ’s license was assigned to commonly-owned Akal Broadcasting Corporation, and then assigned to also commonly-owned Akal Media, Inc. effective October 24, 2019.
On July 20, 2016 KZIZ was granted a Federal Communications Commission construction permit to increase day power to 10,000 watts, increase night power to 2,500 watts and decrease critical hours power to 2,500 watts.[5] The transmitter was off 24th Street East in Sumner, Washington. In accordance with the CP the station has moved to share with KMIA at the Auburn site. At Sumner there is no more trace – even of the mounting blocks.
References
- ^ “Facility Technical Data for KZIZ”. Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
- ^ Broadcasting Yearbook 1977 page C-227
- ^ New “Radio Punjab” in Seattle area on 1560 kHz radiodiscussions.com
- ^ “Station Sales Week of 3/25”.
- ^ “Application for Construction Permit for Commercial Broadcast Station”. CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. July 20, 2016. Retrieved May 9, 2017.
External links
- Radio Punjab
- Facility details for Facility ID 35550 (KZIZ) in the FCC Licensing and Management System
- KZIZ in Nielsen Audio‘s AM station database