As CapRadio continues our practice of openness and transparency with the community, we’re providing an important update on a dispute over the ownership of our news radio tower. On Wednesday, May 21, 2025, a Sacramento County Superior Court judge dismissed crucial arguments in KVIE’s ongoing litigation against CapRadio, rejecting a motion to force CapRadio to hand over our news radio tower rents through a receivership.
There are a few important things to note about this ruling:
- The Elverta land was donated to KVIE, not CapRadio’s tower. KVIE is making a false claim without evidence that they also own the tower.
- The judge did not rule on who owns the tower as this motion was specifically related to KVIE’s attempt to take CapRadio’s tower rents for themselves.
- The judge dismissed all arguments that KVIE made in this attempt to force CapRadio to hand over tower rents to KVIE through a receivership.
- The judge did rule that KVIE was unable to show proof that they owned the tower. This ruling further discredits KVIE’s false premise claiming ownership of the tower.
The determination is a welcomed affirmation of the facts surrounding CapRadio’s long-time ownership, operation and maintenance of our primary public service news broadcasting tower. Additionally, the court supported CapRadio’s argument that KVIE’s claim that maintenance was deferred was invalid and unsubstantiated. This ruling is important because:
- It refutes a major argument that both the endowment and KVIE have continued to use as justification for why the donation was made and accepted.
- It specifically called out KVIE’s president for lacking sufficient personal knowledge to substantiate his false claims.
First and foremost, CapRadio remains committed to our public service mission and the delivery of our trusted, respectful and informative news coverage when our community needs it most. With public media facing growing federal attacks and an uncertain future, there is no better moment for our region’s two cherished broadcasters to find a resolution and work together in service of our community.
It is clear that the outcome that CapRadio and everyone in the community wants is to see this dispute resolved without lawyers. We remain steadfast in our pursuit of a prompt and amicable resolution that is fair and reasonable. We will not, however, abandon our public service duty and willingly cede control of our news broadcasting tower, especially at a time when our community needs reliable access to essential public service journalism.
KVIE is currently pursuing a second motion to block CapRadio’s legally protected right to use the property to gain access to our transmission building and tower in a court hearing scheduled for June 25, 2025.
We remain unwavering in our commitment to being open and transparent with our members, listeners and community at large. As community-funded organizations, we have a responsibility to make sure that details of this needless legal dispute are not hidden behind closed doors.
