Save WCAL group loses an appeal but plans another
Flying a flag of donors’ rights, the fans of defunct Twin Cities classical music station WCAL decided over the weekend to return to the Minnesota Court of Appeals, which rejected their initial appeal Dec. 29 [2009].
The three-judge court agreed with a February 2009 state district court decision that Save WCAL waited too long to file suit opposing St. Olaf College’s sale of its station to Minnesota Public Radio five years ago. Save WCAL sought to void the sale of the frequency, now used by MPR’s Triple A music station, The Current.
“We are pleased that still today the Minnesota Court of Appeals has agreed to uphold the sale,” said MPR spokesperson Jacqueline Cartier. “Save WCAL failed to convince the attorney general of the State of Minnesota and the Federal Communications Commission to intervene in 2004,” and Judge Bernard Borene of the Rice County District Court ruled against the group.
“It’s not about our little radio station,” said Ruth Sylte, head of Save WCAL. “It really is about the rights of donors to any public radio or television station or any charitable trust.”
The court’s decision was entirely on procedural grounds and not on substantive issues, said Michael McNabb, attorney for Save WCAL.
With Judge Michelle A. Larkin writing the decision, the court noted that Save WCAL knew in August 2004 that the station would be sold and in October 2004 that the state attorney general wouldn’t intervene against the sale, but the group didn’t go to court until 2007.
The state’s six-year statute of limitations had not expired during that period, McNabb observed, but the court applied a different legal test called laches, which aims to protect innocent parties from consequences of a late lawsuit.
While Save WCAL argued that the college and MPR had conspired to destroy the charitable trust of WCAL, were not innocent and should not be protected by the laches doctrine, the appeals court said the group didn’t provide enough analysis to make that case.
Web page posted Jan. 11, 2010
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