Rodney Stevens
The Clarence Valley’s original community radio station 2TLC is undergoing refurbishment to enable your favourite presenters and programs to continue to deliver the music and information you know and love.
President Peter Finucan said when 2TLC first lodged an expression of interest for a radio licence in 1984, 12 months studying topography and signal paths was undertaken by members, before TLCFM held the first test FM broadcast into the Clarence Valley in December 1985.
Then, as part of the 1988 bicentennial celebrations, 2TLC was given permission, but no funding, to build the station as a replica of Yamba’s first lighthouse, on Pilot Hill.
“The initial building of the station took place in the late 80’s and it was built by hand, by volunteers who wanted to set up a community radio station, but also build it as a replica of the original lighthouse,” Mr Finucan said.
“During the construction process we applied for and got the Community Radio licence, initially that was under the frequency 101.3, but we’ve changed the frequency in more recent days, at the suggestion of the licencing authority ACMA and we’ve become 93.5.
“About 10 years-ago the place was in need of a bit of a refurb and Howard Hall came along and John Ibbotson, (a renowned lighthouse book author) and they helped us complete the building.
“John Ibbotson, who’s a bit of a lighthouse man, organised and helped us get an actual lighthouse light, to complete the replica.”
Over the last decade as 2TLC has broadcasted hundreds-of-thousands of hours of music across a plethora of genres, Mr Finucan said the raw power of mother nature had taken its toll on the exposed Pilot Hill station, requiring another re-birth.
“We’ve got the upkeep and repair to keep the place ship-shape and we’re in a spot that gets plenty of bad weather, and there’s been no shortage of that over the past year-and-a-half,” he said.
“One of our members, Neale Biddle, he’s a builder and he had been noting what needed to be done and getting up and running with it.”
After securing a $12,000 Community Broadcasting Foundation grant, Mr Finucan said 2TLC would end up contributing about $10,000 to the repaint and repair of the station.
“We did our sums when we applied for the grant about two years ago and decided it would cost about $18,000 to do the work…we applied for $12,000 as a grant and we were lucky enough to get it,” he said.
“All those barriers of weather, Covid and getting a painter organised, we’ve overcome them during the course of 2022.
“It had been 10 years since the last paint job and major work on the station, so we wanted to renew it and it looks magnificent now that it’s been all freshly painted by Russell Goad and his team at RG Coatings.”
Rodney Stevens