A little more than a year after its first broadcast, Iowa City Free
 Radio is off the air, but only temporarily. Last month the six-watt
 radio station received a letter from the Federal Communications
 Commission instructing ICFR to go off the air because the FCC will not
 license stations under 100 watts, leaving ICFR without a license. The
 notice from the FCC means that the station eventually may join a
 nationwide group of sub-100 watt "micropower" stations that have drawn
 notice from the FCC for illegal operation but continue to operate
 nonetheless. Such operation includes the constant threat of FCC
 corrective action, which has ranged from SWAT team raids and jail
 terms to permissive overlooking. Currently, ICFR is off the air while
 station organizers work toward stabilizing the station and minimizing
 the potential for an FCC raid. First, they are trying to find another
 "neutral" broadcasting space, such as an office, instead of
 broadcasting from one person's house, as the situation has been for
 the past year. Second, ICFR is filing for non-profit status so that
 one person is not responsible if further legal clashes result.
 Finally, ICFR is organizing a board of directors and starting a
 fund-raising campaign.
 
 Once these ends are accomplished, ICFR will return to the air. "We
 first want to make sure we're not in jeopardy of losing our
 equipment," co-chair Kristen Baumlier said.
 
 "Iowa City Free Radio is not run by rich or powerful people," Iowa
 City attorney Bruce Nestor said. Nestor is currently representing
 ICFR. "If the government wants to come in full force and shut them
 down, they'll be able to. The current licensing procedure does not
 allow the possibility of being licensed under 100 watts," Nestor said.
 "This is a ban on free radio and is a ban on free speech."
 
 ICFR, which calls itself a "community-based" radio station, is a
 volunteer-run station that works to provide a forum for, according to
 its mission statement, "responsible free speech and education through
 music, cultural programming and discussion not currently served by the
 locally available corporate radio stations."
 
 "I have a problem that they aren't even giving people a chance," ICFR
 director of music acquisitions Natalie Benton said. "Radio is only
 going to become corporate radio. People are not going to hear what
 they want unless people like us have a chance."
 
 Nestor said that his tactics in representing ICFR to the FCC are
 fourfold. In a letter he drafted in response to the FCC's shut-down
 letter, Nestor wrote, "We said we were interested in acquiring a
 license, that we were interested in establishing a [new] regulatory
 measure to obtain a license
 and that.... ICFR has a First Amendment right to broadcast," Nestor
 said.
 
 According to Baumlier, it could cost anywhere from $60,000 to $1
 million in equipment and legal fees to start up a radio station of 100
 watts or more. "100 watts is not expensive, but the equipment is,"
 Baumlier said. Baumlier explained that legal fees might be necessary
 if another big station claims potential interference.
 
 In his letter to the FCC, Nestor also requested copies of the
 complaint that alerted the FCC to ICFR's existence. According to the
 FCC, Nestor said, "the complaint was anonymous and did not allege
 interference with another broadcaster or with transmissions." The
 complaint consisted of copies of newspaper articles about ICFR and a
 simple note stating that the station was operating unlicensed. "I
 would suspect another local broadcaster, although there's no basis to
 suspect anyone," Nestor said.
 
 Representatives of the FCC were not available for comment.
 
 According to University of Iowa law professor and former FCC
 commissioner Nicholas Johnson, the government historically has stated
 its position that broadcasting is not a First Amendment right.
 Micropower broadcasters such as ICFR have only clashed with the
 government since 1978, however, when the FCC eliminated Class D
 licenses, which were available to low-wattage, not-for-profit
 stations.
 
 The reason for this, according to Johnson, is that "there are more
 people who wish to broadcast than there are frequencies." If the
 government were to allow unrestricted broadcast access, some fear
 "wild chaos in which no station can be heard [because they all
 interfere]." The FCC, Johnson explained, was created as a gatekeeper
 of sorts, to be sure that too many stations didn't crowd together and
 create that chaos.
 
 Despite his past FCC allegiance, Johnson supports micropower radio and
 believes that such stations can exist without causing interference for
 others. "If one is operating with a sufficiently low power, the
 question of interference is empirical," Johnson said, noting that the
 FCC could inspect a micropower radio station's geographical location,
 power, tower height and frequency to determine the station's chaotic
 threat. "If someone is not providing interference, it makes it kind of
 hard to shut them down."
 
 Johnson continued in expressing his disdain for the FCC's treatment of
 micropower radio. "I've always found it somewhat ironic that those who
 preach the free market economy insist on sending anyone to
 Leavenworth--anyone who practices free market broadcasting," Johnson
 said. "It would make more sense to permit American citizens who wish
 to exercise their opportunity to speak and participate in a democratic
 dialogue...to do so. This should include low power broadcasting with
 or without licensing."
 
 This legal and constitutional philosophy hovers everywhere around
 ICFR. Indeed when the station began, co-chair Jamie Schweser was
 quoted in news articles as saying that supporting ICFR was a form of
 civil disobedience. "Our stance is that the laws [governing the
 airwaves] are wrong," he said. "You can work within the system to try
 and change it, but there's a lot of money and power keeping things the
 way they are. What we're doing does not hurt anyone.... This is a
 venue for responsible for free speech."
 
 As for what ICFR's chances really are, Nestor said, "It depends on
 what the FCC wants to do. In some places, they are extremely
 aggressive--in Tampa, Fla., they came in with a SWAT team and
 helicopters. In other places, they have backed away and done nothing
 [after an initial letter calling for shut-down]."
 
 Landmark cases, such as the nearly four-year-old suit involving
 Berkeley Free Radio in California, are still tied up in courts. "None
 of the court cases have progressed to the point where they would be
 precedent-setting," Nestor said. "It's still largely an undetermined
 legal issue."
 
 For now, however, there's nothing to be heard from ICFR at 88.7 on
 your FM dial. The station hopes to be back on the air around April 1.*
 
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