KOCE Buyer Lacks Down Payment

The winning bidders for KOCE-TV have failed to come up with the cash needed for a down payment, but the community college district selling the station voted Thursday to extend the deadline since the sale has yet to receive federal approval.

Coast Community College District Trustee Armando Ruiz cast the lone dissenting vote in the board’s 4-1 decision, which gives the KOCE-TV Foundation until Aug. 5 to come up with the cash he said was necessary to fulfill the sales contract.

Under it, the foundation made up business and civic leaders needed to show it could put $8 million in cash toward its purchase of the PBS affiliate.

But the foundation was unable to do so, Ruiz said, adding that it has the money only in pledges.

“They didn’t comply with the contract,” he said.

“They needed to show that they had the money in the bank, and they didn’t,” Ruiz said.

But Bob Brown, chairman of the foundation and the retired president of Toshiba America, argued that the money was raised in time to meet the June 30 deadline.

“It’s a matter of interpretation,” he said.

“No matter what commitment letter we would have had from the bank, there would have been contingencies anyway because of the pending decision” by the Federal Communications Commission, Brown said.

The sale of the TV station is being challenged by Daystar Television Network, the world’s second-largest Christian broadcaster.

Daystar made a cash bid of $25.1 million; a later offer of $40 million was refused be- cause it missed the bidding deadline.

But trustees accepted the KOCE-TV Foundation’s bid of $28 million, which included the $8 million down payment with the rest to be paid over 30 years at no interest, with no payments for five years.

In April, Daystar appealed an Orange County Superior Court judge’s ruling that approved the sale. And in May, it petitioned the FCC to block the sale and deny the license.

The FCC and appellate court have yet to rule.

For those reasons, said Milford Dahl, attorney for the Coast Community College District, the board decided not to void the KOCE-TV Foundation contract.

“We can’t transfer the license anyway, so why unnecessarily argue whether or not they have the money?” he said.

“If they don’t have the money when the FCC makes a decision, then we will terminate the contract,” Dahl said.