Washington - Jan 31, 2007 - The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) has been allocating funds to finance the conversion of public radio stations to transmit HD Radio signals. In 2006, the CPB created a $13 million fund for the effort. During the last round of grants 85 stations were awarded funds. As of August 2006, a total of $7.3 million of the overall fund had been awarded. An additional round of funding, called 2006 II, has been created to distribute the remaining $5 million.

The station application, guidelines, FAQs and other pertinent information are available at the CPB website at this link. All CPB qualified stations are eligible to apply.

This funding round closes March 30, 2007.

To date, the CPB has awarded funds for the digital conversion of 540 public radio transmitters, which is 63 percent of all public radio transmitters. More than 200 public radio stations now transmit a digital signal, and more than 100 additional stations will begin digital transmission in 2007. Many of these stations offer additional channels of programming through multicasting.

Application questions on the process can be directed to Brian Gibbons at 202-879-9753 or bgibbons@cpb.org. Engineering questions can be directed to Doug Vernier at 319-266-8402 or dvernier@v-soft.com.