CHAS-FM

CHAS-FM

City of license	Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario
Branding	100.5 EZ Rock
Slogan	"Today's Best Music"
Frequency	100.5 MHz (FM)
First air date	1964
Format	adult contemporary
Power	13.9 kW
Former callsigns	CJIC-FM
Owner	Rogers Radio
Sister stations	CJQM-FM, CIRS
Webcast	For Windows
Website	100.5 EZ Rock

CHAS-FM (100.5 FM, "100.5 EZ Rock") is a Canadian radio station, which broadcasts an adult contemporary format in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada. The station, owned by Rogers Radio, uses the on-air brand EZ Rock. Prior to using the "EZ Rock" name, the station was known on the air as "Mix 100" and "Lite 100.5".

History

The station was originally launched by Highland Broadcasting on May 15, 1964 as CJIC-FM, a sister station to CJIC and CJIC-TV. In 1976, the stations briefly became the property of Huron Broadcasting, retained the television station but sold the radio stations to Gilder Broadcasting under concentration of media ownership rules. With the TV and radio stations no longer having common ownership, the radio stations adopted the new callsigns and signed on as CFYN (for the AM station) and CHAS on February 1, 1977.

The original on air schedule of CHAS included Berg Neuman from 6:00 - 10:00 a.m., CBC Radio's Morningside from 10:00 a.m. - noon, Brian W. Martin from noon - 2:00 p.m., Fred Edwards from 2:00 - 6:00 p.m., Tony Marziale from 6:00 - 10:00 p.m., CBC Radio's The World at Ten and Mostly Music from 10:00 p.m. - midnight and "The Incredible Rod Wayne" from midnight - 6:00 a.m. The station dropped its CBC programming after CBSM was launched in 1981.

In 1985, CFYN and CHAS were sold to Telemedia. Telemedia refined the "Beautiful Music" format of CHAS, incorporating elements of the "Music of Your Life" format to create a hybrid that was targeted mainly at the 45 plus listener.

As the influence of Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan's WYSS attracted more of the Sault, Ontario audience, pressure to follow suit grew. CHAS evolved to a younger sound, moving the format from beautiful music to adult-contemporary and adopting "Lite 100.5" as the station's branding. However, economic circumstances in the Sault Ste. Marie market and diminishing audiences on both Canadian AM stations severely curtailed the profitability of the Sault, Ontario operations. Telemedia entered into a local management agreement with Pelmorex, retaining ownership of the station but giving Pelmorex the management rights. The station subsequently moved into shared studio facilities with CJQM.

Three members of the CHAS staff were offered positions in the new operation. The rest of the staff was laid off. Marlene Yanni moved to the new operation as a sales representative, Gino Cavallo was offered the position of news and sports director of CHAS and James Warner-Smith became the program director of the new station. Gino Cavallo declined, accepting instead the public relations and play-by-play position with the Sault Greyhounds hockey club.

As of August 31, 1992, several members of the staff of the defunct CKCY (Power 92) assumed new on air positions with Mix 100, including Frank Raven, Scott Turnbull, John Campbell, John Murtha, Mitch Drolet and Dan Bonk.

CHAS continued to broadcast for the next seven years as Mix 100. Among the benchmarks of that time for the station, were reaching a weekly audience of 30,000 listeners and negotiating the broadcast rights for all Sault Greyhounds home and away games away from the Sault Michigan based Talk Radio 1400.

Telemedia bought CJQM from Pelmorex in 1999 and assumed control of the Sault Ste. Marie operation. At this point CHAS, along with other Telemedia stations in Northeastern Ontario adopted the "EZ Rock" format patterned after Standard Broadcasting's 97.3 EZ Rock in Toronto.

In 2002, a number of Telemedia radio stations, including the two in Sault Ste. Marie were acquired by Standard Broadcasting. Standard sold both CHAS and CJQM to Rogers Broadcasting almost immediately.

July 4, 2011, CHAS altered its musical format to present a more contemporary version of its AC Mainstream Plus blend. With this shift, the station cancelled 'The 80's Lunch' program and 'Sunday at the 70's.' 'Solid Gold Saturday Night' was replaced by 'The Saturday Night Show', a program featuring music from the 70's to present. Scott Turnbull remains as host. The station also adopted a new logo as well as the positioning statement 'Today's Best Music.'

External links

• 100.5 EZ Rock
• CHAS history at Canadian Communications Foundation
• Query the REC's Canadian station database for CHAS-FM