Upgrading first to twelve watts in January and again in April to twenty watts, the station has expanded its programming as well. While the radio parties are now a thing of the past, the station has grown rapidly, gaining more diversity in the process. Now broadcasting five days per week,STR presents anarchist news and events, a nightly community calendar, a weekly interview, and talk shows, as well as several hours of Spanish- language programming. "It was always our intention to make our programming as wide- ranging as possible - - not to have people just playing their favorite music, but to have things that spoke to the whole gamut of Loisaida residents - - squatters, low- income tenants, activists and non- activists," says Queequeg, a collective member. "I don't think you can justify micro- power philosophy on any other basis than community need."

It is the realization among activists in general that the concentration of media sources in a few corporate hands - - such as Time- Warner, Turner, Capital Cities and other conglomerates - - each owning vast holdings in radio, broadcast and cable television, movie production, and publishing - - has created the a need for communities to take back the airwaves for their own constructive uses. The means for this are within reach. "The airwaves are public, yet the government insists on its strict and exclusive right to regulate this public property, and then deeds away their use to the corporate sector, which is interested only in profits," says Queequeg. This reality, and micro- power broadcasting's answer to it is at the heart of the on- going Federal prosecution of Stephen Dunifer and Free Radio Berkeley. Dunifer's efforts to fight the $20,000.00 fine levied against him, with the help of the National Lawyer's Guild's Committee on Democratic Communication, has been nothing short of heroic. ( See Shadow #37)

Says collective member D.J. Chrome, "Giving a voice to the people in this neighborhood is our mission - - to make a vehicle for organizing and forging community among the people of the Lower East Side." To this end, Chrome presents a weekly show, Neighborhood News and Views, with interviews and talk on issues that are community centered. A recent show broadcast an original interview with Democratic District Leader Margarita Lopez, a long- time Loisaida activist and outspoken opponent of Councilman Antonio Pagan. D.J. Chrome adds, "In a predominantly working class neighborhood like ours, many people don't have the time or energy to be fully informed on the things going on here that affect them - - real estate development, city policies - - or, the information they do get comes entirely from one side. With this show, they can get takes on issues from the people who live in their own neighborhood, and they can also bring their issues to the show, create dialogue." Ideally, Steal this Radio's organizers envision the micro- power station as a sort of giant community drum that people can tune in to. For this to work, says collective member Grace O'Malley, "the station must develop the greatest degree of access for community members

to programming - - anyone with an idea about a show they think the community needs, or announcements, or events for the calendar, should feel free to bring their ideas to us - - we're committed to finding a way to fit it all in." The only rules in place about programming, she adds, are "no hate speech," and a willingness to accept the station's legitimate security concerns. Fast Forward points out the station's enormous potential when he contrasts its listening area with that of other micro- power stations. "We get approximate coverage from the western edge of Williamsburg to about the Bowery, and from Delancey Street to Stuyvesant Town. A station like Radio Free Berkeley may be better situated in a flat, low- rise area for sending a signal very far, while our signal has to contend with a dense grid of large concrete and steel obstructions - - but the up side of this is that with all the density of multiple- dwelling units, tenements and such, we have some 75,000 people living in a tight area - - we don't need to send a signal very far to have a large potential listenership." But how many people are listening? "We get complaints from people trying to tune us in," says Fast Forward. "Some of them are on the fringes of our range, so they need to put a better antenna on their stereo receivers, or try moving the boom box to a different location in their rooms. As we upgrade our signal, we hope people keep trying."