Anza’s local radio station’s weather-worn hand painted sign was repaired by a talented volunteer Thursday, Jan. 18 and Friday, Jan. 19.
KOYT 97.1 LPFM Anza Community Broadcasting director, The Blues Hour host and volunteer Liese Carney applied her artistic skill to repaint and even add to the battered sign.
“It’s been in dire need for quite some time,” said Carney. “Our KOYT sign that’s directly across from NAPA on 371 has been damaged from the weather and age. We wanted to restore the artwork.”
The sign, designed and painted by renowned Western artist Susan Eyer-Anderson, was erected in 2016. At the time, Anderson was known as the Phantom Artist of Anza, creating and installing hand painted signs secretly around the area.
“In 2016 when Susan’s beautifully painted mural street sign markers were popping up all over Anza, we at KOYT decided we wanted to have this mystery artist paint one for the radio station. We reached out via Facebook, made contact with her and had one commissioned. We then found a location and were able to get permission by the property owner to install the large sign,” explained Carney.
The sign was erected and has proudly announced the radio station with the image of a howling coyote for the last eight years.
But in almost a decade, wind, sun, rain and snow has taken its toll on the plywood sign. Storms in 2023 ripped one half of the sign off and threw it to the ground. It was repaired shortly afterward.
“Over the years we have fixed it up and added our new frequency location of 97.1FM, as the original sign had the old numbers on it. We even had some ladies in town touch up the artwork four years ago,” Carney said. “I wanted to keep Susan’s original design, so we weren’t able to sand on it very much. But it desperately needed some attention, and it looks so much better now, especially at night with the solar powered marquis style lights I put on it a couple of years ago.”
According to Carney, program director Errine Roscoe and volunteer Carrie Gray assisted in the renovation of the sign. Glidden Premium Exterior paint was used for extra durability. The repainting came with Eyer-Anderson’s blessing.
The mission of the Anza Community Broadcasting KOYT 97.1 LPFM radio is to provide an inclusive public broadcasting forum to educate, inform, and entertain the local community and the general public.
KOYT plays all genres of music, including blues, rockabilly, big band, rock, jazz, pop, metal, country and more. Shows like Fika with Annika, where Knöppel interviews local movers and shakers, and Kevin Short’s Jazz Notes with Kevin are standards for the station, delighting listeners every week.
The radio station is 100 percent volunteer operated under the guidance of an all-volunteer Council of Directors, who are elected by the membership for 3-year terms.
KOYT 97.1 FM transmits music, news, and educational programs to much of the Anza Valley and streams over the internet at www.koyt971.org. The radio station offers local information and entertainment in which the community can participate. Local businesses that donate funds or services can get short mentions on air to advertise their products or services.
KOYT has an Emergency Alert System that will enable residents to get relevant information over the FM airwaves in case of a community emergency.
The station is located at 56030 Highway 371, Ste. 5 in Anza.
To learn more, email info@koyt971.org or programming@koyt971.org, call (951)763-KOYT(5698), visit www.koyt971.org or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/koyt97.1/.
Diane Sieker can be reached by email at dsieker@reedermedia.com.
