About CFBO 90.7 FM

CFBO 90.7 FM

Overview

CFBO-FM, branded on air as Plus 90.7, is a French-language community radio station broadcasting at 90.7 MHz in Moncton, New Brunswick. The station is licensed to Radio Beauséjour Inc., a not-for-profit organisation that also holds the licence for CJSE-FM in Shediac, and it serves the Acadian and francophone population of the greater Moncton area in southeastern New Brunswick. CFBO-FM operates as a Class B FM undertaking with an effective radiated power of 30,000 watts. Its studios are located at the Arts and Cultural Centre in Dieppe, the largely francophone city adjoining Moncton. The station broadcasts in French and, since a format change in September 2021, has presented a hot adult contemporary sound under the Plus 90.7 name, making it one of the principal French-language radio voices in New Brunswick's largest metropolitan area.

History

CFBO-FM was authorised by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission in Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2004-518, issued on November 26, 2004. The decision approved an application by Radio Beauséjour Inc. for a French-language Type B community FM station in Moncton, operating at 90.7 MHz (channel 214B) with an effective radiated power of 30,000 watts; the original licence was to expire on August 31, 2011. In its application, Radio Beauséjour proposed a station broadcasting 110 hours of programming per week, of which at least 75 hours would be produced by the station itself, alongside 35 hours per week drawn from the Réseau Francophone d'Amérique. The applicant positioned the new Moncton service as an urban contemporary station aimed at listeners in the city, distinct from the more rural, country-oriented audience of its sister station CJSE-FM in Shediac; the two stations were to share administration while each maintained its own newsroom. The application also described a volunteer coaching programme that Radio Beauséjour was already operating at CJSE, intended to train community volunteers for on-air work.

Although the licence dates from 2004, the station did not sign on until November 2008, launching as "BO 90.7" with an adult contemporary format. The licence was subsequently renewed through a series of administrative renewals in 2011 and 2012, and in December 2012 the Commission renewed it for a term running to August 31, 2019. Radio Beauséjour and CFBO-FM again appeared among the community undertakings administratively renewed in Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2025-136. In September 2021 the station changed format to hot adult contemporary and took on its current identity as Plus 90.7, with the former BO-FM branding ending around October 2021. Most recently, Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2026-216 lists CFBO-FM, licensed to Radio Beauséjour inc., among the community radio licences renewed for an indefinite term effective September 1, 2027, under the Commission's move away from fixed licence terms for radio services. One historical footnote predates the present station: the CFBO call sign was first used between 1928 and 1934 by a Saint John station that later became CHSJ, an unrelated predecessor whose call letters the Moncton station later revived.

Programming and Content

CFBO-FM's programming is built around French-language community service for the Moncton area, mixing locally produced spoken-word and music programming with network content. The founding licence application set the pattern: a 110-hour broadcast week, the majority of it produced in-house, supplemented by programming from the Réseau Francophone d'Amérique, the network serving francophone communities outside Quebec. That balance of local production and network sharing remains characteristic of Acadian community radio, in which small staffs and trained volunteers produce programming rooted in their own community while drawing on a shared pool of French-language content.

The station's present-day schedule, as listed by streaming directories carrying its feed, is organised around the working day of its audience. The weekday morning show "Sors du lit!" is hosted by Samuel Chiasson in the early morning hours, followed by "PLUS au travail," a daytime programme aimed at listeners at work, and "Le Break," a Monday-to-Friday midday show whose music mix is described as combining classics with Acadian, Canadian and American Top 40 titles. Since the 2021 relaunch, the station's overall sound has been hot adult contemporary, a shift from the adult contemporary format heard under the BO 90.7 name. As a French-language community station, CFBO-FM's spoken-word content addresses the life of the Acadian community of southeastern New Brunswick — its institutions, schools, cultural events and municipal affairs in Moncton, Dieppe and the surrounding area — in the language of that community.

Audience and Reach

CFBO-FM serves the francophone and Acadian population of greater Moncton, which includes the cities of Moncton and Dieppe and the town of Riverview, together with francophone communities across southeastern New Brunswick within reach of its 30,000-watt Class B signal. The station was conceived as an urban service: where CJSE-FM in Shediac addressed a rural audience, CFBO-FM was designed from its 2004 application onward for listeners in the metropolitan area, the largest concentration of Acadians in the province. In a metropolitan market where English-language media predominate, the station provides a full-time French-language service produced in the region itself. Its audience relationship is that of a community broadcaster: programming is made with the participation of community volunteers, and the station takes part in the wider Acadian community-radio movement as a member of the Alliance des radios communautaires du Canada, the national association of French-language community stations outside Quebec.

Digital Presence

The station's website is plus90.ca, which carries its branding as Plus 90.7 and serves as its online point of contact for listeners. CFBO-FM's programming is also carried by online streaming directories: Online Radio Box, for example, lists the station under its Plus 90.7 identity with a current programme schedule naming its weekday shows and hosts, evidence that the station's feed and schedule information continue to be maintained for online listeners. Through its website and these directory listings, the station's French-language Moncton programming is available to listeners well beyond its FM coverage area, including the wider Acadian diaspora.

Ownership and Organisation

CFBO-FM is licensed to Radio Beauséjour Inc., a not-for-profit organisation rooted in New Brunswick's Acadian community. Radio Beauséjour is also the licensee of CJSE-FM, the French-language Type B community station in Shediac, and the two stations form a small community broadcasting group serving southeastern New Brunswick. When CFBO-FM was proposed in 2004, Radio Beauséjour told the CRTC that the Moncton and Shediac stations would share administration while keeping separate newsrooms, so that each community would retain its own local news service. The organisation's model depends significantly on volunteers: its application described the coaching programme it ran at CJSE to train volunteer hosts, an approach it planned to extend to the new Moncton station. CFBO-FM is a member of the Alliance des radios communautaires du Canada, through which it is connected to French-language community stations across the country.

Contact and Availability

CFBO-FM broadcasts at 90.7 FM in the Moncton area and is available online through its website, plus90.ca, where listeners can find its current branding, programming information and station contact details. Its studios are located at the Arts and Cultural Centre in Dieppe, New Brunswick. The station can also be heard through online radio directories that carry its live feed and publish its program schedule. As a community station, it welcomes participation from the francophone community it serves, in keeping with the volunteer-based model on which Radio Beauséjour built both of its stations.