A deal is in the works that may convert Lawrence’s longtime pop/rock radio station 105.9 FM to a Spanish-language radio station.

Kansas City’s largest Spanish language media company — Reyes Media Group — has signed a deal to purchase the 105.9 radio station from its Missouri-based owner for $2.25 million, according to filings made with the Federal Communications Commission.

The FCC filings do not state that Reyes Media plans to convert 105.9 FM to a Spanish-language station, but such a move would be consistent with the company’s business strategy. Reyes operates three radio stations and one newspaper in the Kansas City metro, and all of those properties are Spanish-language based.

An executive with Reyes Media hasn’t returned phone or email messages seeking comment on the deal.

The deal must be approved by the FCC before it can be finalized. A ruling by the FCC is still pending, according to a status update listed on the FCC website. When the deal could be approved wasn’t immediately clear. FCC offices were closed on Monday for the Veterans Day holiday.

The 105.9 radio station is owned by Great Plains Media, which also owns two other stations in Lawrence — 1320 KLWN talk radio, which also has an FM location at 101.7, and country music station 92.9 The Bull. The deal with Reyes doesn’t involve either of those two stations.

A local representative for Great Plains Media did not return a call seeking comment.

While it is not clear when a change with 105.9 may occur, it is easy enough to see why Reyes Media is interested in the station. Reyes’ three existing stations in the Kansas City market are all on the AM dial. The 105.9 station, which has its tower in rural Douglas County, reaches into Topeka and into the western portions of the Kansas City metro market, which is Reyes’ prime market.

Reyes, based in Kansas City, Kansas, operates: 1340 AM La Grande: 100% Mexican; 1250 AM La Super Estacion; and 1480 Dos Mundos Radio. Reyes also owns Dos Mundos, a 42-year old Spanish-language weekly newspaper that services the Kansas City metro.

As for 105.9, its history dates back to the Booth family, a longtime Lawrence family that was a pioneer in the Lawrence radio market. Started in the 1960s, the FM station largely simulcast the news, weather and sports programming of its sister AM station, KLWN. By the 1970s, it began playing rock music. During the 1980s and 1990s — after the construction of a more powerful transmitter and new call letters of KLZR — the radio station gained a following as an alternative rock station, and even got some national recognition when Rolling Stone named it to its list of 10 “Station that Didn’t Suck.”

The parent company of Great Plains Media, Zimmer Radio Group, bought the station in 1998. Ever since, 105.9, which changed its call letters to KKSW, has operated as various versions of a Top 40, pop-rock station. The station also has been a longtime broadcaster of KU sporting events. It is not clear that will continue on 105.9 after the sale.

The radio station has its studios on West Sixth Street in Lawrence. It is not clear that 105.9 will maintain a Lawrence-based studio under new ownership.

Check back for updates, as I’ll work to get additional information from the parties involved.