Media activists in Seattle say they’re making the best of the fact that the federal government shutdown has gotten in the way of a two-week window during which local groups can apply for low-power FM, or LPFM, radio licenses, an opportunity that has been a decade in the making.

The Federal Communications Commission had set October 15 as the day that applications would first be expected for LPFM stations, which operate at 100 watts or less. These stations cost far less to set up than full-power FM stations and are required to have an educational bent (they are geared toward community groups, schools, churches, non-profits and the like). Some see them as an antidote for the increasing homogenization of full-power FM that broadcasts the same programs from coast to coast.

In Seattle, more than a dozen groups have been readying their applications for the five to eight licenses that the FCC is expected to issue in the city. Radio organizers have fixated on the two-week window because many see it as not only the first, but also the last time that the feds will hand out new LPFM licenses in urban areas, where the airwaves are particularly crowded.

But with the federal government shuttered, the application process looks to be on hold. The shutdown took offline the FCC database that powers the LPFM application process. More than that, crafting plans for how a station fits, physically, in a community requires flightpath data from the Federal Aviation Administration and elevation data from the U.S. Geological Survey, which either aren’t being updated or are completely unavailable.

In 2000, the FCC under reform-minded Chair William Kennard moved toward licensing low-power stations to community groups. Congress objected, triggering a decade of studies, hearings and negotiations. For years, full-power broadcasters won the day with the argument that LPFM might interfere with existing radio stations. But in December 2010 Congress passed the Local Community Radio Act, which empowered the FCC to restart its licensing process. As it turn out, the long-awaited opening of the window for LPFM applications happened to coincide with day 15 of the ongoing federal shutdown.

Radio activists aren’t exactly sure what will happen with LPFM once the government reopens. Prometheus Radio Project’s policy director Sanjay Jolly has said, “we do plan to press the Commission to make fair accommodations to those applicants who may require additional time due to the shutdown.”

In Seattle, though, organizers see a silver lining. Some, like the immigrant advocacy group OneAmerica, the Sand Point Arts & Cultural Exchange and the Dash Center for the Arts, have their applications ready to go. Others, like the famous Pike Place Market, are still considering whether to apply. For them, the shutdown is something of a reprieve, like a last-minute but much-needed homework extension.

According to Brown Paper Ticket, a ticketing and event company that is organizing the LPFM campaign in Seattle, Pike Place Market “may actually benefit from the extra time created by the government closure.”

Nancy Scola is a Washington, DC-based journalist whose work tends to focus on the intersections of technology, politics, and public policy. Shortly after returning from Havana she started as a tech reporter at POLITICO.