KPWR's launch, it broadcast what it announced as "72,000 Watts of Music Power...Less Talk" (mentioned in on-air station identifications by Chuck Riley and Deborah Rath), a reference to its then-actual effective radiated power (ERP) of 72 kW, allowing its signal to be heard in San Diego, Kern, and Santa Barbara counties). KPWR's ERP was reduced to 25 kW in 1993. KPWR picked up additional competition in May 2005 when KXOL-FM dropped its Spanish adult contemporary format for a Hispanic rhythmic, or hurban, format known as "Latino 96.3". The format is a crossover mix of reggaeton, dancehall, R&B, and hip hop targeting a bilingual audience. However, the abrupt switch violated a transmitter lease agreement that KXOL's parent company, Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS), had with Emmis; the agreement required formal notification to Emmis of any change in format and expressly prohibited KXOL from programming to directly compete with KPWR. SBS switched formats anyway, and Emmis filed a lawsuit to force SBS to either drop the format switch or find a new transmitter. SBS announced that KXOL would move to another transmitter site a month later, and both parties settled the dispute sometime after. KXOL would eventually exit the format on May 16, 2014 to return to Spanish AC as "Mega 96.3" after nine years and moderate to underperformed ratings. Shortly after the debut of Latino 96.3, KPWR replaced the majority of their non-Latino DJs with personalities of Latino descent who often pepper their broadcasts with Spanish words, in an effort to regain some of the audience lost to Latino 96.3. The staff at the time represented the multi-cultural population of Los Angeles: Krystal Bee (Latino), DJ E Man (Filipino), and Todd the Hater (Armenian) of #TheCruzShow. On August 17, 2006, KPWR's country music sister station KZLA flipped directions to rhythmic adult contemporary as "Movin' 93.9". Most of the songs played on Movin' 93.9 consisted of rhythmic pop and dance hits from the 1980s and 1990s to the present day, along with classic disco and freestyle music tracks thrown in for balance. However, after almost a year in the format, KMVN shifted directions to Rhythmic Oldies. With the unique combination of both KPWR and KZLA, the move gave Emmis and Los Angeles its first rhythmic duopoly, as well as the second duopoly in California with this arrangement, the other being Clear Channel Communications siblings KMEL and KYLD in San Francisco. That arrangement ended