Longtime Metro Detroit station WADL-TV purchased by Texas-based broadcaster for $75 million

Longtime Metro Detroit station WADL-TV has been purchased by the Mission Broadcasting Co.

The MyNetworkTV-affiliated station in Clinton Township was launched in May 1989 and reaches nearly two million households, according to a press release announcing the transaction.

"I started this journey 34 years ago at my parents’ kitchen table, where I mortgaged their home in order to build what would later become WADL-TV," Kevin Adell, chief executive officer of Adell Broadcasting, said in a statement. "I could not have selected a better successor of my legacy than Mission Broadcasting.”

Mort Meisner of TV talent agency Mort Meisner Associates, a spokesman for Adell, said the station was purchased for $75 million.

Mission Broadcasting was founded in 1996 and is based in Wichita Falls, Texas. The company's website says it owns stations in 26 markets and has network affiliation agreements with ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, CW and MyNetwork.

“The purchase of WADL represents a rare opportunity to acquire a full-power station in a top-15 market,” Mission Broadcasting President Dennis Thatcher said in a statement. “We are very excited about playing a role in the continued renaissance of this great American city.”

Mission Broadcasting also owns WLAJ-TV, the ABC affiliate in Lansing.

The transaction is subject to regulatory and other customary approvals

More:Metro Detroit media owner Kevin Adell owes millions in unpaid estate taxes, feds say

Last month the federal government sued Adell over millions of dollars in what it described as unpaid taxes.

The suit alleged the longtime leader of 910AM Superstation and the Word Network, the world's largest African American religious network that reaches more than 200 countries, spent years failing to pay sums related to his late father’s estate. The estate included Adell Broadcasting Corp. in Clinton Township.