The stress of the decade-long licensing dispute led Gross to decide to leave the broadcasting business. He sold WJIM-TV to Backe Communications in 1984. The station, per FCC rules at the time (which prohibited TV and radio stations in the same market, but with different ownership, from sharing the same call letters) adopted its current call letters, WLNS-TV, on July 16, 1984. WJIM-AM was sold to Liggett Communications the following year. Backe's ownership of the station was short-lived; in 1986 it sold WLNS to Young Broadcasting.