KAZA came into being on July 15, 1967 when South Valley Broadcasters did away with the station’s original call letters, KPER. The 5,000-watt daytime-only station’s programming was almost exclusively in Spanish by that time.
In 1973, South Valley Broadcasters sold KAZA for $522,000. The buyer was Radio Fiesta Corporation, led by J. D. Williams, Olen Hayes, and Ines Castillo. Two years later, Hayes and Castillo teamed up to buy San Jose’s KEZR when the airline-based conglomerate PSA decided to get out of the broadcasting business.
By 1978, Albert Sidhu Rodriguez and his wife Luz Maria had acquired control of KAZA. The two had emigrated from Zacatecas, Mexico, eventually owning a number of movie theaters that showed Mexican films. At the time that they became owners of KAZA, fewer than 20 radio stations nationwide were controlled by Hispanics.
Michael Ramirez served as the station’s general manager for a number of years while also investing in radio stations in Santa Maria and Bakersfield, CA.
Calling itself La Mexicana, the station’s Spanish-language Top 40 format took its cues from south of the border. In 1985, owner Albert Sidhu Rodriguez told the San Francisco Chronicle, “We stay close to the charts of what’s being played in Mexico City.” By that time, the station was broadcasting an AM stereo signal.
Through the 1990s, KAZA tried different versions of Spanish-language programing, at times airing regional Mexican music, Spanish-language Top 40, and Spanish-language oldies.
In 2002 and 2003, KAZA carried Oakland Raiders broadcasts in Spanish, with Erwin Higueros and Ambrosio Rico calling the action.
Albert Sidhu Rodriguez died in 1999 and his widow Luz Maria Rodriguez passed away in 2020. Their legacy includes not only the movie theaters (including the demolished UA Theater in downtown San Jose) and KAZA but also Luz Al Promotions, which produced Mexican dance concerts for many years at South Bay venues including the San Jose McEnery Convention Center.
In 2010, Tron Dinh Do’s Intelli LLC began operating KAZA under a local marketing agreement with Radio Fiesta. At that time, the Spanish-language broadcasts disappeared and the station began airing the Vietnamese-language Viên Thao Radio network.
In 2014, the family-owned Radio Fiesta sold KAZA to Intelli LLC for a reported $1 million.
