[ADTech]

Give the station's engineering department a call and see if they might be having any technical issues that require them to run at reduced power. Sometimes things break...

Other than that, there is no reason for them to jeopardize their license to broadcast by doing as your paranoid neighbor suggested.

If the station engineering department indicates that they are and have been running normally, then that opens up the probability of interference as the probable cause. It might be something local to you and your neighbors, perhaps a new cellular or 4G wireless tower was recently lit up and it's causing interference into your receiving gear.