Systems and methodologies are described that facilitate establishing a forward link acknowledgement channel and transmitting acknowledgment signals thereupon. In particular, the signals can be spread within contiguous channel clusters in a tile where the signals in the cluster are mutually orthogonal to one another. Additionally, the signals can be multiplexed over a plurality of frequency regions. In this regard, the acknowledgment signals are diverse with respect to frequency and interference; moreover, the signals can be received and decoded even where one of the channels experiences high interference. Furthermore, the acknowledgement signals can also communicate a channel deassignment value, which allows devices to utilize persistent channels in communicating data to one another