WRGT - TVSpy

Sinclair to Add Mobile DTV in Nine Markets

Kevin Eck — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 10:29:03 +0000

Sinclair Broadcast Group has announced it will begin broadcasting mobile capable signals from ten of its stations in nine markets.

“The pace of technology makes it imperative for broadcasters to continue to lead in serving our communities,” said Mark Aitken, vice president of Advanced Technology for Sinclair and chairman of the ATSC A/153 MobileDTV standardization activity. “Broad adoption of MobileDTV, as a part of our local broadcast television offering, is the next step. We are confident our Network partners will see the value mobile simulcasting brings in building station and Network brands, audience share, and local television relevancy.”

Mobile DTV, as the service is called, allows viewers to watch their favorite local broadcast stations, for free, on portable devices like smart phones and tablets by adding a plug-in adapter. continued…

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Sinclair Executive Defends Election Special: ‘it was hard-hitting, but it was fair’

Merrill Knox — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 15:05:42 +0000

Scott Livingston, Sinclair Broadcasting’s vice president of news, is defending the company’s election special against criticism that it presented an anti-Obama agenda. The special — which aired on six stations in battleground states on Monday night — was a “continuation of the engagement of the audience and the process of educating them about the topics,” Livingston tells TVNewsCheck:

“No doubt it was hard-hitting, but it was fair,” said VP of News Scott Livingston, who oversees the local news operations of 42 Sinclair stations. “No one is disputing the facts of the stories that aired in the special.”

Livingston said no partisan agenda was at play in producing the show — nor in choosing the markets in which it was played. continued…

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Sinclair’s Election Eve Special, Broadcast in Swing States, Criticized as Partisan

Merrill Knox — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 11:51:07 +0000

Sinclair Broadcast Group is under fire for an election special that aired on stations in battleground states Monday night. The half-hour special — broadcast on the eve of the election in Columbus, Dayton and West Palm Beach — is being criticized as a partisan attack on President Barack Obama. Talking Points Memo, which first reported on the special, writes it “sounded more like Fox News than local news”:

ABC affiliate WSYX in Columbus aired a half-hour “election special” twice on Monday night — first at 6:30 p.m. instead of World News with Diane Sawyer, and later at 11:30 p.m., during the slot normally held by Nightline. Rather than a side by side comparison of the two major party candidates, however, the special featured some of the most partisan criticisms of President Barack Obama, and spent relatively little time examining Republican nominee Mitt Romney.

“Much of the first two years of President Obama’s term in office was spent developing and defending Obamacare — that’s the Affordable Care Act, signed into law in March of 2010,” anchor Bob Kendrick said, near the program’s halfway point. “It supposedly guarantees health care for any U.S. resident who could not obtain good health care otherwise. The biggest parts of the law go into effect in 2014, with other pieces of it rolling out over the next decade. The cost of Obamacare is making many Americans sick to their stomach, though.” continued…

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WDTN Cuts Main Anchor Michelle Kingsfield

Andrew Gauthier — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 10:03:43 +0000

Dayton NBC-affiliate WDTN has parted ways with Michelle Kingsfield, who anchored the station’s 5, 5:30, and 11 p.m. weekday newscasts over the past five years.

Kingsfield told the Dayton Daily News that she was “abruptly” let go last week, with the LIN-owned station failing to offer a reason for her dismissal.

Kingsfield has been a fixture on Dayton TV for over a decade. Before joining WDTN in 2007, she worked as an anchor at WKEF-WRGT, the market’s Sinclair-run duopoly. continued…

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Ohio Stations Yank Ad Featuring Grandmother

Andrew Gauthier — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:59:39 +0000

Thirty TV stations across Ohio have reportedly pulled a political ad off the air over its controversial use of footage featuring a great-grandmother from Cincinnati.

78-year-old Marlene Quinn recently signed on to appear in an ad opposing an upcoming ballot initiative. The ad (embedded above)–in which Quinn recounts how a group of brave firefighters saved her granddaughter’s life–was apparently so effective at swaying voter opinion that a group supporting the ballot initiative used footage of Quinn in its own ad (video inside). continued…

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WKEF-WRGT News Director Dies After Year-Long Battle with Brain Cancer

Andrew Gauthier — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 11:00:12 +0000

Pat Casey, the news director of Dayton’s WKEF and WRGT, died over the weekend after a year-long battle with brain cancer. He was 54.

Casey was diagnosed with Glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, in February of 2010. WKEF-WRGT announced last week that Casey was close to death. He died at a Cincinnati hospice center on Saturday with his wife and three children at his side.

“If you met Pat, you met someone very special. He lived his life the right way,” said Bill Cunningham of Cincinnati talk radio station WLW last week.

Casey worked in southwestern Ohio for the past decade. He was the news director at Cincinnati Fox-affiliate WXIX for five years before moving on to Dayton’s WKEF-WRGT in 2005. He began his broadcast career 30 years ago at Baltimore’s WMAR.

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