WRAL-WRAZ Raleigh, N.C., Now Off Dish

Effective Tuesday, Dec. 29, at 5 p.m. ET, Capitol Broadcasting’s Raleigh, N.C., WRAL (NBC) and WRAZ (Fox) are no longer being offered on Dish Network.

The broadcaster said in a statement: “WRAL and Fox 50 routinely reach amicable carriage agreements with cable and satellite partners. We have successfully completed these agreements with large national cable and satellite operators like Spectrum, DirecTV, AT&T U-verse and Comcast, including some this year.

“WRAL and Fox 50 are free to watch over the air with an antenna. Dish charges you to watch them on your television. The law requires all satellite and cable companies to negotiate with local TV stations for the right to carry the television signals on their paid services. Since they charge you to watch our free channels, we are allowed to charge them a carriage fee.

“Our very reputation has been built on integrity and community service. We did not want you, our viewers, in the middle of this. We even extended our contract multiple times to try to work it out. We are very sorry for the inconvenience to you.”

Jimmy Goodmon, president and COO of Capitol Broadcasting, added: “WRAL and Fox 50 are not pushing for things that are unreasonable. We are asking to be paid market rate for our programming so we can pay the affiliation fees required by NBC and Fox. This isn’t about greed, it’s about survival for our small, locally owned media company. Now, more than ever, local television news and original programming is a critical service to our community.”

A Dish statement said: “We have been working hard to get a fair deal, but unfortunately Capitol Broadcasting made the decision to remove their channels. We made a fair offer to keep their channels up, but they rejected it. We also offered to extend the current contract so viewers would not be impacted, but Capitol Broadcasting refused this as well.”