Gray Television

“No other company has a right to negotiate on behalf of my company without our consent,” said Gray Chairman-CEO Hilton Howell. “I have no intention of negotiating in public, or criticizing anyone anywhere.”

The increase to $1.1 billion was driven primarily by the primarily due to the cyclical increase in political advertising revenue.

Gray moves her from local sales manager at its NBC affiliate in Jackson, Miss.

Gray Television brings her in from Spectrum Reach to lead sales at its Birmingham, Ala., Fox affiliate.

The digitally native Hawaii newscast This Is Now has taken off thanks to production DIY simplicity, giving room for stories to breathe and buy-in from the broadcast side at Gray Television’s KGMB and KHNL Honolulu. Click through to read the full story.

Gray will give its KNIN Boise, Idaho, to Marquee for its WPGA Macon, Ga.

Solutions journalism, which presents news consumers with constructive responses to problems, has been gaining traction among station groups including Graham, Gray, Nexstar, Hearst, ABC and CBS. Viewers once put off by relentlessly negative reporting are tuning back in for it.

Robby Thomas is tapped to oversee WIS Columbia, S.C., while he will be succeeded as GM of WTVY-WRGX Dothan, Ala., by Valerie Russell.

New jobs posted to TVNewsCheck’s Media Job Center include openings for a general sales manager; an assistant chief engineer; a multimedia journalist; a sales account executive; a producer and reporter to work remotely on a new national daily news magazine; and a weekend anchor/reporter.

Without political advertising and with, possibly, a recession on the horizon, station groups rely on their customer-focused approach to drive cross-platform businesses with omnichannel, client-focused campaigns. Note: This story is available to TVNewsCheck Premium members only. If you would like to upgrade your free TVNewsCheck membership to Premium now, you can visit your Member Home Page, available when you log in at the very top right corner of the site or in the Stay Connected Box that appears in the right column of virtually every page on the site. If you don’t see Member Home, you will need to click Log In or Subscribe.

E.W. Scripps and Gray Television are taking advantage of cable and satellite’s diminished state to make a play for professional sports rights. It’s about time for broadcasting to reclaim them.

Last week, Fox Television Stations convened station groups and syndicators for a press- and deals-free ideas exchange in Los Angeles. Attendees said it could become an annual event. (Fox Television Stations photo)

Gray Television promotes her from general sales manager to succeed the retiring Al Lancaster as head of the CBS affiliate.

Executives expect a quiet ’23 for the syndication market but insist that streaming isn’t hastening its demise altogether. Audiences and advertisers are still hanging in, though programming budgets may need to be right sized under pressure from fragmentation.

Executives from Nexstar, Graham Media and Gray Television will share strategies for creating and expanding on opportunities to reach consumers on streaming and other digital platforms in a TVNewsCheck Working Lunch webinar on Jan. 26. Register here.

Connectivity, security and cloud-based applications top newsroom tech wishlists, technology executives from Sinclair, Gray Television, WCBS New York and Avid said at TVNewsCheck’s NewsTECHForum event. Above (l-r): WCBS New York’s Rich Paleski, Avid’s Craig Wilson, Gray Television’s David Burke and Sinclair Broadcast Group’s Mike Palmer (Alyssa Wesley photo). Read a full report here and/or watch the video above.

Behind-the-scenes news leaders and on-air talent shared cutting edge approaches to using emerging presentation technology at TVNewsCheck’s NewsTECHForum last week. A key takeaway: No matter the tech, it only takes off with the right talent and tone. Above (l-r): Barry Nash & Co.’s Barry Nash, Scripps News’ Christian Bryant, Gray Television’s Jonathan Saupe, The Weather Channel’s Nora Zimmett and TVNewsCheck‘s Michael Depp, moderator (Alyssa Wesley photo). Read a full report here and/or watch the video above.

TV stations are amping up their news sharing, collaboration and archive-mining to fill the ever-growing need for more content, and executives from Scripps, Gray Television, Sinclair Broadcast Group, Fox Television Stations and Dalet shared their most effective methods for doing so in a NewsTECHForum panel on Tuesday. Above, l-r: FTS’ Emily Stone, Dalet’s Stephane Guez, Scripps’ Vanessa Strouse-Kenney, Gray’s Lisa Allen and Sinclair’s Ernie Ensign (Alyssa Wesley photo). Read a full report here and/or watch the video above.

Gaston will have oversight of Gray stations in the South, Texas and Colorado. He will be succeeded as head of WBRC Birmingham, Ala., by Jason Mathews, that station’s current general sales manager.

Technology executives from Gray Television, Sinclair Broadcast Group, WCBS New York and Avid share how they’re rethinking approaches to reporting, editing, production and multimedia distribution in a panel at TVNewsCheck’s NewsTECHForum event at the New York Hilton on Dec. 13. Register here.

Gray owned Fort Wayne, Ind., stations WPTA (ABC) and WISE (NBC) are set to become one brand called 21Alive News in early January of 2023. A Gray spokesperson said they are combining news operations into one news brand, not one station.

The new deals cover 25 markets and run through Dec. 31, 2024.

Executives from Gray Television, Fox Television Stations, E.W. Scripps, Sinclair and Dalet will discuss how hubbing, news sharing and collaboration, AI, the cloud and cutting-edge video acquisition strategies are enhancing the ability of content creation teams to expand their productivity in a panel at TVNewsCheck’s NewsTECHForum event at the New York Hilton on Dec. 13. Register here.

Gray taps the general sales manager of its WKYT Lexington, Ky., to lead operations at its Florida Fox affiliate.

COO Bob Smith: “As August began, momentum was as strong as we’ve ever seen it and the political buyers were as upbeat and as busy as you would expect in the final weeks of a presidential year, rather than the summer of a mid-term year. But then, shortly after our August earnings call, we began experiencing large and unexpected pullbacks in political advertising in a number of key races.”

The increase to $909 million was driven by a big increase in political advertising as well as higher retransmission consent money.

The new division will be headed by veteran journalists and researchers Chris Archer and Tony Calfo who will join on Jan. 1.

The FCC said it will not rescind its half-million dollar fine against Gray Television for “willfully and repeatedly” violating its prohibition on owning two of the top-four rated full-power TV stations in a market. Gray said it will take the FCC to court and expects to get the decision reversed.

Technology executives from Sinclair, Gray, WLS Chicago and Dalet shared some of the more enduring remote workflows holding over from the pandemic in a TVNewsCheck webinar last week, noting that improvements in IP connectivity and public cloud technology are pushing innovation even further.

The “first-of-its-kind” partnership will result in Spanish-speaking audiences in 13 Texas DMAs receiving live news on weekday mornings.

Last Friday, Sept. 30, the CBS affiliate in Atlanta owned by Gray went on the air branded as “Atlanta News First,” changing its call letters from WGCL to WANF. But living that brand has been going on since Gray took over the station in December 2021.

Graham Media Group announced in a statement that Phil Lane has been named VP and GM of KPRC, the NBC broadcast affiliate television station in Houston. Lane replaces Jerry Martin, who recently announced his retirement after 11 years at the helm of KPRC.

Executives from NBCUniversal, Fox Television Stations, E.W. Scripps, Gray Television and Estrella Media told a TVNewsCheck webinar last week they’ve needed to embrace a wide range of tools and tactics to grow audience and revenue for their streaming channels. Ubiquity and flexibility, they said, are key.