Black-Oriented TV News: Has Its Time Come?

For the most part, TV news targeting African Americans has been a bust. Two now defunct cable networks, Black Family Channel and New Urban Entertainment, tried it in the early 2000s, and the pioneering BET now limits itself to breaking news and occasional specials, eschewing regular newscasts.

But despite some skepticism, the concept is showing new signs of life at both the local and national levels.

WBTV, the Raycom-owned CBS affiliate in Charlotte, N.C., is leading the way, producing three hours of black-oriented news daily for Bounce, the black-oriented diginet it carries on a subchannel.

News Director Dennis Milligan launched a two-hour morning show for Bounce in January and added an 8 p.m. newscast a month later, after WBTV stopped producing a 10 p.m. newscast for WJZY, which Capitol Broadcasting sold to Fox, freeing up some resources.

Milligan says it was a natural move for the station, which for the last three years has been trying to better reach a “community that was being underserved by all television stations in the market, including us.”

The Bounce morning show airs from 7 to 9 a.m., starting when WBTV’s regular morning news ends. The same talent appears on both show, but the Bounce show is notably different in that 90% of its guests are African American, says Milligan.

The one-hour nightly newscast at 8 p.m. features two African-American anchors, Brigida Mack and Delano Little. That show includes news of the day — stories you’d find on the main channel — but also showcases stories and people based in the black community.

“It’s a cultural exchange that’s probably long overdue,” Milligan says.

Soul of the South, a one-year-old diginet based in Little Rock, Ark., has a daily national black-oriented newscast in the works, says News Director Tom Jacobs.

That newscast, slated for an early June launch, will, Jacob hopes, eventually include local inserts produced by affiliates. Plans call for hiring about 20 multimedia journalists around the country, Jacobs says.

Soul of the South already produces D.C. Breakdown, a nightly African American-focused political show. Angela Rae, a longtime journalist who has worked at stations including CBS-owned WCBS New York and WFOR Miami, anchors that show from Washington.

Jacobs says he also plans to launch a two-hour morning news show later this summer.

Meanwhile, a years-long effort to create the country’s first black cable news network may be gaining traction.

The idea for the Black Television News Channel dates to 2008 when former U.S. Rep. J.C. Watts, a founding partner in the venture, announced his intention to raise $20 million to build the operation.

Watts’ partners include partners include Bob Brillante, a cable industry veteran who founded the Florida News Channel, a regional 24-hour cable channel; former U.S. House of Representatives Budget Director Steve Pruitt; and Frank Watson, a media management consultant.

Brillante says the demise of black-owned TV stations has fueled the need for black-targeted programming — to say nothing of the potential money that can be made serving an audience that watches 37% more TV than other groups.

According to Brillante, BTNC programming plans call for a nightly one-hour newscast featuring “culturally specific” content as well a business news show and a morning news show. Other slots will be filled with talk shows.

The initial effort to launch the service stalled when the economy tanked in 2008. Brillante says the venture is renegotiating carriage contracts with cable and satellite operators that had lapsed in the hopes of launching the network within the next 18 months.

The key contract it wants to resurrect is with Comcast. It had agreed to air BTNC in seven of the country’s top 10 African American markets — Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, Atlanta, Detroit, Miami and Baltimore.

BTNC recently announced a formal partnership with Florida A&M University, through which the school will house the channel’s headquarters on its Tallahassee campus.

The network hopes to partner with other historically black colleges and universities and enter into news sharing arrangements with TV stations.

African American TV news has its doubters.

“Journalists of colors have gotten their hopes up plenty of times when people announce new ventures, and they have learned that the proof is in the pudding,” says Richard Prince, a longtime journalist and proponent of diversity in media.

He says producing news for African Americans could actually be tougher today than in the past.  Racism and other issues are subtler today than they used to be, meaning covering them is more labor intensive than it was in the days of “looking at the ‘white’ and ‘colored’ water fountains,” he says.

“Are these networks going to invest the time and money into doing that?” Prince asks. “African Americans and other people of color watch television like everyone else, and I suppose there is a market for news that you can’t find other places. But the question is whether they are going to be doing serious stuff and can they do it in a way that’s appealing?”

Greg Morrison, who served as the Black Family Channel’s news director, also questions the viability of black-oriented newscasts. He says they face the same challenges as mainstream media such as changes in news consumption and competition from digital media.

In addition, he doesn’t believe in the idea of a one-size-fits-all African-American newscast.

“The black community is definitely not monolithic,” Morrison says. “The audience is very fragmented so targeting a black audience with television news is a tall order in these days and times.”

“I think that the real challenge is not only identifying the audience and getting their attention, but keeping them there night after night after night and day after day after day,” he says. “If they can pull it off, it’s a huge deal.”

Of the seven stations that produce news for the Bounce diginet,  WBTV is the only one that has created one aimed specially at African American viewers.

Scott Duff, news director at Raycom-owed WSFA Montgomery, Ala., is among the stations that produces newscasts for Bounce that are similar to those on the main channel. “Half our audience is African American,” Duff says. “We are here for everybody; we have lots of stories that involve folks who are African American.”

Bounce COO Jonathan Katz says he encourages affiliates to put news on Bounce, but the network has no plans to get into that business.

But Jacobs insists the time it ripe for black-oriented news. Technology has made news production cheaper and quicker, he says. What’s more, he adds, “there are a whole lot of experienced people who have been downsized out of the business, and many are people of color.

“I am going to give them a home.”