WFOX-TV

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Coordinates: 30°16′51.9″N 81°34′12.2″W / 30.281083°N 81.570056°W / 30.281083; -81.570056
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WFOX-TV
FCC
Facility ID11909
ERP663 kW
HAAT289 m (948 ft)
Transmitter coordinates30°16′51.9″N 81°34′12.2″W / 30.281083°N 81.570056°W / 30.281083; -81.570056
Links
Public license information
Websitewww.actionnewsjax.com

WFOX-TV (channel 30) is a

Southside
section.

History

Early history in 1980s

The station first signed on the air on February 15, 1981, as WAWS-TV (the "-TV" suffix was dropped from the call letters on October 8, 1981); it was the first general-entertainment

drama series
.

WAWS became a charter affiliate of the Fox Broadcasting Company when the network launched on October 9, 1986. As was the case with other Fox stations during the network's early years, channel 30 continued to program itself in the manner of an independent station as Fox's initial schedule consisted of an hour of late night programming on Monday through Friday evenings, while the later addition of a prime time schedule in April 1987 only consisted of programming during that time period on weekends (Fox would not carry a full seven nights a week of programming until September 1993). Until Fox began airing programming on a nightly basis, WAWS aired a feature film at 8 p.m. on nights when the network did not offer any programming.

Clear Channel ownership

In 1989, Malrite sold the station to the

Pensacola–Mobile, Alabama market, WPMI-TV (now an NBC affiliate) and was the first television station that Clear Channel ever owned. As was the trend for many Fox affiliates throughout the mid to late 1990s, WAWS began shifting its programming toward talk and reality shows and decreased its reliance on classic sitcoms. In 1995, Clear Channel began managing channel 47—later to become WNFT—under a local marketing agreement; the two stations pooled programming and resources, while running the strongest syndicated programs on WAWS. Clear Channel purchased channel 47, which by that point had become UPN
affiliate WTEV-TV, outright in 2000, creating the second television duopoly in the Jacksonville market.

Former logo used from 2001 to April 12, 2009.

After WTEV took the CBS affiliation from longtime affiliate

Gannett Company owned NBC affiliate WTLV (channel 12) and ABC affiliate WJXX (channel 25), both of which are now owned by its broadcasting and digital media spin-off Tegna Inc.
).

On January 24, 2006, the

Twentieth Television that was created to compete against The CW, as well as to give UPN- and WB-affiliated stations that were not named as charter CW affiliates another option besides converting into independent stations.[10][11]

On March 28 of that year, then-owner

Variety Television Network (MeTV
since 2011) airing at all other times.

Newport Television ownership

On April 20, 2007, Clear Channel entered into an agreement to sell its television stations to

total-day viewership
). As a result, the FCC granted Newport Television a temporary waiver to acquire WAWS and WTEV, provided that Newport sell one of the two stations within six months of the sale's consummation. After the group deal closed on March 14, 2008, Newport had originally planned to sell off WAWS to another company while keeping WTEV.

Final logo used by the station under the WAWS call letters, from April 12, 2009, to September 6, 2014.

On May 21, 2008, High Plains Broadcasting agreed to purchase the license assets of WTEV and six other stations from Newport Television due to ownership conflicts in the affected markets (including Jacksonville).

Nexstar Broadcasting Group and Mission Broadcasting and the Sinclair Broadcast Group and Cunningham Broadcasting
. This arrangement also placed WAWS in the unusual position of being the senior partner as a Fox-affiliated station in a virtual duopoly with a CBS affiliate (the Fox station normally serves as the junior partner in most virtual or legal duopolies involving a Fox affiliate and a Big Three-affiliated station). WAWS is the only television station in the Jacksonville market that has never changed its primary network affiliation.

Cox Media Group ownership

On July 19, 2012, Newport Television announced the sale of WAWS and WTEV-TV to the

Orlando duopoly of ABC affiliate WFTV and independent station WRDQ. Due to the very same rules that forced the license of WTEV to be transferred to a separate licensee back in 2008, Cox acquired WAWS outright and transferred WTEV's license assets to Bayshore Television, LLC, which then entered into a joint sales agreement with Cox. The FCC approved the transaction on October 24, and the three companies involved finalized the deal on December 3.[19][20]

On August 26, 2014, Cox announced its intention to change WAWS' call letters to WFOX-TV, contingent on FCC approval, through a request made to the agency on July 30. In an email to The Florida Times-Union, general manager Jim Zerwekh stated that the change would better reflect the station's status as one of Fox's ten strongest affiliates. The use of the callsign differs from other stations that incorporate their network partner's name into their call letters—a usage originated by the coastal flagship owned-and-operated stations of ABC, NBC and CBS based in New York City and Los Angeles. However, the WFOX calls were not used by Fox for its O&O in New York City, which bears the calls WNYW, partly derived from the former WNEW callsign it had prior to former parent Metromedia's 1986 purchase by the network's original parent company News Corporation. A similar situation exists with KFOX-TV in El Paso, Texas, which Cox owned from 1996 to 2013 (now owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group), and had adopted those calls in 1994 as they were not already used by Fox's Los Angeles O&O, which uses its legacy KTTV callsign. Concurrently with the change to WFOX-TV, sister station WTEV-TV was renamed WJAX-TV.[21] The change took effect on September 7, 2014.[22]

In February 2019, it was announced that Apollo Global Management would acquire Cox Media Group and Northwest Broadcasting's stations.[23][24] Although the group planned to operate under the name Terrier Media, it was later announced in June 2019 that Apollo would also acquire Cox's radio and advertising businesses, and retain the Cox Media Group name.[25] The sale was completed on December 17, 2019.[26]

News operation

WFOX-TV presently broadcasts 50 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with eight hours each weekday and five hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in addition, the station produces the half-hour sports highlight program Action Sports Jax Primetime, which airs weekend evenings at 10:30 p.m. The stations utilize

Doppler radar data from the National Weather Service Forecast Office near Jacksonville International Airport
.

In 1991, then-ABC affiliate WJKS (now WCWJ) entered into a news share agreement with WAWS to produce a nightly prime time newscast at 10 p.m., titled Fox 30 First Coast News (not to be confused with the present day First Coast News operation shared between WTLV and WJXX). Shortly before WJKS announced that it would shut down its news department in preparation for the loss of its ABC affiliation to WJXX, Clear Channel decided to invest in a news department for WAWS. The WJKS-produced newscast ended when that station's news department shut down on December 29, 1996; WAWS launched its own in-house news department the following day on December 30, 1996, with the debut of a half-hour nightly 10 p.m. newscast, which was also accompanied by a half-hour 11 p.m. newscast on weeknights (the latter broadcast would eventually be moved to 10:30, expanding the prime time newscast to one hour).

Over the next few years, more newscasts would be added: a 3½-hour weekday morning newscast (in 1999) and an hour-long 4 p.m. newscast on weekdays (in 2001); WAWS also began producing a weeknight 6:30 p.m. newscast for sister station WTEV in 1999. After WTEV switched from UPN to CBS in July 2002, that station began managing the shared news department with WAWS and took over primary production of the newscasts on both stations; channel 47 also substantially expanded its local news programming, adding a full slate newscasts at 5:30 a.m. (effectively "moving" over to that station from WAWS, which replaced the program with religious programming and children's programming from the Disney's One Too block upon its simultaneous assumption of UPN programming[27]), noon, 5, 5:30, 6 and 11 p.m. on Monday through Fridays, along with weekend evening newscasts.[28] Initially, both stations maintained certain primary personnel (such as news anchors) that would only appear on either WAWS or WTEV. In addition, newscasts used separate on-air branding and graphics packages, with WTEV's newscasts being conducted from the duopoly's newsroom in order to distinguish the two outlets and retain separate on-air identities. WAWS would eventually cancel the 4 p.m. newscast in 2007.

The stations hired Mark Spain (who previously served as 7 p.m. anchor on WJXX), who joined WAWS/WTEV as anchor of channel 30's 10 p.m. newscast on August 27, 2007. Ironically, the station also hired First Coast News weekday morning traffic reporter Michelle Jacobs just weeks earlier (she would eventually return to WTLV and WJXX in October 2008). Shortly after she left, WAWS hired Julie Watkins (who previously worked at First Coast News before moving on to WFTV in Orlando) as a weekend meteorologist. In the late 2000s,[when?] WTEV's weekday morning newscast began to be simulcast on WAWS. Corresponding with the change, Action News This Morning was expanded to two hours (from 5 to 7 a.m.), with a two-hour extension of the program (from 7 to 9 a.m.) eventually being added on WAWS.

On April 13, 2009, WTEV and WAWS began utilizing a single on-air identity for their respective newscasts, branding their news programming collectively as

CBS Morning News in the 4:30 slot on a half-hour tape delay). On September 19, 2010, WAWS restored its "Fox 30" brand for its news programming, adopting a new logo and graphics package by Hothaus Creative (and originally created for fellow Fox affiliate KSWB-TV in San Diego
in 2008 for its relaunch of its in-house newscasts) based on the standardized look of Fox's owned-and-operated stations.

On May 28, 2014, Cox Media Group management fired five WAWS/WTEV anchors—weeknight anchors Mark Spain, Tera Barz (who anchored the station's 10 p.m. newscast) and Paige Kelton (the latter of whom had been with the news department since it launched, originally serving as anchor of WAWS's 10 and 11 p.m. newscasts), and morning anchors Lynnsey Gardner and Mike Barz—in a restructuring of its news staff; all five anchors left the stations on or around September 1.[29] The layoffs drew criticism from Jacksonville city council president Bill Guilford stating that Cox Media Group "exercised bad judgment" in cutting the five anchors.[30]

On September 27, 2014, WFOX-TV expanded Action News This Morning to weekends with a three-hour Saturday broadcast from 6 to 9 a.m., and a two-hour Sunday broadcast from 6 to 8 a.m. Unlike the 5 to 7 a.m. portion of the weekday morning edition of the program, the weekend morning newscast is not simulcast on WJAX-TV.[31][32] On January 11, 2016, WFOX premiered an hour-long early evening newscast at 6 p.m. on Monday through Friday nights; the first half-hour is a simulcast of WJAX's existing 6 p.m. newscast, while the second half-hour (during which time WJAX airs the CBS Evening News) is exclusive to WFOX.[33]

Notable current on-air staff

  • Certified Broadcast Meteorologist
    Seal of Approval) – chief meteorologist

Notable former on-air staff

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's signal is

multiplexed
:

Subchannels of WFOX-TV[34]
Channel Res. Aspect Short name Programming
30.1 720p
16:9
 WFOX-HD Fox
30.2 480i WFOX-MY MyNetworkTV & MeTV
30.3 WFOX-HI Heroes & Icons
30.4 720p WFOX-TM Telemundo

Analog-to-digital conversion

On June 12, 2009, WFOX-TV (as WAWS) terminated its analog signal, on

UHF channel 30, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.[35] The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 32, using virtual channel
30.

References

  1. ^ "Facility Technical Data for WFOX-TV". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
  2. ^ "Call Letters" (PDF). Broadcasting. August 6, 1979. p. 110. Retrieved January 11, 2022.
  3. ^ "Maltz: the low profile of a highly successful owner" (PDF). Broadcasting. February 4, 1980. p. 113. Retrieved January 11, 2022.
  4. ^ "WJXT-TV 4 to drop CBS". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications. April 3, 2002.
  5. ^ Basch, Mark (April 5, 2002). "TV-4's decision rooted in bottom line". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications.
  6. ^ Basch, Mark (April 23, 2002). "TV-47 to become new CBS affiliate". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications.
  7. ^ Basch, Mark (May 10, 2002). "Stations confirm changes". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications.
  8. Time Warner
    .
  9. ^ Carter, Bill (January 24, 2006). "UPN and WB to Combine, Forming New TV Network". The New York Times.
  10. Gannett Company
    . February 22, 2006. Retrieved January 21, 2013.
  11. Reed Business Information
    .
  12. ^ Romano, Allison (March 28, 2006). "The CW Signs 30 More Affils". Broadcasting & Cable. Reed Business Information. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  13. ^ Romano, Allison (July 12, 2006). "MNT Signs Up Seven More". Broadcasting & Cable. Reed Business Information. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  14. Clear Channel Communications
    . April 20, 2007. Retrieved November 21, 2007.
  15. ^ Malone, Michael (May 21, 2008). "Newport (Sort of) Selling Stations". Broadcasting & Cable. Reed Business Information. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  16. ^ "Newport stations drift to High Plains". Television Business Report. Streamline-RBR, Inc. May 21, 2008. Archived from the original on September 22, 2008. Retrieved September 28, 2008.
  17. ^ "Application Search Details". CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved September 28, 2008.
  18. ^ "Newport Sells 22 Stations For $1 Billion". TVNewsCheck. NewsCheck Media. July 19, 2012.
  19. ^ "Federal Communications Commission" (PDF). CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. October 24, 2012. p. 1. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 26, 2015. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
  20. ^ "Federal Communications Commission" (PDF). licensing.fcc.gov. October 24, 2012. p. 1. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 6, 2014. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
  21. ^ Dixon, Drew (August 26, 2014). "Home to Jacksonville's Action News, WTEV & WAWS will soon change call letters". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications. Retrieved August 26, 2014.
  22. ^ Dixon, Drew (September 3, 2014). "Jacksonville's Action News stations WAWS and WTEV change call letters Sunday". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications. Retrieved September 4, 2014.
  23. ^ "Apollo Global Management Acquires Cox's Television Stations Plus Radio & Newspapers In Dayton". RadioInsight. February 15, 2019. Retrieved February 15, 2019.
  24. ^ Jessell, Harry A. (March 6, 2019). "Cox TV Valued At $3.1 Billion In Apollo Acquisition". TVNewsCheck. NewsCheckMedia LLC. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
  25. ^ Jacobson, Adam (June 26, 2019). "It's Official: Cox Radio, Gamut, CoxReps Going To Apollo". Radio & Television Business Report. Retrieved June 26, 2019.
  26. ^ Venta, Lance (December 17, 2019). "Apollo Global Management Closes On Its Acquisition Of Cox Media Group". RadioInsight. Retrieved December 17, 2019.
  27. ^ "WAWS-TV30 releases new schedule". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications. May 10, 2002. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  28. ^ McAlister, Nancy (June 25, 2002). "New CBS affiliate sets its news anchor lineup". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications.
  29. ^ Gurbal Kritzer, Ashley (May 28, 2014). "Action News slashes marquee anchors in Jacksonville". Jacksonville Business Journal. American City Business Journals. Retrieved May 29, 2014.
  30. Financial News & Daily Record
    . Bailey Publishing and Communications Inc. Retrieved June 4, 2014.
  31. ^ Dixon, Drew (September 24, 2014). "Action News to add weekend morning newscasts for Jacksonville area coverage". The Florida Times-Union. Morris Communications. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  32. ^ "Action News in Jacksonville will debut weekend morning news, starting this weekend". The Changing Newscasts Blog. September 25, 2014.
  33. ^ "WFOX To Debut 6 And 6:30 News". TVNewsCheck. NewsCheck Media. January 8, 2016. Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  34. ^ RabbitEars TV Query for WFOX
  35. ^ "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and Second Rounds" (PDF). Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved March 24, 2012.

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=WFOX-TV&oldid=1218405181"