Booking It

It's been a very busy couple of weeks or so, media news-wise, so let's step down for just a bit and talk about media-related books...and some other items.

The folks at Cleveland's Gray and Company remind us of their latest book focusing on Cleveland TV, "Big Chuck! My Favorite Stories from 47 Years on Cleveland TV" by Chuck Schodowski (with Plain Dealer writer Tom Feran).

Quoting their release about the book by the now-retired WJW/8 mainstay:

The book includes hundreds of funny and surprising stories from Chuck's career in television.

Since 1960, Chuck has been on camera, behind the camera, and in the director’s chair. He collaborated with Ernie Anderson on the groundbreaking “Ghoulardi” show, and continued to host a late-night show with popular co-hosts Bob “Hoolihan” Wells and then Lil’ John Rinaldi across four decades—the longest such run in TV history.

He worked alongside a wide range of talented people, from Tim Conway to Burgess Meredith to Muhammad Ali. He wrote and directed two thousand hilarious sketches that were watched religiously by adoring fans, including Drew Carey, Tom Hanks, Meat Loaf, Don King, and even two of NASA’s top astronauts. His honors are almost too many to mention: dozens of Emmys, film and television festival awards, even a Grammy nomination—for a polka record, what else?

Chuck’s stories are packed with details that will take readers of several generations back in time. They revisit favorite characters including the Kielbasy Kid, Certain Ethnic Guy, Ben Crazy, and many more.

OMW is getting our Primary Editorial Voice(tm) hands on a review copy of the book, and we'll talk about it more after we've read it. Even the above press release likely brings a flood of memories to adult readers in Northeast Ohio.

Plus, Chuck's been "good to us", even if he doesn't realize he has. We'll revisit this book later.

We'd also like to use the OMW Stage to plug a book written by a Friend of OMW.

McKeesport PA resident Jason Togyer not only dabbles in radio in the Pittsburgh market, he's also a noted expert on his suburban Pittsburgh hometown and the nearby "Mon-Yough" area. (Though we get the idea that folks there would bristle at the description of McKeesport as a "Pittsburgh suburb".)

Jason is the editor of Tube City Online, an extensive website solely devoted to that part of Western Pennsylvania - McKeesport and its nearby area. Your hometown should be covered so extensively online. There's a good reason McKeesport is known as "Tube City", a good reason you can find by going to Jason's site. (Hint: "think steel")

He's also the author of "For the Love of Murphy's: The Behind-The-Counter Story of a Great American Retailer", a hardcover book about one-time retailing great G.C. Murphy's, which was founded there. More from Jason himself on his site.

Though it's not radio related, it should hold interest for those in Northeast Ohio - we're pretty sure G.C. Murphy's made some inroads here back in the day.

And we're all about supporting our friends - Jason's a great guy, and the book is a wonderful gift for anyone interested in retailing's history, the building of a retail giant or just history in general.

While we're supporting Friends of OMW, you need a wall calendar, don't you? If you're a regular here, why haven't you already picked up the 2009 Tower Site Calendar?

It's put together with care by Scott Fybush, a long-time personal and professional Friend of OMW who is well-known for his work as editor of NorthEast Radio Watch, numerous articles in radio trade magazines, and as editor of the radio listings site 100000watts.com.

And that's not even half of what he does related to the radio industry.

The calendar features a number of full-color, professional pictures of broadcast transmitter sites all over the nation, each picture taken in person by Mr. Fybush.

(And most years, your Primary Editorial Voice[tm] is behind the scenes with him at a few of the chosen sites. We think we have two on the "We Were There" list for 2009. We said "behind the scenes" - we're not pictured, thankfully for Scott's camera lens.)

Quick - click on over to the Fybush.com store to order your 2009 Tower Site Calendar.

And no, Scott didn't pay us for this mention. He doesn't even know we're putting it up. It's heartfelt and free, like good things in life should be. And besides, "NERW" was one of the major inspirations for this Mighty Blog[tm]...

Road Trip To Tiffin

Syndicated morning talk show host Doug Stephan's camp has been touting his recent "road trip"...where the "Doug Stephan's Good Day" host broadcast his radio show from a number of his affiliates. It's something he's done annually, hoping to provide in-person support to the stations which carry his show.

Only now, Stephan owns one of those stations.

The mention of his first stop - Tiffin talk outlet WTTF/1600 - reminded us to check, and sure enough, Tiffin Broadcasting, LLC officially owns the station as of October 15th, according to the FCC.

As we reported earlier, Tiffin Broadcasting itself is fully owned by...syndicated morning talk show host Doug Stephan.

We'll assume some other station business took place, aside from a radio broadcast, when Stephan dropped in on WTTF. But though he owns the place now, the voice (and owner) of "Good Day" won't be running it for some time.

That's because of what we also reported earlier. The sale from BAS Broadcasting (which picked up WTTF from Clear Channel) to Stephan's Tiffin Broadcasting includes a built-in reverse LMA. BAS will continue to operate the Tiffin AM station on Stephan's behalf for some time.

Eventually, say in a couple of years, Stephan reportedly plans to take over WTTF. We've heard that when he does so, he plans to operate it as a broadcast training facility for students at his alma mater, Tiffin's Heidelberg College (and we believe other schools).

The national host is quite active as a board member for the college, and has been involved in such things as Heidelberg's search for a new leader.

For the moment, though, he's an "absentee owner" of the station, with BAS Broadcasting continuing its operation of WTTF...

Television Facility Changes

This is an item about two proposed local facilities changes - one approved, one on the consideration table - and oddly enough, a very indirect link between them.

First, thanks to the many tipsters who have let us know that Western Reserve PBS' Youngstown-market WNEO/45 Alliance has indeed received FCC approval of a construction permit to increase its new Channel 45 digital facility from 44KW to 500KW.

The "maximization" permit was approved after WNEO and Post-Newsweek Detroit NBC affiliate WDIV/4 reached an interference acceptance agreement. The area involved would be a small area presumably on the fringes of each station's coverage area.

OMW doesn't know yet when WNEO will be able to increase its power.

For one, the construction permit (as you can see from the FCC link above) is labeled a post-transition application, and we're not sure yet if the Western Reserve PBS folks would be able to light it up before the transition on February 17th. We don't know the FCC rules regarding post-transition facility grants.

But we're sure they will increase the power of WNEO's digital transmitter as soon as it is possible, even if it's on that date. WNEO, of course, moved its digital allocation to 45 last month, signing off the old analog channel 45 for good.

Stay tuned...we'll let you know as soon as we know.

Over in Akron, Western Reserve PBS' WEAO-DT will remain on digital channel 50 at the transition, though it'll continue to appear on digital tuners and converter boxes as channel 49.

But WEAO's analog channel 49 will sign off along with all (remaining) full-power analog stations across America in February. And since Western Reserve PBS won't want or need the old RF 49 channel, the folks at Trinity Broadcasting are hoping to take it over.

The FCC has released a "Notice of Proposed Rulemaking", which would allot digital channel 49 to Canton, replacing digital channel 39 (PDF file)- which is being used now by Trinity's WDLI-DT from its transmitter site in Summit County's Copley Township just down the road from WEAO/WEAO-DT.

WDLI would continue to be based at the Wadsworth Road facility it built recently. The station once applied to move its analog channel 17 to Summit County, but it never left Stark County's Louisville...and is a moot point with the end of full-power analog TV so near.

And of course, the "PSIP" program information standard will show WDLI-DT as Channel 17(.1, .2, etc.) no matter what.

But the move to underlying digital channel 49 after WEAO abandons it on the analog side would allow the TBN O&O a large power increase. WDLI-DT is operating at a power level of 200KW, and moving the underlying digital RF channel from 39 to 49 would allow it to increase power to 900KW.

It's such a big move that Trinity has already secured a mutual interference agreement with another occupant of digital 49 - Gray Television's WTAP-DT, the Parkersburg WV NBC affiliate, which is maximizing its own facility.

And the reason would appear to be obvious...that WDLI would be able to cover much more of the full Cleveland market from its Summit County digital transmitter after the power increase and channel change...

"KNR2" Denied Tower Zoning

As it turns out, there's a good reason Good Karma sports WWGK/1540 Cleveland "AM 1540, KNR2" hasn't been able to upgrade its power under a recently granted construction permit.

The city of North Royalton's zoning appeals board has turned back the tower construction needed to move WWGK from Cleveland's East Side to the transmitter site of "big brother" station WKNR/850 "ESPN 850".

The weekly newspaper the "Sun Star" has more:

City leaders contend the property is now zoned "Traditional Town Center/Main Street District." They don't want additional towers there mainly because they plan to develop that property, which Thomas Embrescia owns, as a life-style, mixed-use concept. That's why voters in 2004 changed 286 acres of land in the downtown area to that Town Center zoning.

The zoning appeals board members heard an interesting mix of testimony and even saw a video by former Cleveland Browns quarterback Bernie Kosar on behalf of the station. Kosar is not only president/co-owner of the Cleveland Gladiators Arena Football League franchise...he has an on-air deal with Good Karma's WKNR.

Kosar has more pressing problems on his plate, as his arena football team may not even be playing this year. There are reports that the entire league is expected to suspend play in 2009 amid financial problems. That brings us back to radio, too, since the Good Karma stations are the radio flagship stations of the Gladiators.

On the other side of the WWGK tower zoning issues, residents opposed to the two new towers brought out the usual complaints of RF interference, like this man:

"When the station switches from its day signal to its night signal, all my GFIs in my bathroom and my outside click off because of the surge of RF," (Bob Suter) said. "We are now talking about intermixing two high powered stations together, which causes multiple harmonics when you mix two large signals together. Anything that is in the area, any rusty wire, or any fence that has a rusty area on it, will cause intermixing."

Regular OMW readers have already pointed out one problem with Mr. Suter's words, not even counting the whole "intermixing" thing (we're not engineers, so we won't try to take it apart).

WWGK is a daytime only station. It won't be switching to a night pattern along with WKNR, because it doesn't have nighttime operation, and still wouldn't operate at night at the new facility.

Another nearby resident talks about WKNR's existing interference to TV reception.

Now, again, we're not engineers, but we believe a radio station's licensee is expected to help resolve those complaints - and we're going to assume here that the complainant in question hasn't invoked the help of Good Karma's engineers.

(No, non-radio folks, you can't tell a licensed FCC station to "turn the power down", even if they could...but engineers as a rule are usually quite helpful with such things as interference traps.)

The Sun Star reports that Good Karma has a 10 day window after the ruling to appeal.

OMW reports that WWGK's construction permit is valid for three years after it was approved (per FCC rules), but we're sure the station doesn't want to wait that long...

Layoffs Hit Another Station

UPDATE 12/10/08 8:50 AM: Plain Dealer media columnist Julie Washington - who apparently escaped her own employer's recent layoff axe - confirms a number of the details in this PD story.

Washington says "as many as 13" WOIO/WUAB employees were shown through the We Can't Afford You Anymore door, including "19 Action News" morning co-anchor Jeff Eliasoph, in what appears to be a nationwide cut of about 10 percent of station owner Raycom Media's staff.

Eliasoph tells Washington that he didn't have any other names of those let go, and didn't ask:

"I didn't want to know," he said. "The circumstances in our business are so dire that I can't blame anyone."

Eliasoph, who worked alongside Tiffani Tucker, confirms our earlier mention that off-air staffers were also affected.

And one more on-air layoff surfaced in an extensive report about the Raycom layoffs in the popular TV newsroom news and gossip site NewsBlues - reporter Shannon O'Brien. Both Eliasoph and O'Brien were names we were hearing rumored to be on the layoff list Tuesday. We're hearing one other name rumored to have been cut from the "19 Action News" employment rolls, but we can't confirm.

Eliasoph has an interesting quip in the PD piece.

Local television news is losing viewers and advertisers because it stopped being relevant and became a place for traffic, weather and sensational crime, Eliasoph said.

"TV has been selling the sizzle and not the steak."

So far, we haven't been able to find details of layoffs at Raycom's other Ohio station, FOX affiliate WXIX/19. We'll update this item when we do.

At Raycom newsrooms across the country, there may not be any steak, or even lima beans. NewsBlues says the layoffs affected about 10 percent of Raycom's employees chainwide, and the numbers could total around 200 layoffs nationally.

The Julie Washington piece is not all bad news for the local TV industry, quoting Scripps ABC affiliate WEWS/5 general manager Victoria Regan.

Regan tells Julie the same thing we've heard off-blog, that there haven't been any layoffs at "NewsChannel 5"...the company has reduced employee size, so far, by attrition. While she can't rule out job cuts (and really, no one in media can in 2008/2009), she tells Washington "that's not typically how our company operates."

And the story reminds readers that the other two TV newsrooms in Cleveland, those at Gannett NBC affiliate WKYC/3 and Local TV FOX affiliate WJW/8, have endured recent layoffs.

Our original item is below...

-----------

The layoff axe, which has cut jobs at local radio and TV stations frequently in the past few months, has apparently hit at one TV station that's been safe from cuts so far.

We don't have a lot of details about rumblings of a large number of job cuts at Raycom's Cleveland market CBS/MyNet combo WOIO/19-WUAB/43, many reportedly affecting the station's "19 Action News" newsroom.

But if those rumors are correct, double-digit job losses have landed at Reserve Square, affecting as many as three on-air personalities, along with various newsroom support staffers and office staff members.

We want to clarify...we don't have a lot of details, and much of this isn't confirmed.

But we have confirmed from at least one other sister Raycom station that the Montgomery, Alabama-based company is cutting jobs on what sounds like a company-wide basis.

The Memphis Commercial Appeal has a story on Tuesday's job cuts at WOIO's sister station there:

Citing increasing pressure on advertising revenues in a prolonged economic downturn, WMC-TV Channel 5 said Tuesday that it is reducing its staff.

Weeknight anchor Donna Davis and midday anchor Bill Lunn are among the 15 employees being let go by the local NBC affiliate as part of wider cuts by parent company Raycom Media, said WMC general manager Lee Meredith.

With about 150 full-time employees locally, Tuesday's cuts account for 10 percent of the station's work force.

The article says Davis has TV history in the Cleveland market, though we don't remember her here.

The WMC general manager blames the usual culprit for layoffs in this Scary New World - the down economy and lower advertising revenue in all forms of media.

This wild ride will stop...somewhere. We hope...

WAKS Isn't Going Anywhere

And by "isn't going anywhere", we mean "isn't being sold".

In a move we first saw reported today by AllAccess, an application has been filed with the FCC to return top 40 WAKS/96.5 Akron - the Cleveland market "Kiss FM" outlet - to Clear Channel, along with a number of stations in similar situations.

WAKS and the other stations had been flipped to the Aloha Station Trust, a holding company which was charged (in principle) with selling the stations to other companies so Clear Channel could comply with ownership caps after its sale to private equity firms. The sale triggered the caps, since many of the markets were grandfathered over the caps.

The wording from the AllAccess item:

In each case, the stations have been reassigned by ARBITRON to different markets (KFSO from FRESNO to VISALIA-TULARE-HANFORD, WAKS from CLEVELAND to AKRON, KTEG from ALBUQUERQUE to SANTA FE, KYRK from NEW ORLEANS to BATON ROUGE, WJRR from ORLANDO to MELBOURNE-COCOA BEACH-TITUSVILLE) and the two year waiting period for redesignation to be effective has expired.

Or, to quote the application filed in the WAKS case - which we found in the FCC database attached to one of the other station's applications: (warning, all upper case ahead):

AS DEPICTED IN EXHIBIT 11, THE ASSIGNEE IS AN INDIRECT SUBSIDIARY OF CLEAR CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, INC. (CLEAR CHANNEL). ACQUISITION OF THE SUBJECT STATIONS BY THIS CLEAR CHANNEL SUBSIDIARY COMPLIES WITH THE COMMISSIONS RADIO OWNERSHIP LIMITS AS FOLLOWS:

WAKS(FM), AKRON, OH

ON JANUARY 11, 2009, THE REDESIGNATION OF WAKS(FM), AKRON, OH FROM THE CLEVELAND, OH ARBITRON MARKET TO THE AKRON, OH MARKET WILL BECOME EFFECTIVE FOLLOWING THE EXPIRATION OF THE TWO-YEAR WAITING PERIOD.

THE AKRON, OH MARKET CONTAINS 15 FULL-POWER RADIO STATIONS. SEE BIA REPORT: AKRON, OH. IN MARKETS WITH BETWEEN 15 AND 29 FULL-POWER RADIO STATIONS, SECTION 73.3555(A) OF THE COMMISSION'S RULES ALLOWS COMMON CONTROL OF SIX RADIO STATIONS, NOT MORE THAN FOUR OF WHICH ARE IN THE SAME SERVICE.

CONSEQUENTLY, THE TRANSACTION PROPOSED HEREIN WILL COMPLY WITH THE COMMISSION'S OWNERSHIP RULES BECAUSE, FOLLOWING THE ACQUISITION OF WAKS, CLEAR CHANNEL WILL OWN FOUR RADIO STATIONS IN THE AKRON MARKET (TWO FM AND TWO AM).

(We've added some spacing to make it easier to digest.)

The "two FM" signals, of course, includes hot AC WKDD/98.1, which recently adopted a COL change from Canton to the Akron suburb of Munroe Falls...though it'd been attributed in the Akron market even before that change.

In all of this activity, WAKS didn't move an inch.

It's still physically a part of the Clear Channel cluster at Oak Tree in the Cleveland suburb of Independence, and has operated there even while being under the Aloha Station Trust. (That's pretty standard procedure, as those trusts generally are not operating companies.)

With the redesignation of 96.5 Akron back into the Akron market, WAKS will continue status quo out of Oak Tree, and can bury the Akron COL all it wants, and shout "Cleveland" to the heavens if it wishes.

It'll continue to broadcast from its transmitter site in Brecksville, a hair north of the Cuyahoga County-Summit County line near the I-77/Rt. 21 exit of the Ohio Turnpike.

The only effect of all of this?

Clear Channel can hang onto the station, and won't be forced to sell it to another operator, assuming this application is approved (which it will likely be, at the end of the Arbitron waiting period in January).

As we've talked about here extensively, selling large market radio stations has become nearly impossible, given the credit crunch and the end of all of those debt-laden, highly leveraged transactions that fueled a radio buying spree for years.

It's a buyer's market for radio stations, as CBS Radio continues to be interested - as far as we know - in selling its sub-top 10 market stations, including Cleveland's four FM cluster.

But...who's able to buy? That answer is almost no one, and even the cash-rich groups that aren't heavily in debt seem to be waiting for super, sub-basement deals and for an improved economy.

CBS Radio had some sniffs at its stations, but it would appear no one has met the price level the company hoped to get...

Thoughts Going Out

Our thoughts are going out today to the author of a blog which has become something of a Southwest Ohio companion to OMW.

Tri-State Media Watch editor Jeremy Moses will be away from the blog that covers media in the Cincinnati area for some time, due to critical health concerns. He tells us:

To sum up, I have been having what were termed by my doctors as "syncopal episodes", also known as fainting spells, over the last two days. It's not clear what is causing these, whether it's stress or other things, although I can tell you that it is NOT diabetes, or a heart problem, or for that matter electrolyte imbalance.

Here's hoping that Jeremy is able to return to his TSMW keyboard, in good health, soon...

A Mess Of Cable Changes

Every once in a while, we dip into the legal programming notices section of Time Warner Cable's website, where the company has to disclose some upcoming changes without shouting them from the rooftops.

The list currently up for TWC's Northeast Ohio service area is long, complex and detailed.

But...what looks innocuous on the legal notice could well develop into a problem not many anticipated.

The notice includes what most usually think is "boilerplate" language about the potential loss of carriage of a number of broadcast and cable networks:

Time Warner Cable’s agreements with programmers to carry their services routinely expire from time to time. We are usually able to obtain renewals or extensions of such agreements, and carriage of programming services is discontinued only in rare circumstances. The following agreements with programmers are due to expire soon, and we may be required to cease carriage of one or more of these services in the near future.

The list this time is pretty extensive, with a number of local broadcast outlets there (with the wide area TWC's Northeast Ohio system covers):

WBNX, WKYC, WKYC HD, WKYC Weather Plus, WAOH, WIVM, WOHZ, WCMH, WYFX, WYTV, WTRF

We're hearing from local broadcast sources that the renewal of such agreements could be "a mess" in the coming weeks, and that nothing should be taken for granted about the ability to retain cable carriage of area stations...even, if not especially, large market network affiliates run by major TV group owners.

This comes on the heels of the lengthy contract dispute between LIN TV and Time Warner Cable, which forced three Ohio stations off the company's systems - NBC affiliate WDTN/2 Dayton, CW affiliate WWHO/53 in the Columbus market, and FOX affiliate WUPW/36 in Toledo.

Though that deal was eventually struck, viewers of those stations either were forced to get rabbit ears or other antennas for a number of weeks, or they dumped cable for satellite - with heavy nudging from both the LIN stations and from the satellite providers.

Or, they scattered to competitors. LIN's WIVB/4, the CBS affiliate in Buffalo NY, is still recovering to regain its news leadership position after the TWC blackout...with Granite's WKBW/7 (ABC) gaining significant audience numbers, if we remember right, at WIVB's expense.

From what we're hearing, you can expect that to be more the norm, as TV group owners try to squeeze every penny they can get...in the face of the economic meltdown, the decline of advertising and everything else we're getting tired of writing about as a media-related blog.

Meanwhile, the battle over retransmission consent is at the top of the cable companies' agendas. Note this fresh quote from Time Warner Cable's top executive at an investor conference from The Hollywood Reporter:

Time Warner Cable president and CEO Glenn Britt on Monday cited retransmission deals with broadcasters as a key factor of cost pressures for cable operators beyond sports content and said his company may suggest the new Congress review regulation on the issue.

The cable folks are also getting pinched in these troubled times, with companies saying they're seeing a reduced demand for high-end services like DVRs, digital phone and the like - blaming, of course, the down economy. (Which, by the way, reduces the number of new homes that would be receptive to a cable company's offerings.)

Oh, and that's not to mention intense competition on the ground not only from satellite companies, but from phone companies' new video services (AT&T's U-verse, Verizon FiOS, etc.).

The upshot, from what we're hearing...from now on, if a local broadcast station has a carriage renewal agreement negotiation in the works...don't take the renewal for granted, and expect more hardball from both sides of the broadcast/cable carriage debate.

In other TWC changes, though the NFL Network has fought a long, unsuccessful battle for non-sports-tier carriage on TWC and other cable systems, Major League Baseball's MLB Network will start its life on Time Warner's local systems, in the Digital Basic tier, from day one on January 1, 2009.

One good reason for that - the network counts Time Warner as one of its cable company investors. (Satellite's DirecTV is also on the list.)

And if we're reading the notice right, the "Outdoor Channel" will add Digital Basic coverage as soon as this week. It's been up in the Digital Sports tier.

The programming notice also covers TWC's operations in the Erie PA area, and confirms what we'd already heard...on December 18th, the suburban Erie system formerly served by Adelphia will become the last (as far as we know) of the company's systems in the region to get the digital channel lineup realignment started earlier this year elsewhere in the TWC Northeast Ohio universe.

And the notice also shows a number of carriage changes for local network affiliates in the fringe areas of their coverage, due to their duplication with in-market stations.

For example, Youngstown's network affiliates will leave the company's system in Windham, in far eastern Portage County, which is still in the Cleveland TV market despite being just a few miles from downtown Warren.

Some Columbus network affiliates will lose their carriage in systems in the Mansfield area, though CBS affiliate WBNS/10 apparently hangs onto Mansfield itself, while losing some nearby systems. (Mansfield is halfway between Cleveland and Columbus, but is in the Cleveland market.)

Toledo CBS affiliate WTOL/11 loses TWC's New London, Norwalk and Willard areas.

And there's a TBN shuffle ahead, as the religious broadcaster's Sandusky-based affiliate WGGN/52 loses a number of North Central and even Northeast Ohio TWC systems - as far east as Mentor, an area which was part of the old Comcast system that also served Elyria.

Those looking for TBN will instead find the company's Northeast Ohio owned-and-operated station, WDLI/17 Canton, added to the lineup.

That addition will apparently include the former Adelphia systems out of Cleveland, which never carried WDLI for the most part. The TBN O&O will, it sounds like, bump foreign news channel SCOLA up into "Digital Access" - we believe that puts it on all digital boxes, even those without "Basic" service.

That would leave analog room for WDLI in the greater Cleveland area. (TWC's Akron/Canton systems have carried Canton's Channel 17 since the beginning. And we mean the beginning, back to the early days of both the cable systems and the station, which was once locally-programmed secular independent WJAN.)

WDLI also picks up clearances in Time Warner's Ashtabula and Conneaut system, bumping Erie PBS affiliate WQLN/54 off the lineup there.

In a related item, TWC's changes in the company's Columbus-based Mid-Ohio system are bouncing Zanesville NBC affiliate WHIZ-TV/18 off of the Time Warner systems in Perry County, a move that the Zanesville Times Recorder reports is actively being fought by the WHIZ folks.

Quoting the article:

Judy Barbao, spokesperson for Time Warner in Columbus, said the decision was based on trying to eliminate duplicate programming.

The article notes that WHIZ is going to retain its carriage in Coshocton County, along with, of course, in its home county of Muskingum. Both Coshocton County and Perry County are in the Columbus TV market...the tiny Zanesville market only includes Muskingum County.

But WHIZ boss Hank Littick points out that the station provides local news and sports coverage to Perry County, just to the southwest of Zanesville.

Most of these changes are slated to take place on December 31st...

NBC Leads With Its Chin

It's not a local media story, but it's big enough to be displayed prominently on the website of the Cleveland station that'll be most directly affected by it.

The not-yet-confirmed news is spreading like wildfire among the various national TV writers this Monday evening.

NBC's late night talk show king Jay Leno, who is scheduled to step down from his post hosting the network's "Tonight Show" next year, won't be leaving that network after all.

The New York Times' Bill Carter is one of many reporting that Leno instead will stay with the Peacock, signing a multi-year deal to host a brand new 10 PM prime time hour that will air Monday through Friday on NBC. (We picked Carter's story because of the key role he's played in reporting Leno's career - remember "Night Shift"?)

Back at the "Tonight Show", current "Late Night" host Conan O'Brien will still take over the 11:35 PM slot on the network next May, and we assume he will still be followed by comedian Jimmy Fallon, who'll take over "Late Night" after a few month "test run" on the Internet. Leno's prime time show would start in Fall 2009.

Though the move, as reported, would give Leno a big pay raise, it would also save NBC Universal some much needed money. As Carter's piece points out, even a highly-paid Jay Leno and his show would cost the network somewhat less than a slate of nightly hour-long dramas, and NBC would now program as many prime-time entertainment hours as FOX (17 hours per week, vs. the current 22 hours).

Just Monday, NBC executives contemplated a reduced schedule of entertainment programming, pointing to newer networks like FOX, MyNetwork TV and The CW not mounting a full three hour (four on Sunday)/seven day schedule like NBC, ABC and CBS have done for decades.

And NBC avoids another worry...by putting Leno in prime-time on its own network, it keeps him out of the 11:35 PM slot on, say, ABC, FOX or even on Tribune stations. (Tribune may not be able to afford Leno now, anyway, as it just filed for bankruptcy Monday.)

NBC is reportedly set to announce the deal on Tuesday.

It does have one local effect - Leno, starting in the Fall, will become the lead-in for WKYC's "Channel 3 News at 11" and all the other local late-night NBC affiliate newscasts across the country...

Out Of The Box Monday

Items have been piling up, almost literally, over the weekend...so, let's give them room to breathe free. But this update is so big, we'll have to split it into two...with more coming later today...

WRUW BACK: Case Western Reserve University's WRUW/91.1 Cleveland is back on the air again.

The non-comm station's website has details:

We were able to turn on our transmitter again just after 9:30 am on Friday, December 5, 2008, after almost two weeks off the air due to a fire at our transmitter site in East Cleveland.

The fire was on the lower floors of the building, so our equipment remained unscathed, but the building has been without power for about 10 days. Residents of the 27-story apartment building were able to begin moving back in earlier this week.

As we noted, that building was the same building featured on local TV newscasts for the past couple of weeks. When we looked into news reports of the fire's aftermath, it appeared that those who lived in floors above a certain level (like, the 10th floor) were allowed to return when power was restored, and of course, WRUW's facilities are up on the roof of the building...

CRAIG LIKES THE WORLDWIDE LEADER: It should be no surprise to anyone who follows sports radio either here in Northeast Ohio, or in Milwaukee.

But Good Karma Broadcasting boss Craig Karmazin finally gets to unite his Madison WI radio station with his favorite sports radio network, The Worldwide Leader In Sports(we're-pretty-sure-that's-a-tm), ESPN Radio.

Karmazin's WTLX/100.5 Monona WI, once an FM "hot talk" station and now a sports outlet, becomes "ESPN 100.5" in January - as the owner of Cleveland's "ESPN 850 WKNR" and "AM 1540, KNR2" takes the ESPN affiliation in the Madison market from its longtime affiliate there, crosstown Clear Channel sports WTSO/1070.

The station will mix ESPN hosts like "Mike & Mike", Colin Cowherd and Scott Van Pelt with its established simulcast of local host Steve "The Homer" True in afternoon drive. True is based at Karmazin's "540 ESPN" in Milwaukee. In Cleveland, "Mike & Mike" air on Good Karma's WKNR, with Cowherd and Van Pelt on "KNR2".

And like "KNR2", the Good Karma Madison market station on 100.5 is getting a signal upgrade. WTLX is moving from its home as a rimshot out of Columbus WI to a tower in the heart of the Madison market...an upgrade Karmazin expects to be complete when the ESPN Radio affiliation starts.

Here, by the way, at last check, WWGK/1540 - the radio artist known as "KNR2" - is still broadcasting its 1,000 watt daytime-only signal from a tower next to a church and a drug store at 80th and Euclid Avenue on Cleveland's East Side, the transmitting equipment in a temporary trailer setup. (We took a quick ride on RTA's new "HealthLine" bus rapid transit system to get a look.)

"KNR2" is destined for a new 3,500 watt (still only) daytime signal diplexed with big brother WKNR at the station's transmitter site in North Royalton, but a quick radio signal check the other day confirms that they aren't there, yet...

RE-CLIPPED: A Columbus radio station is about to start another run as the flagship station of the AAA Columbus Clippers minor league baseball team.

If you guessed that the Central Ohio entrant in the International League will return to North American Broadcasting standards WMNI/920, you are correct.

Friday, the team and station announced a new five-year deal that will put every Clippers game on WMNI, starting with this season's debut at the new Huntington Park ballpark in downtown Columbus' Arena District.

Quoting the release:

The partnership will include all 144 regular season Clippers games, the broadcast of the annual Triple-A All Star Game, all post season games and the Triple-A Championship Game known as the "Bricktown Showdown."

WMNI stepped in to carry Clippers games back in 2006, when former Clippers flagship WVKO/1580 went off the air in that mess between former owner Stop 26-Riverbend Productions and current owner Bernard Radio.

Bernard Radio took the station off the air after taking over the management of it, due to a lost transmitter site lease...and eventually returned WVKO to the air from a new transmitter site near an apartment complex on Morse Road.

But WMNI only ran a package of weekend games ("Weekend with the Clippers") in both 2006 and again later in 2007.

The Clippers' games then returned to WVKO, by then a liberal talk station operated in an LMA by Gary Richards' Cowtown Communications, for the full 2008 season.

(A Columbus Dispatch article on the Clippers/WMNI signing doesn't even mention WVKO by name or frequency, only calling it "the team's radio affiliate" that went off the air in 2006.)

Both the article and release note that WMNI has history carrying Columbus baseball games even before it stepped in to air the weekend games a couple of years ago...the station was the flagship of the old Columbus Jets team in the 1960's.

The team says broadcaster Scott Leo returns for 2008, and the Dispatch also reports that the games will be made available on the Internet.

After getting Rodney Dangerfield-style non-respect the past few years, the Clippers are becoming a hot ticket in Central Ohio...with the move to the new ballpark, and with the recently announced four-year development deal that makes the Cleveland Indians the team's new parent club...

AND SPEAKING OF WVKO: Despite a number of issues, the aforementioned WVKO/1580 has made it through its first year as a liberal talk outlet.

WVKO hit the airwaves on December 3, 2007, offering a lineup of syndicated progressive talk fare once heard in the market on Clear Channel's WTPG/1230, which is now WYTS "Your Talk Station"...featuring a decidedly non-liberal lineup.

Since then, WVKO has added local talk, including a weekday afternoon show now hosted by Dr. Bob Fitrakis ("Fight Back"), along with some local weekend shows ("Blue State Diner", etc.).

It hasn't been an easy year for Mr. Richards and company.

After enduring brickbats from, well, certain media blogs about a lack of satellite delivery for its syndicated programming and poor audio quality, WVKO hung in there...even while Mr. Richards and company expressed serious concern before the November election that left-leaning political candidates didn't feel they "needed" to advertise to the audiences that would "already vote for them".

And the station is still asking listeners for contributions, selling T-shirts and magnets online (with free bumperstickers and window clings), and looking for "progressive minded" sales people to help jumpstart commercial sales.

(Of course, the problem of selling commercials is not at all limited to any one station in the current economy. And really, what WVKO needs more than "progressive minded" sales people is "aggressive minded" sales people, but that's another matter.)

After all of that, and in the middle of a breathtaking economic downturn, the station is still around to hold a shindig celebrating its first anniversary.

It'll be held Tuesday night at Studio 35 Cinema in Columbus. The evening features a special movie double-feature aimed right at WVKO listeners' political sweet spots - "Religulous" by Bill Maher at 7 PM, followed by Oliver Stone's "W." at 9 PM.

Doors will open at 6 PM, and the station says admission is free.

Now, we have a touchy history with WVKO.

When we first brought up the bad-sounding Internet-fed audio, we tweaked them here pretty good, which led a mini-army of WVKO supporters, staffers and those associated with the station to go after us on the station's message board...saying we were, let's see if we can remember, "right-wingers enjoying the station's troubles".

No, we are media professionals, who were calling out a top 40 market radio station for sounding like it was an Internet audio feed with an AM transmitter, that audio delivered by an unequalized phone line. (That's all been fixed, as far as we know, and has been for some time.)

Politics had absolutely nothing to do with it. And remember, we're big fans of one of WVKO's most prominent national hosts, Dial Global's Stephanie Miller.

Since then, it's also become quite apparent to us that WVKO is, as has been put, a "below shoestring" operation...basically, it's Mr. Richards' one-man band with assorted help from some others.

We're big fans of "the little guy" trying to make a go of it in a complex, big company-owned media world...especially one that puts his own financial livelihood on the line, literally putting his money where his (radio) mouth, er, microphone, is.

So, here's hoping that WVKO actually hangs in there through what'll be a very difficult time for all media outlets in this country.

The station operates in a niche, to be sure. It's never going to give Clear Channel talk powerhouse WTVN/610 any indigestion, and it's a high-band, modestly powered AM station.

But maybe WVKO's very vocal and active supporters and listeners can help 1580's current operation make it to its second anniversary...

ZANESVILLE CHANGES: An OMW reader reports that Zanesville hot AC WHIZ-FM/102.5 "Z102" has ended its long run on the frequency, as WHIZ Media Group prepares to move 102.5 to the Columbus ex-urb of Baltimore OH, presumably to sell it to a new owner at some point.

Our listener tells us that 102.5 is still on the air, from what sounds like its Zanesville transmitter facility, but running a crudely-put-together presumably automated country music format as "Highway 102.5".

We have no other confirmation, other than our reader's report.

But WHIZ has been simulcasting its FM side for some weeks now on WCVZ/92.7 South Zanesville, the former "92.7 the River" that WHIZ's Southeast Ohio Broadcasting System is in the process of buying from Christian Voice of Central Ohio.

CVCO launched WZNP/89.3 Newark "89.3 The Promise" to nominally replace the 92.7 "River" CCM format in the region. CVCO, of course, owns the "River" mothership in the Columbus market - WCVO/104.9 Gahanna.

A quick check of the WHIZ website shows that they've even kept the WCVZ calls for the FM side, at least online, and the FM's page now identifies it solely as "WCVZ Z92.7", complete with the new logo pictured at right.

So, even though we can't hear the country music said to be wafting over the airwaves on WHIZ-FM's former home at 102.5, it sure looks like the WHIZ Media Group folks have "closed the books" on that frequency - with just some automated country music meant to keep the frequency warm, but also meant to make sure "Z102" listeners made the move to 92.7 permanently...

Wrapping Up December's First Week

UPDATE 10:29 PM 12/5/08: Umm, oops.

Our apologies to Akron Beacon Journal popular culture writer and OMW reader Rich Heldenfels, for posting this item without yet reading his detailed story on the WKYC changes in Friday's paper.

Rich's item even contains some of the information we listed as "not confirmed 100%" below, including the weekend anchor moves involving Jeff Maynor and Kim Wheeler. We guess "not confirmed" meant "we hadn't read the Beacon yet" in this case.

Since we're pretty sure Rich reads here, our apologies again.

Regular readers will tell you that it's not the first time we've overlooked a newspaper story on a media item. We apologize pretty well around these parts, and we always try to give proper credit for items that appear elsewhere first. When, well, we're aware they're out there.

Anyway, the Heldenfels piece also answers a question we had - as WKYC news director Rita Andolsen says the station's Akron bureau at Main and Market won't see a permanent bureau chief after Eric Mansfield moves his work desk north, and moves into the 7 PM anchor slot.

But Andolsen tells Heldenfels, as Eric has also said himself, that the soon-to-be-former Akron bureau chief is hanging onto his Akron/Canton area contacts, and will still be working on stories in the area - even if his overall beat expands to the entire Northeast Ohio region.

In an update not contained in the Rich Heldenfels story, Mansfield noted on Friday's edition of Western Reserve PBS' "NewsNight Akron" that he'll remain as anchor of that weekly Akron-based news discussion program (Fridays at 9 PM on WNEO/45-WEAO/49)...now based next to what will soon be his "old desk" at WKYC's Akron bureau.

And if he's working on an Akron-based story on a Friday, he can use the facilities WKYC still has at the United Building to work on the story...before turning to the other side to host "NNA", though having to be in Cleveland at 7 PM will certainly affect the taping schedule for the Western Reserve PBS show.

Andolsen says the station will maintain its Akron bureau facilities, in what's now a combined facility for WKYC, Western Reserve PBS and NPR affiliate WKSU/89.7.

Our original item is below...and again, congratulations to Eric on a well-deserved move up!

--------


We'd call it a "Friday Clear Out", though right now we're not sure if this will be our final item of the week. Read on, anyway...

MORE WKYC MOVES: Yesterday's announced changes at Gannett Cleveland NBC affiliate WKYC/3 aren't the only changes in store at 13th and Lakeside. (And really, in the current environment, we don't think we can close that "change" book for ANY broadcast outlet.)

We have not confirmed these moves, but OMW hears that WKYC is apparently splitting up the weekend morning anchor team of Jeff Maynor and Kim Wheeler, with Maynor heading for the weekend evening newscasts, and Wheeler staying behind in mornings - both anchoring solo.

And as a result, it sounds like recently installed weekend anchor Chris Tye returns to a 5-day-a-week weekday reporting slot.

We caution again - we haven't confirmed this 100%, but our sources are good. And the moves seem reasonable when you read the language attached to Romona Robinson being named the solo anchor of the 6 PM and 11 PM weekday shows after Tim White's departure.

We'll quote (again) from an item we linked yesterday, from our friend Frank Macek's "Director's Cut" blog:

"...as newsrooms across the nation begin shifting away from traditional two anchor teams for their newscasts."

With Romona "going solo" in weekdays, it makes less sense to have dual anchors on weekends.

Of course, with the appointment of Eric Mansfield and Carole Sullivan as 7 PM anchors, that'll be one time slot with two anchors...but the 7 PM show is a little different, and has no news competition in the market. Oh, and WKYC has no 5 PM show. (Sorry, "Dr. Phil" fans...we're not. Fans of "Dr. Phil", that is...)

And as far as we know, Mark Nolan and Abby Ham continue as a team on WKYC's morning show. But again, that's a different kind of show...we don't expect to see any solo-anchored weekday morning news shows anywhere, at least in any large market...

DIGITAL TV SOFT TEST: We've been railing about this for so long, we're wondering if they did it just to shut us up.

The Ohio Association of Broadcasters has lined up TV stations statewide for an analog shutoff "soft test", on December 17th from 7:30-7:35 PM, two months before the "real thing". Stations will air a five minute interruption alerting analog viewers that they need to take action before February 17th to avoid losing their signal.

Cincinnati Enquirer TV/radio guru John Kiesewetter has more in his blog. (We can't get the link to work in Firefox 3.0, so either use Internet Explorer or another browser if you're in the same boat...or use the "Blogs and Forums" > "Entertainment Blogs" menu to get to Kiese on that junk-laden, piece of crap website.)

We're just guessing here, but it could look similar to this video (YouTube) from the Washington DC market. We've seen the exact same video airing in at least one other market, and we believe it's probably being given to local TV stations by the NAB or some other trade group to use in this testing.

But viewers in Ohio's TV markets will also be directed to a local phone bank if they have any questions about the transition.

In Cleveland, we hear the phone bank will be hosted at ideaStream PBS affiliate WVIZ/25...an oddity, when you consider that WVIZ's temporary digital signal can be seen (without cable) by roughly a few thousand lucky souls in southern Cuyahoga County...

A "FREQY" CHANGE, PART 2: We told you earlier about the format change at Beacon Broadcasting gospel WRTK/1540 Niles, the Mahoning Valley station now pumping out its own Christmas music instead of the usual satellite-fed "Rejoice - Musical Soul Food".

We have some more details on the flip, thanks to the station's minimal, but newly established web site. Quoting:

. . .Coming Soon . . . Freq1540 AM will be playing Christmas music from November 27 (Thanksgiving Day) through January 4, 2009!

Then January 5 the all-new Freq1540 will be released!

With a new logo - with the legend "Reaching The Kingdom" - we'll take a guess...and this is only a guess...that on January 5th, Beacon will simulcast the original "Freq" in the 5-station chain straddling the Ohio/Pennsylvania border, WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA "Freq 107".

Christian rock music on an AM daytimer, to extend the FM's range? Why not?

Beacon certainly has a history of shuffling around formats and simulcasts, sometimes in head-scratching ways. Remember early in the Beacon days, when the pre-Beacon "Wexy 107" oldies format was fully moved to new AM WLOA/1470 Farrell PA, complete with the "Wexy 107" name?

Or, they could mount a more adult skewing CCM-ish format to complement 107.1. Again, at this point, we are just guessing.

The "Freq 1540" website promises "Listen Live 24/7", but we see no link to a webcast.

So, we took the existing WANR streaming audio URL, changed the call letters to "WRTK", and there it is...

The "Freq 1540" Windows Media stream.

Enjoy!

BYE, BYE, BILL: As hinted earlier, rumors become reality.

Popular FOX News Channel host Bill O'Reilly is going to only have one "Factor" soon, his TV "O'Reilly Factor"...as O'Reilly and Westwood One confirm the end of his two-hour weekday syndicated "Radio Factor" is near.

The show will end, says troubled Westwood One, "in the first quarter of 2009".

O'Reilly tells the New York Post's David Hinckley:

"The media business is getting more and more intense," O'Reilly said Thursday. "We've got to keep the TV show at the level we have it now, and that means more and more time to keep it competitive and fresh. I've been working 60, 65 hours a week and I just can't keep doing that."

OK, so O'Reilly just signed a new multi-million dollar, multi-year deal with FOX for his TV show, with more work ahead.

But it's no secret in the radio business that the FNC host, on radio, basically failed to do what he first set out to do - provide a serious challenge to the early afternoon time slot's entrenched superstar, Premiere's Rush Limbaugh. Quoting the New York Post again:

"I knew my show couldn't be ideological," he said. "Going up against [Rush] Limbaugh, that would be suicidal. Why would a listener who's already got Rush turn to someone else to hear the same things?

"So I was doing a show that was fact-based. It was more news/talk. And we were very competitive. In some cities, like Boston and St. Louis, we beat Limbaugh outright."

Umm, OK. And in some cities, like New York City, O'Reilly got his lunch handed to him again and again. He was tape delayed into afternoon drive in the Big Apple on 50,000 watt WOR/710, where ABC Radio/Premiere's Sean Hannity beat him like a rag doll.

WOR isn't waiting for O'Reilly to turn off the "Radio Factor" microphones. The station recently announced a number of schedule changes, including the addition of Premiere's Glenn Beck and United Stations' Lou Dobbs.

That, radio wise, translates to something like: "he's giving it up, right? Right? We can change the schedule now, right?".

Here in Northeast Ohio, O'Reilly is not even remotely a factor. He counts a clearance on Spirit Media talk/variety WELW/1330 Willoughby as his Cleveland market affiliate, and Media-Com talk WNIR/100.1 in the Akron market runs "The Radio Factor" on delay late on weekend evenings.

(And while checking the WNIR schedule, we see that no, WNIR's long-rumored web site upgrade is still not live. We're wondering the Internet, as we know it, will still exist by the time it goes up. We'll probably be in the year 2020 with "Internet 15.0 3-D", and WNIR will finally get its "Web 2.0" site up with streaming mono audio...)

WBQC-US: Another case where we wonder if this ran because of us.

Thanksgiving weekend, we noted that a name change for Cincinnati LPTV/Class A outlet WBQC-CA/38 to "WKRP" made the national news, and was a dependable item on national radio newscasts all day on Saturday.

We also noted that from here, at least, it appears that - despite an Associated Press story on the name change - that WBQC-CA did not "change its call letters" to any form of the moniker made famous by the late 70's/early 80's sitcom "WKRP in Cincinnati". (We're pretty sure Jennifer could have handled that up at the front desk, if it was a problem.)

As it turns out, the news that "WKRP Cincinnati" existed only as a branding identifier and a trademark - not call letters - made it to the AP wire, with this correction:

The station refers to itself as WKRP, reminiscent of the 1970s hit television show "WKRP in Cincinnati," and changed its trademark to WKRP Cincinnati but did not change its call letters, said Elliott Block, general manager.

If the Cincinnati Enquirer's John Kiesewetter made the correction to his original story on the name change, we can't find it in that aforementioned junk-laden piece of crap that masquerades as the Enquirer's web site. (It's enough to drive you into the arms of the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Cleveland.com and ITS junk-laden website, and that's saying a LOT...)

Replacing Tim, Adding Eric and Carole

OK, so now it can be told.

Gannett NBC affiliate WKYC/3 Cleveland has come up with its plan for replacing news anchor Tim White, who was unable to reach a contract renewal agreement to remain as co-anchor alongside Romona Robinson. White's last day at WKYC will be one week from Friday, on December 12th.

Tim's replacement on "Channel 3 News" at 6 PM and 11 PM weekdays starting Monday, December 15th is pictured here:





No, that's not a broken picture link.

Co-anchoring WKYC's 6 and 11 PM weekday shows with Robinson after White leaves the anchor desk will be - no one.

Get out your Channel 3 News anchor guide, and where it says "Romona Robinson and Tim White", use the white-out to cover up everything starting with "and". (Don't do it on your screen. It'll leave a mark.)

Robinson will be the sole anchor of those programs. Romona will, of course, continue to be joined by sports anchor Jim Donovan, weather anchor Betsy Kling, or whoever else is filling in for them. Plus, of course, the reporters doing live shots from either the studio or from the field.

But there will be no second news anchor on those 6 PM and 11 PM shows...when it comes to news, she'll be solo at the anchor desk. (For out of towners, there is no 5 PM edition of "Channel 3 News", when the incredibly annoying "Dr. Phil" picks up viewers who don't share our tastes in TV programming.)

That's not to say there aren't other people involved in Channel 3 News' moves today, and two of those people get a weekday showcase.

In addition to confirming Romona's solo anchoring at 6 and 11, WKYC senior director and "Director's Cut" blogger Frank Macek notes big changes on the station's 7 PM newscast.

Romona will get the 7 PM edition of "Channel 3 News" off, as WKYC Akron Bureau chief Eric Mansfield will be teamed with reporter Carole Sullivan to anchor that half-hour news program.

Macek writes:

(Eric and Carole) will bring a fresh new approach to our 7 pm newscast while Channel 3 News Anchor Romona Robinson will handle the 6 & 11 pm broadcasts as newsrooms across the nation begin shifting away from traditional two anchor teams for their newscasts.

While times are difficult, we look forward to the new challenges that our business has to offer and the opportunity this presents us in television to re-invent ourselves.

Mansfield himself has more on his move on his "Have I Got News For You!" blog, after 15 years covering news out of Akron for WKYC.

Though he says the change means a "move up north" to Cleveland, workplace-wise, he says he isn't letting go of Akron, and still has some Summit County based stories working:

Akron's my home .. so I'm not moving either .. but the opportunity to cover more of Northeast Ohio is one I welcome. This truly is the best place in the world to live.

Eric reminds us in the item that he has known his new 7 PM co-anchor for a long time, as the pair worked together at the old WAKC/23 news operation:

Carole and I go back 15+ years to "23 News" on WAKC, and I couldn't ask for a better partner. I like to call her the "TV sister I never knew I wanted" because I grew up with two brothers .. and never realized how great it can be to share laughs with a "girl" of all things.

In all seriousness, we're both committed to making the new 7 p.m. newscast a top-notch broadcast; we've got some creative ideas so come along for the ride.

OMW hears that in addition to co-anchoring the 7 PM show, Eric will also be available to co-anchor with Romona Robinson - in the event breaking news calls for an extra anchor at 6.

But in general, it sounds like this move puts Mansfield into the mix as a Cleveland-based reporter during the day, which brings up another question - if that assumption is correct, who replaces him in the Akron bureau at Main and Market?

That's one piece of information we don't have...

Waiting For Shoes To Drop

This is an item filled with mostly some random items, much of the content from outside the immediate Cleveland/Akron/Canton area.

But as they say, "stay tuned".

The rumblings surrounding pending major moves at one local TV news operation are very loud...so loud you could probably hear them while standing on, oh, just to pick a street totally out of random, Lakeside Avenue in downtown Cleveland.

What we're hearing will probably surprise you, and not just because of any names involved, or for that matter, not involved.

We're thisclose to nailing down all the details, which are bouncing around the rumor mill at all the other local TV newsrooms as well. We expect to have details later today.

Meanwhile...elsewhere...

FIRED OUT: We don't know how we missed this, but a local non-commercial radio station has been knocked off the air. And this time, no digitized pictures are involved.

An OMW reader passes word that Case Western Reserve University's station, WRUW/91.1 Cleveland, has been silenced over the air - offering its programming only via Internet stream - since a high-profile fire at its transmitter site.

From WRUW.org:

The station's transmitter is located on top of an apartment building in East Cleveland. Around 12:00 noon on Saturday, November 22, an electrical fire broke out on the sixth floor of the building, forcing evacuation of over 400 residents of the 27-story building. There appears to be smoke and water damage to the building.

The staff of WRUW hopes to resume normal over-the-air broadcasts when power is restored to the building. At the present time, it is unknown how long until we can turn our transmitter back on.

And yes, as far as we know, that's the same apartment building fire that has been featured on local TV newscasts the past few days - unless there's another 27 story apartment high-rise in East Cleveland that also caught on fire recently.

We don't know if WRUW's signal has returned yet (we aren't currently within its signal range), even though some residents may be back in their apartments.

But, we got the idea from a brief TV news report that the power situation may not be permanently resolved, and we'll assume WRUW won't be able to return to the air until things are no longer temporary.

In the meantime, the CWRU station continues uninterrupted online, via its 56Kbps and 128Kbps Internet streaming audio feed...

A "FREQY" CHRISTMAS: Here's a surprise entrant for your Ohio Christmas Music Stations list.

It's Beacon Broadcasting WRTK/1540 Niles, the long-time gospel daytimer now under the control of the Glunt World Broadcasting Empire. (For those who haven't kept track, "Glunt" is Harold Glunt, the steel supply company magnate who took over Beacon Broadcasting's five Mahoning/Shenango Valley stations some time back.)

OMW hears that WRTK recently dumped the "Rejoice - Musical Soul Food" satellite gospel format (formerly an ABC Radio Networks product, now on its own), and is now playing a curious mix of pop Christmas tunes and occasional Christmas music from the R&B music world.

An OMW reader also tells us that the WRTK Christmas music is being promoted over on WRTK's sister classic hits station, Warren's WANR/1570.

The header for this sub-item is no joke, as the Christmas music format is being promoted as "Freq 1540". "Freq" is an abbreviation for "Frequency" (not "Freak"), we assume, as Beacon uses it as the station name for sister Christian rocker WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA ("Freq 107").

At this point, we have no word what'll happen on the Mahoning Valley's 1540 after, well, the last hall is decked and after Santa's sleigh pulls away from Niles for good.

If we had to bet, we'd put $10 on a return of "Rejoice - Musical Soul Food" after the 25th...

SALE DONE: A radio station sale in western Ohio is on the books.

Blanchard River Broadcasting reports the closing of its purchase of former Clear Channel station WBUK/106.3 Ottawa, which has most recently been carrying Clear Channel's "Fox" classic rock format.

WBUK's call letters come from its previous incarnation as oldies "106.3 The Big Buck" in Clear Channel's Lima market cluster. When the company decided to keep the "Fox" format after selling WPFX/107.7 North Baltimore to BAS Broadcasting, it moved the rock to 106.3. (BAS, of course, later flipped WPFX to Dan Dudley's "Toledo Radio", and 107.7 is still silent as the new owners seek a new facility to house it.)

But Clear Channel knew the Fox-to-106.3 move would be temporary, as WBUK was one of the very first small market stations it tabbed to be sold. WBUK was actually transferred into the Aloha Station Trust holding company, where Blanchard River picked it up for a reported $500,000.

Whatever Blanchard River does with WBUK, it'll be likely aimed at Findlay. The station just southeast of Ottawa is roughly an equal rimshot to both Findlay and Lima, but Blanchard River is the radio arm of Findlay Publishing.

In addition to owning the daily newspaper in Findlay (the "Findlay Courier"), the Findlay Publishing/Blanchard River folks also already own the city's two main radio stations - talk WFIN/1330 and rock WKXA/100.5...

A Packed Wednesday

This one's full of both radio and TV items, news updates and enough to make us want to charge you for it. Hey, a Primary Editorial Voice(tm)'s gotta eat somehow.

But alas, fortunately for you, OMW is free, as always...

MORE 92.3 FALLOUT: It's not really a format change, per se...just a deeper playlist and a more shallow staff list. But we're still picking out the details from the changes of the newly revamped CBS Radio alt-rocker WKRK/92.3, now known as "Radio 92.3".

As befitting the bare bones name (a la the Clear Channel "Radio" rockers in the Columbus and Cincinnati markets), 92.3's new on-air voice is doing sort of an alt-rock version of the voice of the adult hits "JACK FM"' format.

We've heard the voice assure listeners that unlike other stations, "Radio 92.3" won't talk over song intros and outros. The "JACK FM" attitude isn't QUITE there...it's more of a "sit back and listen to the music" thing, with no "hype". (Isn't a "too cool for the room" FM station with a stylized logo a bit of "hype" on its own? Just wondering.)

Anyway, OMW has confirmed that yes, the weekend specialty local music show "The Inner Sanctum" will continue to be heard on 92.3, which has been its home since it lost alt-rocker "The End" (WENZ/107.9) when it changed to hip-hop "Z107.9" a few years ago.

We hear the composition of the show hasn't changed, with Pat The Producer, Jim Benson and Matt Wardlaw still aboard...and some new things are in the works.

As for "Radio 92.3", we wouldn't have minded a brief format stunt of playing TV theme songs, something Clear Channel Columbus market rocker WRXS/106.9 Dublin did before it started its new format - using the moniker "Television 106.9".

(That's a nod to OMW reader - we think he still is, though we've definitely been off his Christmas Card list - John Crenshaw, CC's Columbus operations manager...)

WHILE WE'RE AT CBS CLEVELAND: OMW can also confirm that classic rock WNCX/98.5's morning drive show has officially slimmed to two hosts - Scott Miller and Mike Olszewski.

We're hearing from inside the station that the show's third host, Kim Mihalik, is no longer with WNCX. The reason? She's a victim of what we'd call, if it weren't for the general state of the economy and the media business, "CBS Radio Disease".

Yes, Mihalik is out due to CBS Radio budget cuts.

A quick look at the AllAccess "Net News" scroll shows she's among dozens the company has released nationwide just in the past few weeks due to the chain slimming staff sizes pretty much everywhere.

Among the latest moves - "major staff changes" at the New York City "K-Rock" sister station to our local 92.3, WXRK/92.3. The Cleveland market station carried those calls during the New York station's run as "Free FM" talk WFNY, before becoming WKRI, and eventually, taking the WKRK calls from Detroit's former "Free FM" talker, now sports WXYT-FM.

CBS Radio is obviously not alone in sending a lot of people to radio's beach, which isn't feeling very playful these days. But the company's size and reach makes the list larger...a list that Clear Channel employees, for example, hope won't be duplicated on their side of the ledger in this current economic environment.

Mihalik joined the WNCX Morning Show at its start, first co-hosting a program also known as "Mud, Mihalik and Mike"...the local replacement after CBS Radio canned former "Van Halen" frontman David Lee Roth's attempt to replace Howard Stern. (Of course, one of the other Stern replacements was Shane "Rover" French, who, well, eventually left 92.3 for Clear Channel and WMMS/100.7.)

"Mud" was the artist formerly known as Wynn Richards ("M105", WGAR/1220)...who was replaced a while back by former WDOK/102.1 "Soft Rock 102.1" programmer Scott Miller.

And Mihalik is remembered, of course, from her long stint as Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100's afternoon co-host alongside Mike Trivisonno...

SPEAKING OF JOB CUTS: A former Northeast Ohio sportscaster and radio personality was recently the victim of one, and you know it's bad in radio when someone like Lee "Hacksaw" Hamilton has to actively announce his availability.

But yes, he did, via AllAccess:

Sports talk radio veteran LEE "HACKSAW" HAMILTON is available now for fill-ins and auditions for the holidays and beyond (and full-time as well).

The 22 year vet of sports radio has been doing some work lately appearing on SIRIUS XM RADIO's MAD DOG SPORTS channel and on XM's HOME PLATE baseball talk channel, and has been filling in at FOX SPORTS RADIO and at NPR affiliate KPBS-F/SAN DIEGO.

His resume includes a long run on the various incarnations of XTRA SPORTS in SAN DIEGO (on XETRA-A and, most recently, KLSD-A, where he was caught in the recent CLEAR CHANNEL budget cutting) and on KLAC-A/LOS ANGELES.

It's been a long time since Hamilton was here in Northeast Ohio, where he did play-by-play for the World Hockey Association's Cleveland Crusaders (via then-WWWE/1100 "3WE", today's Clear Channel talk WTAM), and also did a regular weeknight sports talk show in the mid-1970's on Akron's WHLO/640 "News/Talk 64", then owned by Susquehanna (today, a company that is now part of Cumulus).

WHLO went from talk to all news to middle of the road music before being sold to religious operator Mortenson, then to Salem...it, of course, is a talk station today under Clear Channel's ownership.

After a stint in Phoenix, "Hacksaw" landed in Southern California...with the very extensive resume listed above - and some stuff not listed, including some NFL play-by-play experience.

It was thought he would be joining Sirius XM's "Mad Dog Sports" channel on a full-time basis, but that apparently never came to fruition aside from some of the fill-ins mentioned above.

"Mad Dog Sports" is the channel featuring former WFAN/660 New York City sports talker Christopher Russo, best known as for his long stint as "Mad Dog" of the station's "Mike and the Mad Dog" afternoon drive show.

Anyway, it's a symptom of the state of the radio industry that a "name" veteran like Lee Hamilton has to go out and actively solicit fill-in or full-time gigs...

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, BILL DRAKE: Tributes have been pouring out from all over the radio industry about the man who could basically be called the architect of top 40 radio in the late 1960's and 1970's, Bill Drake.

The Associated Press reports that Drake died over the weekend at age 71.

Local media consultant and former WMMS program director John Gorman weighs in on his Gorman Media Blog:

The secret to Bill Drake’s format was that it wasn’t complex. It was, quite unmistakably, logical. Play the hits in a structured format that refined one’s air personality. The fewer words one uses makes each word more important. He perfected top 40’s forward motion.

Anyone with any involvement in radio, or any knowledge of that time frame, knows that Drake crafted and cared for a number of stations with tight-sounding, high-energy top 40 formats that made the music, well, "sing"....not to mention making both the station and on-air personality seem "larger than life".

He was the creator of the "Boss Radio" concept, mostly used out west (the air personalities were "Boss Jocks" out there), but his influence on top 40 radio spread coast to coast.

It never directly spread to Cleveland, but it had a major influence here in Northeast Ohio anyway.

Top 40 here was exemplified by stations like WIXY/1260, but the region was well within earshot of a Drake-consulted powerhouse - CKLW/800 "The Big 8", booming its 50,000 watts across much of the eastern U.S. from just across the river from Detroit, in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. The open waters of Lake Erie delivered the CKLW signal like an express train right into much of Northern Ohio.

CKLW is nowhere near its "Big 8" days now, as a local talk station targeting listeners only in Canada, if you don't count a stray American fan of Dr. Joy Browne, Clark Howard or George Noory, U.S. syndicated talkers heard in today's "AM 800" lineup.

But the success the station had this far south and east of Windsor/Detroit in its top 40 music days was immense. Former CKLW staffer Steve Hunter talks about it in an article on the "Classic CKLW" web site:

One of the most important and unique facts about CKLW: for a long, relatively uninterrupted time in the late 1960's and early 1970's, the Big 8 was not only #1 in the ratings in Detroit, but also #1 or, occasionally, just below #1, in Cleveland and Toledo and Akron/Canton. This was practically unheard-of at the time, even in the days of powerhouse AM rockers, and drew a LOT of attention to CKLW from other programmers, bringing even more renown to Bill Drake.

It brought a lengthy Cleveland career to one Larry Morrow, who was doing nights on CKLW as "Duke Windsor". WIXY/1260's Norman Wain lured him to Cleveland after seeing his CKLW nighttime show top the ratings here from its home base far from Northeast Ohio.

Apparently, Larry Morrow wasn't the only evening air personality Wain imported from "The Big 8" - the Steve Hunter article linked above says he made the same move - CKLW to WIXY - as well.

As such, Bill Drake's influence was felt both directly and indirectly in Cleveland radio - even if he never set foot in Northeast Ohio...

Tim Kelly To Envision

We have details on the new destination for Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting's operations director and Sandusky market manager Tim Kelly, who announced his resignation from the Elyria-based broadcaster Monday.

Kelly moves to a management role at Beachwood-based Envision Radio Networks, where he takes a new post as vice president and general manager at the growing local radio syndication firm.

More on the move in a press release from the Envision folks, reprinted below:

-----------

ENVISION RADIO NETWORKS ANNOUNCES NEW VICE PRESIDENT/GENERAL MANAGER
Tim Kelly Joins ERN Team

(DECEMBER 2008) – Envision Radio Networks welcomes longtime Cleveland radio fixture Tim Kelly who joins the company in the newly created position of Vice President/General Manager. Kelly will begin his new duties on Wednesday, December 17th and will be based at Envision Radio Networks new Cleveland headquarters.

“We are thrilled to have Tim join our growing company,” says Envision Radio Networks COO Laura Orkin. “He brings a wealth of sales and operations experience to our expanding business.” Orkin continues, “Tim will oversee our affiliate sales team as well as manage additional operational initiatives debuting in 2009.”

Tim Kelly joins Envision Radio Networks after spending the last 13 years with the Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting Company where he was most recently Corporate Director of Operations and Market Manager for their Sandusky, Ohio cluster.

He continues his work as Chairman of the Board of Directors for The Conclave Learning Conference, where he has been involved with the organization for over 10 years.

Kelly studied at Capital University and Ashland University where he majored in Radio/Television Production and Performance. He also later obtained certification in financial management from Case Western Reserve University. Kelly lives in Huron, OH with his wife Kelly and their two dogs Bennie and Bert.

More Print Cuts

The Internet rumors we hinted about in Monday's update have, unfortunately, become reality at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

WKYC/3 is reporting today that 50 Plain Dealer staffers are exiting the state's largest daily newspaper, in the latest round of job cuts at the Advance/Newhouse owned paper.

WKYC's Tom Beres reports that 27 PD newsroom staffers got the word via phone this morning that they were being laid off, and that another 23 workers have accepted a buyout from the paper.

Beres notes that the PD staff is "about a third smailler" since the series of layoffs and buyouts began some years ago.

So far, there's no word of any names of employees who have either taken buyouts, or been laid off.

But given the state of both the economy and the newspaper business, these Plain Dealer job cuts are not likely to be the last ones...

Radio Changes, The Tuesday Edition

When there's change or upheaval at a radio station or cluster, it often takes a while to figure out who's still around...and who's not.

So, let's try to figure out the situation at CBS Radio alt-rock WKRK/92.3, which just tweaked its music format and dumped its on-air personalities - including syndicated morning drive talk fest "Opie and Anthony" - on Monday.

Apparently still in the building, if not on the air, is program director Dom "Nard" Nardella, who describes the new "Radio 92.3" format to AllAccess:

"RADIO 92.3 is an evolution of the music that we played on K-ROCK. There's more depth on the station now as we've added titles from COLDPLAY, GREEN DAY, DAVE MATTHEWS, THE POLICE and many more. We're giving our listeners more of what they've been asking for...more music!"

And no air personalities, as "Nard" confirms that O&A and the rest of the WKRK air staff have been sidelined...the station now features "significantly less talk".

OMW hears that at least one "K-Rock" element could be retained in the "Radio 92.3" era: weekend specialty local music show "The Inner Sanctum", which landed at the station in 2006 after a run on the old "End" alternative format on what's now Radio One hip-hop WENZ/107.9. It's sounding to us like "Inner Sanctum" will continue after the changes at 92.3.

Semi-related, as it's in the CBS Radio cluster - an OMW reader points out to us that the web page for classic rock WNCX/98.5's morning drive show now only features co-hosts Scott Miller and Mike Olszewski...with the third "M" on the show, Kim Mihalik, no longer pictured or mentioned. We're checking into it.

And not related at all, but a radio change - OMW hears that Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting operations director/Sandusky market manager Tim Kelly has submitted his resignation after a 13 year run with the company. We hear that he's heading for a well-known Cleveland-based radio-related company, but are checking on the details on this one as well.

Kelly has most recently been ELB's operations director, along with his direct oversight of the company's stations in the Sandusky area: country WKFM/96.1 Huron "K96", along with AAA WLKR-FM/95.3 and sports WLKR/1510 Norwalk. ELB also owns Cleveland market smooth jazz mainstay WNWV/107.3 "The Wave" and talk WEOL/930 Elyria...

They Own Lima

The owners of Lima NBC affiliate WLIO/35 are taking over every other TV network affiliate station in the market.

The Lima News reports that Toledo-based Block Communications has agreed to pay $2.3 million dollars for Greg Phipps' four area LPTV stations, including the FOX (WOHL-CA 25), CBS (WLMO-LP 38) and ABC (WLQP-LP 18) affiliates in the Lima market. Another $100,000 will go to Greg and Kathleen Phipps for signing a non-compete agreement.

The deal also takes in one of Phipps' stations that isn't technically in the Lima market - America One affiliate WFND-LP 22 Findlay.

The Lima News reprints the deal filed with the FCC here (PDF file).

Block's Toledo empire includes the Toledo Blade newspaper, Buckeye Cablevision, CW Network cable-only affiliate "WT05" and the Buckeye Cable Sports Network.

From the article:

Block Communications President Gary Blair said the stations will be operated separate from WLIO including retaining its own newscast. The stations will continue to operate out of the South Central Avenue location, he said.

"We want to keep those stations independent," he said.

Still, Blair tells the Lima paper that they have through the end of the year to "review" the dynamics of the purchase, including anything related to jobs. We find it hard to picture that the Phipps LPTVers won't eventually be streamlined into WLIO, for efficiency and economic reasons if nothing else.

While negotiating the sale, Block and Phipps have been battling in court. The FOX affiliate's owner had charged Block with trying to get in the way of renewal talks between WOHL and the network...which will now be dealing with Block as the incoming new owners of "FOX Lima".

How can one company own basically all the viewing choices in a market like Lima?

The move will give Block control of nearly all network affiliations in the market, including the off-pattern MyNetwork TV airing on WOHL.

(We say "nearly all" because Block's WLIO dumped the CW Network feed off of its DT2 subchannel a couple of months ago, a move that returned the "CW Plus" cable-only feed to Lima viewers. And of course, religious/independent WTLW/44 is the other full-power Lima commercial station.)

But LPTV outlets don't count when it comes to FCC ownership limits. It's the second such deal in recent months, after Schurz Communications announced it was buying a similar LPTV cluster in South Bend IN to add to its full-power CBS affiliate (and a locally programmed DT2 subchannel).

The folks at Television Business Report (tvbr.com) note that the South Bend deal attracted "national attention from watchdogs", and wonder if this deal in Lima will see the same scrutiny...

BREAKING NEWS: "K-Rock" Broken

Just a few months after losing its high-profile morning star to a crosstown competitor, it appears major changes are being heard at CBS Radio alt-rock WKRK/92.3, the Cleveland market station known - apparently until today - as "K-Rock".

The station is now playing continuous alt-rock music without benefit of any air personalities, and is now using the on-air identifier "radio 92.3" in occasional recorded liners.

Radio-Info.com's news page reports that WKRK was one of two stations that dumped CBS/XM syndicated morning stars "Opie and Anthony" today. (WBCN in Boston was the other.)

New York-based O&A moved into 92.3's morning drive slot from a delayed afternoon drive clearance, after Shane "Rover" French bolted for Clear Channel rock WMMS/100.7 with his "Rover's Morning Glory" show earlier this year.

A quick run to the station's website reveals a new minimal website with the "radio 92.3" logo, with just two links: "listen live" and "feedback". There are no references to any of "K-Rock's" on-air personalities, which have included program director "Nard". Radio-Info reports that the station has dumped "all live DJs".

And just a couple of weeks ago, CBS Radio named AC WDOK/102.1 "Soft Rock 102.1" and hot AC WQAL/104.1 "Q104" programmer Dave Popovich as director of programming for the entire Cleveland cluster, including WKRK.

The music mix on WKRK may be slightly different than what's been heard over the airwaves until today.

We haven't confirmed it, but we hear rumblings that the main air signal now features the format that has been airing on 92.3's HD2 channel (seemingly verified by the "radio 92.3" page's title - "WKRK2"). Since we've long said that we're not the best source for examining changes in music playlists, we'll have to leave it to others for a bead on "radio 92.3"'s new music mix...

Radio Daze: The Documentary

A TV documentary based on Mike Olszewski's book "Radio Daze" premieres this week.

"Radio Daze: Cleveland’s FM Air Wars" debuts Tuesday night at 9:30 PM on Western Reserve PBS, the local PBS affiliate combo known to mere mortals as WNEO/45 Alliance-WEAO/49 Akron.

Quoting a release from our good friends over on Campus Center Drive:

It presents the dramatic rise of northeast Ohio’s FM rock scene, from its early days on college and ethnic stations manned by hippie disk jockeys to a billion-dollar entertainment industry.

Western Reserve PBS says Olszewski, a former WMMS/100.7 staffer now co-hosting CBS Radio classic rock WNCX/98.5's morning drive show, produced the documentary along with Tom Cummings and Dave Rogant.

Though the iconic WMMS is "featured prominently" in the documentary, Olszewski says "the Buzzard" won't be the sole focus. Quoting him in the release:

"We aimed to show the social, cultural and political changes that helped shape FM rock radio. It’s not about one station, but a number of very creative and very competitive air staffs that evolved and helped forge the strongest radio audience in America.”

The release lists a number of names, including Jeff and Flash, Matt the Cat, Kid Leo, Billy Bass, Betty Korvan, Ted Lux, Murray Saul and Denny Sanders, though it's not clear which actually appear in the documentary in new interviews. Quoting the release again:

The video stands as a historical document of a time when FM radio was the most important source of entertainment and information for the baby boom generation. According to Olszewski, “Radio Daze also features interviews with the pioneers of the medium and additional footage that should prove to us all what a long, strange trip it has been.”

Western Reserve PBS tells us that "Radio Daze" will repeat Friday at 9:30 PM, and Sunday at 1:30 PM...

Monday In December

Unless you're a big winter weather fan, or happy about the start of a new work week, the phrase "Monday in December" seems rather foreboding. For that matter, so do some of our news items as we start the week...

WKYC BUYOUTS: OMW hears that our earlier fears regarding Gannett's continuing effort to reduce staff at Cleveland NBC affiliate WKYC/3 are true.

We passed along an item earlier from Dave Hughes' DCRTV - that Gannett was actively offering buyouts to help further cut staff at its TV stations around the country.

The news came on the heels of at least four WKYC reporters exiting due to the station not renewing their contracts, and we wondered if this news was *in addition* to the exits of high-profile staffers like station veteran Obie Shelton.

It is.

OMW hears that Friday, Gannett officially offered the buyout package to WKYC staffers who are either over the age of 55, or who have more than 10 years of service with the company. We're told that the buyouts are being offered to everyone except department heads and employees with personal services contracts (i.e. they would exclude on-air staffers).

They're being characterized as "voluntary buyouts" for now, but Gannett has made it clear that if not enough people take the offers, more involuntary exits are likely...

NEWSPAPER WOES: Speaking of "involuntary exits", our friends in the print industry are getting hit hard by economics - even more so than those in broadcasting.

We haven't confirmed this one at all. But OMW hears that a rumor is floating around the Internet that more significant staff cuts could be coming to the Cleveland Plain Dealer - which could take effect soon as today.

The numbers we're hearing are well into double digits, but we haven't confirmed anything here.

But if you can't reach someone at the Plain Dealer today, and have no explanation why...

MORE NEWSPAPER WOES: While we're temporarily in Print Mode, OMW hears that you can put an asterisk next to "Kent" in the name of Record Publishing's daily newspaper, the Kent-Ravenna Record Courier.

OMW hears that this month, the R-C is closing its operations office in Kent, leaving the Portage County city without a daily newspaper's office for the first time since the mid-1880s. No, that's not the mid-1980s, it's the mid-1880s.

We're told that the paper's display advertising staff has been moving from Kent into the R-C's Ravenna office, and the R-C classified advertising and web divisions will follow them east on Ohio 59 soon.

We hear the R-C, like most newspapers, has laid off a few staff members both in editorial and production...and is struggling with the surging price of newsprint.

The company will continue to operate its weekly division separately out of Commerce Drive in Stow, the home of papers like the Stow Sentry and the Cuyahoga Falls News-Press. Though that division is said to be doing better financially, it had to close struggling weekly newspapers in Bedford and Maple Heights earlier this year.

And obviously, the Record Courier will continue to cover Kent...it just won't have production-related operations there...though we don't know if the paper will operate a nominal "bureau" in Kent.

Record Publishing has a sister radio operation, of course...Wooster-based Dix Communications has a small group of radio stations, including country WQKT/104.5 and oldies WKVX/960 in the company's hometown...

GARY'S BOOK: A veteran Cleveland TV news reporter, who recently retired after a 30 year run, has finished a book.

He's WJW/8's Gary Stromberg, who had been with the local FOX affiliate long before it switched networks from CBS in the mid-1990's.

And as such, Stromberg's new book - Aren't You That News Man? The Funny Side of the Evening News - covers, among other things, his many years working for former WJW news director Virgil Dominic in both Cleveland and Atlanta.

Stromberg tells OMW that as the title suggests, the book not only reflects on the "the professional standards and guidance" provided by Dominic:

The book provides plenty of laughs. For the first time ever, it's revealed how we smuggled a news tape on to the Channel 5 helicopter and had them ferry it to Cleveland without them knowing a thing about it.

From the book's description:

Gary explains how legendary baseball manager Casey Stengel offered him a chance to join the New York Mets.

He reveals why he is grateful to the Beatles for helping him get into Northwestern.

And, for the first time ever, he explains why Channel 8 workers pulled the pants off of a producer, and ran them up the flagpole in front of the station.

The things you learn after a veteran reporter retires, eh?

It can be purchased via online publisher "iUniverse" in both softcover and eBook form, and Gary tells us you can also find it on Amazon.com, or you can ask your local bookstore to order it...