Charter, Belo Reach Retrans Accord
Agreement In Principle Covers 12 Stations In 11 Markets
By Mike Reynolds & Linda Moss -- Multichannel News, 12/29/2008 10:46:00 AM
Charter Communications and Belo Corp. have reached an agreement in principal for retransmission consent covering stations in 11 markets.
Belo spokeswoman Jill Matthews said that lawyers were hammering out the final details, but at this stage there aren’t any plans for discontinuance of service on Dec. 31. The stations are alerting their viewers about Belo’s tentative accord on their Web sites.
The station group, which had been seeking cash compensation, would not discuss deal terms. KMOV-TV in St. Louis had told its viewers it was looking for a penny per day per subscribers, or about $1.6 million annually.
In addition to KMOV, t
he tentative agreement covers signals for the following stations: WFAA-TV in Dallas/Fort Worth; WWL-TV and WUPL-TV in New Orleans; WCNC-TV in Charlotte; KGW-TV in Portland, Ore.; WVEC-TV in Hampton/Norfolk; KING-TV and KONG-TV in Seattle/Tacoma; KREM-TV and KSKN-TV in Spokane; KHOU-TV in Houston; KTVB in Boise; and WHAS-TV in Louisville
The pact also covers carriage of two off Belo’s 24-hour new channels, Northwest Cable News and Texas Cable News.
Early last week, Belo stations KMOV, the CBS affiliate in St. Louis, WVEC, the ABC affiliate in Norfolk, Va., WFAA, the ABC affiliate in Dallas-Ft. Worth and WCNC in Charlotte, had notified their watchers via their Web sites that their signals may go dark on Charter systems in the aforementioned markets.
However, in recent days, KMOV, WVEC and WCNC had all indicated via their Web sites that Belo had reached tentative accords with Charter.
