KNSD

KNSD
	File:KNSD logo 2012.jpg
San Diego, California
Branding	NBC (7/39) San Diego (general) NBC San Diego News(newscasts)
Slogan	Coverage You Can Count On
Channels	Digital: 40 (UHF)Virtual: 39 (PSIP)
Subchannels	39.1 NBC39.2 NBC Plus39.3 Universal Sports
Owner	Station Venture Operations, LP (NBCUniversal, 76%/LIN TV, 24%)
First air date	November 14, 1965
Call letters' meaning	NBC San Diego
Former callsigns	KAAR (1965-1968) KCST (1968-1975) KCST-TV (1975-1988)
Former channel number(s)	Analog:39 (UHF, 1965-2009)
Former affiliations	independent (1965-1973) ABC (1973-1977)
Transmitter power	370 kW
Height	566 m
Facility ID	35277
Transmitter coordinates	32°41′48″N 116°56′6″W
Website	www.nbcsandiego.com/

clearinKNSD is the NBC television station based in San Diego, California. It is owned by a joint venture of NBCUniversal (76 percent) and LIN TV (24 percent). However, because NBC Universal has majority control, KNSD is run as an NBC owned and operated station (O&O). The master control center and local commercial insertion for KNSD is at the NBC West Coast headquarters in Burbank, California.

The station is carried on channel 7 on all San Diego-area cable systems; its former branding,NBC 7/39, reflected both this and its over-the-air analog channel (and digital virtual channel) number (39) (the station now brands as NBC San Diego). On both San Diego area cable systems, KNSD's high definition signal can be seen on Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable on channel 707, and in neighboring Tijuana on Cablemas channel 42. The station is also available on its customary channel 39 position (in both standard definition and in high definition) on both of DirecTV's and Dish Network's local channels packages. A 24-hour local weather channel, NBC Plus is seen on KNSD's digital sub-channel 39.2.

History

Early history

The station went on the air on November 16, 1965 as KAAR, San Diego's first UHF independent station. The station at the time was based in the building once occupied by the National Pen Company, located in Kearny Mesa, a neighborhood ten miles northeast of downtown San Diego. However, in 1966, a fire gutted the KAAR building, and the station was off the air for more than a year while the building was being rebuilt. Channel 39 was sold to Bass Broadcasting, a Texas-based broadcaster, and returned to the air in 1968 as KCST. The new call letters stood for California San Diego Television.

For a three to four year period in the late 1960s to the early 1970s, Bass tried to take the ABC network affiliation from XETV-TV (channel 6), a station licensed across the Mexican border in Tijuana but based in San Diego. XETV had been San Diego's ABC affiliate since 1956, but Bass claimed that it wasn't appropriate for an American television network to affiliate with a Mexican television station when there was a viable American station available.

In 1972, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) revoked XETV's permission to carry ABC. KCST, as the only other commercial station in town other than the CBS and NBC stations, took over the ABC affiliation on July 1, 1973. and XETV became an independent station until it became a charter Fox affiliate in 1987 and more recently, a CW affiliate in 2008. Storer Broadcasting, owner of major network stations in the East and Midwest, bought KCST on September 30, 1974. Shortly afterwards, Storer added the -TV suffix to KCST's call sign.

As an NBC station

In 1977, in the wake of its newfound success as America's number one television network, ABC switched its San Diego affiliation from KCST to KGTV (channel 10), with KCST taking KGTV's old NBC affiliation. ABC had never been happy with the way its San Diego affiliation had ended up on KCST in the first place, and had sought a way to get back on VHF at the first opportunity. This move did not please Storer, who retaliated by dropping ABC from KCST's then-sister station, WITI-TV in Milwaukee, in favor of CBS, with which Storer had strong relations. Around the same time, KCST adopted the "Channel's Alive" station image package from Peters Productions, rebranding to "39 Alive".

In 1985, the Storer stations were taken over by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR). Two years later, KCST and the other Storer stations were sold to Gillett Communications (except for former Storer flagship WTVG in Toledo, Ohio, which had been sold to a separate owner). On September 16, 1988, the station changed its call letters to the current KNSD. It also began calling itself "Channel 7/39" on-air. Gillett restructured into SCI TV in 1991 after Gillett defaulted on some of his bond purchases. After SCI filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1992, its stations were sold to New World Communications.

KNSD, under the traditional definition, is the only network O&O in San Diego. Current Fox affiliate KSWB-TV (channel 69) was previously an O&O of The WB. KNSD is one of two NBC UHF O&Os, Hartford's WVIT (channel 30) being the other; a third UHF O&O, WNCN (channel 17) out of Raleigh-Durham was sold to Media General as of June 2006. In the past, the station blamed its woes on its UHF status, but as viewers moved to cable (San Diego has one of the highest cable penetration rates in the country) and as many VHF analog stations transition to digital UHF, the problem of its position on the UHF dial has been reduced. [1] KNSD used to own KNSD-LP (channel 62), which was leased to Entravision to expand the coverage area of KBNT-CA.

New World then entered into a deal with News Corporation in which most New World stations (mostly CBS affiliates, with a few ABC and NBC stations mixed in) would convert to the Fox network. However, KNSD stayed with NBC since Fox was already on VHF in San Diego (see XETV). KNSD and WVTM-TV in Birmingham, Alabama were both sold to NBC in May 1996, becoming final that August. That following January, KNSD began calling itself "NBC 7/39". Later, in October 1997, NBC sold a minority stake (24 percent) of KNSD to LIN Television, while in exchange, NBC acquired majority control (76 percent) of KXAS-TV in Dallas-Fort Worth from LIN. The deal closed on March 2, 1998, marking the official launch of the new NBC / LIN joint venture (controlled by NBC) known as Station Venture Operations, LP.

In spring 2001, KNSD moved its studios and offices into a redeveloped high-rise office building in downtown San Diego at the NBC Building, which includes an all glass enclosed street-level news studio resembling that of The Today Show in New York City's Rockefeller Center. On May 18, 2007, LIN TV announced that it was exploring strategic alternatives that could have resulted in the sale of the company, including LIN's share of KNSD.[2]

Digital television

Digital channels

This station's digital channel is multiplexed:

Virtual Channel	Physical Channel	Video	Aspect	Programming
39.1	40.1	1080i	16:9	main KNSD/NBC HD programming
39.2	40.2	480i	4:3	NBC Plus
39.3	40.3	480i	4:3	Universal Sports

California Nonstop

Analog-to-digital conversion

After the analog television shutdown and digital conversion on February 17, 2009,^[2] KNSD remained on its current pre-transition channel number, 40.^[3] However, through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display KNSD's virtual channel as 39. After KFMB-TV, KGTV andKSWB-TV went digital-only on February 17, KNSD became one of only three full-power English-language stations in the San Diego market (not counting XETV or XHDTV, which are licensed by the Mexican government, but broadcast in the English language) that continued to transmit an analog signal for regular programming; the other two were KUSI-TV and KPBS.

Programming

As of August 2010, with the cancellations of both Martha Stewart and Bonnie Hunt, KNSD, along with both KNBC and KNTV, announced the pickup of three more syndicated programming, which includes Access Hollywood Live, The Real Housewives, and The Nate Berkus Show, which debuted on September 13, 2010.^[4] In Addition to NBC programming and local newscasts, syndicated programming includes The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Access Hollywood, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy!.

Streetside San Diego (a local lifestyles and infotainment program) and Noticias Mi San Diego (a Spanish-language newscast; it was a holdover from KNSD's operation of KBOP-CA) were local programs previously produced by KNSD; these programs, along with the station's weekend morning newscasts, were canceled on December 5, 2008 as a result of budget cuts at the station.^[5]

News operation

In 1973 as KCST, the station started a news department, with Harold Greene, later to gain fame in Los Angeles, as news director and lead news anchor.

With the addition of California Nonstop, KNSD currently produces 29½ hours of local news, with 5½ hours on weekdays and one hour on weekends, except for that Sunday's 6pm newscasts is preempted for NBC Sunday Night Football during football season. A two-hour news block is aired live at 5am, followed by the market's only one-hour 4pm newscast, then half-hour blocks at 5 and 6pm, and a 35-minute wrap at 11pm. The 11pm newscast is rebroadcast at 4am before Early Today, which leads to its local morning newscasts. On weekends, unlike most NBC O&O stations, KNSD only has half-hour news blocks at 6 and 11pm.

In December 2010, KNSD underwent major renovations for the first time since moving to the new studios in 2001. The new look debuted on December 13, 2010.^[6] The studio itself mainly mirrors that of the Today show,^[7] which is the first step in preparation for HD broadcasts.

On January 29, 2011, KNSD became the fifth station in the San Diego market, and the last NBC-owned station to produce its newscast in high-definition, although not all field reports are shot in true HD. The newscast also featured a new graphics package as well as the station's new primary branding, NBC San Diego, dropping any reference to the "NBC 7/39" moniker and at the same time, the "7/39" branding in general after 23 years. A new music package by 360 Music was commissioned at the time of the launch,^[8] which features the NBC chimes. This left XETV as the only station in the market that continued to broadcast its news in 4:3 standard definition until April 23rd, 2011 when they finally switched to HD. In addition, MyNetworkTV station WWOR-TV in Secaucus, New Jersey remains the largest television station (by market size) and the only major English-language network O&O with in-house news operations without high-definition or even 16:9widescreen newscasts. (It is noted that CBS-owned WWJ-TV in Detroit also produces its morning news show in pillarboxed 4:3 standard definition; however, it does not have a full-time news department.)

News/station presentation

Newscast titles

Channel 39 Eyewitness News (1973–1976)
39 News Alive (1976–1981)
NewsCenter 39 (1981–1988)
News San Diego (1988–1997)
NBC 7/39 News (1997–2011)
NBC San Diego News (2011)
NBC 7 San Diego News (2011–present)

Station slogans

This is The Place to Be on 39 Alive (1973-1974; localized version of ABC ad campaign)
Hello San Diego, Hello 39 Alive (1974-1975; localized version of ABC ad campaign)
Welcome to the Bright New World on 39 Alive (1975-1976; localized version of ABC ad campaign)
Let Us Be The One on 39 Alive (1976-1977; localized version of ABC ad campaign)
39 Alive Still The One (1977; last localized version of ABC ad campaign)
39 Alive! (1976–1979; station image package by Peters Productions, San Diego)
39 Cable 7, Proud As A Peacock! (1979–1981; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
39 Cable 7, Our Pride Is Showing (1981–1982; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
We're KCST, Just Watch Us Now (1982–1983; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
39 Cable 7 There, Be There (1983–1984; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
39 Cable 7, Let's All Be There! (1984–1986; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
San Diego's Leader in Electronic Journalism (1985–1987)
Come Home to 39 Cable 7 (1986–1987, localized version of NBC ad campaign)
Come on Home to 39 Cable 7 (1987-1988; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
Covering All of San Diego County and Beyond (1987–1990)
Come Home To The Best, Only on 39/Come Home To The Best, 39 Cable 7 (1988-1990; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
We're There When You Need Us (1990–1991)
39 Cable 7, The Place To Be! (1990-1992; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
News - San Diego (as in K-N-S-D) (1990–1993)
It's A Whole New 39 Cable 7 (1992-1993; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
The Stars Are Back on 39 Cable 7 (1993-1994; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
Coverage You Can Count On (1993–present)

On-air staff

Current on-air staff

Anchors

Mark Mullen - weeknights at 5, 6, 7 (California Nonstop only), and 11 p.m.
Jason Austell - weekday mornings "NBC San Diego News in the Morning" (5-7 a.m.)
Catherine Garcia - weekdays at 4, 4:30 p.m.; weeknights at 7 p.m. (California Nonstop only)
Marianne Kushi - weekday mornings "NBC San Diego News in the Morning" (5-7 a.m.)
Artie Ojeda - weekends at 6 and 11 p.m.
Susan Taylor - weekdays at 4, weeknights at 5, 6 and 11 p.m.

Weather Team

(Meteorologists are available to appear from sister station KNBC-TV in Los Angeles)

Fritz Coleman - Chief Weather Anchor; weekdays at 4, weeknights at 5, 6 and 11 p.m., also weekday weather anchor at KNBC in Los Angeles
Pablo Pereira (AMS Seal of Approval; AMS and NWA member)- Meteorologist; weekends at 6 and 11 p.m., also the weekend meteorologist at KNBC in Los Angeles
Whitney Southwick - Meteorologist; weekday mornings "NBC San Diego News in the Morning" (5-7 a.m.)

Sports Team

Jim Laslavic - Sports Director; Sunday-Thursdays at 6 and 11 p.m., also host of Sportswrap
Jim Stone - Sports Anchor; Friday-Saturdays at 6 and 11 p.m.
Derek Togerson - sports reporter
Allison Mehnert - sports reporter

Reporters

Greg Bledsoe - general assignment reporter
George Chamberlin - money advisor
Gene Cubbison - general assignment reporter
Rory Devine - general assignment reporter
Monica Dean - general assignment reporter
Bob Hansen - consumer reporter ("Consumer Bob")
Jodi Kodesh - morning reporter; also morning traffic reporter and fill-in weather anchor
Steven Luke - general assignment reporter
Mari Payton - general assignment reporter
Tony Shin - general assignment reporter
Nicole Ward - general assignment reporter

Notable past on-air staff

Clark Anthony - anchor/reporter (1992–2002)
Stacey Baca - anchor/reporter (1999–2002, now at WLS-TV in Chicago)
Dave Bender - weather (1988–1991, later moved to KNBC and now at KOVR in Sacramento)
Paul Bloom - anchor/reporter (1977–1982, 1984–1986 and 1988–1994; now at KUSI)
Pat Brown- weather anchor (2001–2009)
Laura Buxton - anchor/reporter (1980–1987, now at Channel 4 San Diego)
Tim Carr - anchor/reporter (1989–2001)
Bob Dale - weather (deceased)
Bobby Estill - sports anchor (1988–1991)
Susan Farrell - anchor/reporter (1987–1998)
Jack Gates - reporter (1980–1997, now at Channel 4 San Diego)
Bernard Gonzales - anchor/reporter (1988–1992 and 2001–2004)
Dave Gonzales - anchor/reporter (1984–1989, now at KCBS in Los Angeles)as KCAL's noon and 2pm anchor
John Gregory - reporter, now at KABC-TV in Los Angeles
Harold Greene - anchor (1973–1974), now retired
Laurence Gross - entertainment critic (deceased)
Brian Hackney - weather anchor (1985–1990, now at KPIX-TV in San Francisco)
Roger Hedgecock - anchor (1991–1992, now a radio host at KOGO-AM)
Kevin Hunt - weekend anchor (1988–1990)
Lorrie Jordan-now at XETV
Al Keck - sports anchor (1986–1988, now at WFTS-TV in Tampa, Florida)
Kimberly King - Traffic anchor (1998–2008)
Ken Kramer - About San Diego (1995–2009)
Lauren Krause - reporter, weekend evening anchor
Jovana Lara - reporter, now weekend evening co-anchor at KABC-TV in Los Angeles
Marty Levin
Joe Lizura - weather anchor (1990–2006); now at KUSI
Katia Lopez Hodayan - reporter for KNSD and Mi San Diego
Tania Luviano - anchor Mi San Diego
Greg Mills - News Reporter/Anchor (2003), now Reporter at KCBS/KCAL in Los Angeles
Dennis Morgigno - anchor/reporter (1978–1987, now at Channel 4 San Diego)
Soncee Partida - anchor, weekday mornings
Margaret Radford- Reporter/Fill-in Anchor (1994–2007), now retired
Suzanne Rico - reporter; former morning co-anchor at KCBS-TV in Los Angeles
Bill Ritter - reporter 1987-90 (now at WABC-TV)
Allison Ross - anchor (1991–1996)
Vic Salazar - reporter, anchor (1990–2008)
Mike Smith - sports anchor (1967–1982, now a partner in Ad-Lib Productions)
Rolland Smith - anchor (1993–1996, returned to New York)
Anne State - anchor/reporter (2002–2008)
Lynn Stuart - reporter; now at XETV-TV
Bree Walker - anchor (1997–2000)
Dave Walker - anchor (1968–1988, now a partner in Ad-Lib Productions)
Mark Walton
Sarah Wallace - anchor/reporter (1981–1985, now at WABC-TV in New York)
Denise Yamada - anchor/reporter (1987–1994)
Kim Devore - anchor/reporter