WWOR-TV Has Further Reduced Its News and Public Affairs Programming, and Fails to Meet Its Public Interest Obligations In May, 2007, Voice for New Jersey filed its Petition to Deny Renewal of Station License for WWOR-TV (the "VNJ Petition"). The VNJ Petition clearly set forth WWOR's consistent failure to provide adequate local news coverage in its community of license. A brief summary highlighting some of the petition's key elements is set forth below. The findings documented in the VNJ Petition clearly show that WWOR-TV ("WWOR") failed to meet its public interest obligations at the time of its application for license renewal in 2007. Incredibly, however, the station has since stripped down its headquarters operations, dramatically reduced staffing, and further gutted its already-limited schedule of news and public affairs programming. Operationally, the station appears to have effectively merged with its New York sister station, WNYW-TV. Further, recent ex-parte filings with the FCC by WWOR's owner, Fox Television Stations, Inc. ("Fox") , grossly misrepresent the level of news and public affairs programming being offered on WWOR. In particular, Fox ignored significant recent reductions in such programming in these presentations. A recent review of the station's public files by a member of Voice for New Jersey also gives rise to serious concerns that WWOR is not maintaining its public comment files in accordance with FCC regulations. For all of these reasons, Voice for New Jersey asserts that WWOR has failed to fulfill its obligations to its Northern New Jersey community of license, and that its application for renewal of its station license should be denied. 1) The WWOR-TV Station License Carries With It a Special Obligation to the People of Northern New Jersey. In its recent ex-parte presentations, Fox repeated its erroneous legal argument to the effect that it does not have a special legal obligation to viewers in northern New Jersey notwithstanding the clear language and legislative history of Section 331 of the Communications Act. a) In its prior reply to Fox’s opposition, VNJ explained that this claim is based on a flat out misquotation of a Commission decision. When the unidentified omission from the quoted passage is added back in, the language strongly supports VNJ’s interpretation of the law. Simply put, WWOR’s authorization carries with it a unique legal requirement to give special emphasis to the needs of northern New Jersey. b) Fox also appears to have made a new argument as well. Since the reference in the written ex-parte notice is very short, it is only possible to guess at exactly what argument was made, but it appears to be that since the transfer of WWOR’s license was not conditioned on having a special duty to northern New Jersey, that obligation died with the transfer of the Page 1 of 11 license. This is wrong, since VNJ could find nothing on the record to indicate that the original license renewal granted to WWOR was conditioned upon conformance with Section 331. See RKO General, Inc., 93 FCC2d 303 (1983). Given the clear language and legislative history of Section 331, there was no reason to attach such a condition or to place such a condition on the subsequent transfers of that license. Moreover, it is flatly at odds with the understanding of the prior licensee and of Fox itself, which have always included in their various renewal and transfer applications special presentations relating to New Jersey. Indeed, in this very proceeding, Fox has placed hundreds of pages on the record attempting to document its service to New Jersey. 2) As amply documented in the VNJ Petition, WWOR has failed to meet its public interest obligations. The VNJ Petition is based on the station's consistent failure to to provide adequate local news coverage in its community of license. WWOR's coverage of New Jersey elections and New Jersey government has been--and remains--woefully deficient. The Petition to Deny cited several sources of data in support of these conclusions; they are summarized below. a) Election Coverage: In 2005, the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University conducted a comprehensive analysis of election coverage on 12 television stations reaching the New Jersey market. This study analyzed a total of 332 hours of broadcast news coverage in the final 30 days of the 2005 election. (1) Of the 44 WWOR broadcasts captured during the study period, just 11 (25%) had an election story. Of the all New York stations in the study only one (WWOR's sister station, WNYW) had a lower percentage (11%). The average for all New York stations was 52%. (2) 13 stories aired during these 11 broadcasts. Of these, 10 stories (67%) focused on a New Jersey election, and 9 out of the 10 stories focused exclusively on the race for Governor. None of the stories were characterized as being positive in tone. Like many other NY stations, WWOR presented no significant election coverage of any local (i.e. non-gubernatorial) New Jersey race. With respect to its community of license, the Eagleton study concluded that "WWOR barely covered the 2005 elections." b) Programming and Issues: VNJ undertook a comprehensive analysis of the reports that WWOR files with the Commission. This analysis encompassed the five most recent "Issues and Programming" reports available at the time the Petition was filed, covering all four quarters of 2006 and the first quarter of 2007. Further, we examined the Exhibit entitled "Service to New Jersey" that accompanied the station's application Page 2 of 11 for license renewal, and that enumerates the station's coverage of New Jersey news stories from 1999 to 2006. Our analysis of the station's own documentation leads inescapably to the conclusion that WWOR fails to meet even minimal standards with respect to local news coverage. Some of our findings are highlighted below. (1) WWOR’s “Service to New Jersey” reports indicate a total of 1,354 New Jersey news stories for the years 1999 – 2006. This suggests an average of less than 170 New Jersey news stories per year, or LESS THAN ONE NEW JERSEY STORY EVERY TWO DAYS. (2) WWOR reported ONLY 2.66 HOURS OF NEW JERSEY NEWS COVERAGE in its Issues and Programming Reports covering the first three quarters of 2006. For the fourth quarter of 2006 and the first quarter of 2007, WWOR stopped reporting the airtime of its stories altogether. (3) There are six municipalities in WWOR's northern New Jersey service area with populations of 100,000 or greater. Of these, only the City of Newark has received even minimally acceptable levels of local news coverage. (4) In the 15 month period encompassed by the station's Issues and Programming reports, the City of Jersey City was covered in only 13 news stories and the City of Patterson received only 8 news stories. For the balance, there were only four news stories covering the Township of Edison, two covering the City of Elizabeth, and one covering the Township of Woodbridge. VNJ's Petition to Deny highlights a number of significant news events that took place in these cities during the period analyzed; WWOR's failure to cover ANY of these events showcases the station's failure to meet the needs of its community of license. c) Independent Programming Analysis: In addition to analyzing the independent research of the Eagleton Institute and the station's own reporting, VNJ undertook an independent analysis of WWOR's news coverage during a two-week period in April, 2007. Our independent review once again confirmed the station's failure to properly meet its public interest obligations. Further, our analysis exposed WWOR's clear and calculated efforts to distance itself from its community of license and to identify itself with the larger and more lucrative New York media market. This New York identity permeated the station's branding, marketing, and promotional efforts. 3) The FCC Should Deny the Renewal of WWOR-TV's Station License The issues raised in the VNJ Petition clearly document WWOR's failure to meet its public interest obligations and provide ample reason to deny its application for Page 3 of 11 license renewal. Incredibly however, WWOR has further gutted its schedule of news and public affairs programming. a) WWOR's News Programming Has Historically Been Lacking. Now It's Even Worse. In December, 2007, VNJ filed a Reply to Fox Television Stations' Opposition to the Petition to Deny. In this document, VNJ took note of the fact that the overall quantity of news coverage offered by WWOR was then woefully below that of its peer group. (1) At the time of VNJ's reply, WWOR offered one one-hour news broadcast per day, seven days per week. The worst of WWOR's peers in the New York media market (its sister station WNYW), offered three times more news coverage than WWOR. The remainder of the station’s peer group averaged over five hours of news coverage per day—more than five times the volume of news coverage then offered by WWOR (2) Despite this abysmal level of programming, and as if to highlight its total contempt for its public interest obligations, WWOR recently cut it's weekday news coverage in half, and eliminated weekend news coverage alltogether. The station now provides the people of northern New Jersey with ONLY TWO AND ONE HALF HOURS OF NEWS PROGRAMMING PER WEEK. This is LESS THAN 10% OF THE VOLUME OF NEWS PROGRAMMING AS MEASURED AGAINST THE AVERAGE OF COMPARABLE STATIONS IN THE NEW YORK MARKET. b) Public Affairs Programming Has Likewise Been Slashed.