WLWC

WLWC is the CW-affiliated television station licensed to New Bedford but which operates out of Providence and acts largely as a Rhode Island station despite its licensing. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on UHF channel 22 from a transmitter in the Ashley Heights section of East Freetown, Massachusetts. It can also be seen on Cox and Verizon FiOS channel 9 (in Rhode Island) as well as Comcast channel 13 (in Massachusetts). For high definition, it is offered on Verizon FiOS channel 509, Cox channel 705, and Comcast channel 813.

Owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station has studios on Westminster Street in Downtown Providence. Syndicated programming on WLWC includes: Two and a Half Men, The Office, Tyra, and Judge Mathis. It is one of two major Rhode Island stations (other one being ABC affiliate WLNE-TV) with facilities in Providence despite being licensed to the Massachusetts side of the market.

History

WLWC began broadcasting in April 1997 as a primary WB and secondary UPN affiliate. It was owned by Fant Broadcasting and operated by NBC-owned WJAR under a local marketing agreement (LMA). It was the first completely new station to sign-on in the Rhode Island market in 34 years. For the first two years of The WB and UPN's existence, Boston's WLVI-TV and WSBK-TV, which had been carried on cable in Rhode Island for decades, doubled as the WB and UPN affiliates, respectively, for Providence/New Bedford as well. The station launched with various syndicated shows as well as a WJAR-produced 10 p.m. newscast, known as TV 28 News at 10, which began airing a few months after the WPRI-TV-produced effort on Fox affiliate WNAC-TV.

Fant had signed an LMA with WJAR's previous owner, Outlet Broadcasting, just months before Outlet's 1996 merger with NBC. Since 1992, Fant's other station, WWHO in Columbus, Ohio; had been junior partner in an LMA with Outlet-owned NBC affiliate WCMH-TV. By the time channel 28 signed on, NBC had let it be known that it not want to run stations outside its core owned-and-operated (O&O) outlets. NBC, during this time, pushed Fant to sell the stations. In September 1997, NBC came up with a three-way swap in which Fant exchanged WLWC and WWHO to Paramount/Viacom, while Paramount/Viacom-owned NBC affiliate WVIT in Hartford became an NBC O&O.

With the ownership change, WLWC became more or less a UPN O&O in 1998; as UPN became its primary affiliation while The WB was relegated to secondary status. The swap also made WLWC a sister station to WSBK. For most of the television era, the FCC had not allowed common ownership of stations with overlapping city-grade signals. Just months earlier, Fox affiliate WNAC-TV had to be sold because its previous owner, Argyle Television, had merged with Hearst, owner of Boston's WCVB-TV--the second time in three years that a Rhode Island station had to be sold after its owner merged with the owner of a Boston station.

After Viacom and CBS merged in 2000, WLWC's master control and some internal operations was integrated with those of WSBK and WBZ-TV at WBZ's facility on Soldiers Field Road in the Brighton section of Boston. When Viacom split into two companies in 2005, WLWC, along with the rest of Viacom's television stations, became part of CBS Corporation. On January 24, 2006, The WB and UPN announced that they would end broadcasting and merge into a new combined network called The CW which launched on September 18. At the same time, the new network signed a 10-year affiliation agreement with 11 of CBS' UPN stations, including WLWC. However, it was a near-certainty that WLWC would become an affiliate of The CW in any event, given that it was a dual UPN/WB affiliate. With coming CW affiliation, WLWC rebranded itself as "CW 28" and its web address changed to "cw28tv.com".

On February 7, 2007, CBS announced it was selling WLWC and seven other stations in Austin, Texas, Salt Lake City, Utah, and West Palm Beach, Florida to Cerberus Capital Management for $185 million. Cerberus then formed a new holding company for the stations, Four Points Media Group, who took over the operation of the stations through local marketing agreements in late-June 2007. Subsequently, WLWC's website was converted to an interface somewhat similar to the former CBS version. On November 26, master control of WLWC moved from WBZ to KUTV's studios on Main Street in Downtown Salt Lake City. The entire group deal officially closed on January 10, 2008.

WLWC permanently turned off its analog transmitter at Midnight on December 9, 2008. The last minutes of transmission were uneventful with the conclusion of Malcolm in the Middle, some commercials, and the opening title of That '70s Show. WLWC remained on its pre-transition channel 22 (using PSIP to display its virtual channel as 28) following the February 2009 analog shutdown. Nexstar took over the operations of all of the Four Points stations in March 2009. At one point, the station had studios on State Street in Downtown Providence.

On June 30, 2010, WLWC invoked the FCC's network non-duplication rule. This resulted in Comcast blacking out primetime CW programming on WLVI-TV in Fall River, Massachusetts. This did not impact the rest of the communities in Bristol County, due to the fact that WLVI-TV still has "significantly viewed" status across Bristol County. However, WLWC filed a request with the FCC to exempt Fall River from significantly viewed status. ^[1] On August 2, 2010, the station added LATV on a new second digital subchannel. ^[2] This is also seen on Comcast digital channels 299 and 702, Verizon FiOS digital channel 469, and Cox digital channel 809. ^[3]

On September 8, 2011, Four Points Media announced the sale of its television group, including WLWC, to Sinclair Broadcast Group. Sinclair was expected to begin operating the stations via a local marketing agreement following antitrust approval and prior to the closing expected in the first quarter of 2012.^[4] Sinclair owns one other television station in New England: Portland, Maine's CBS affiliate WGME-TV. Sinclair was also a former owner of Springfield, Massachusetts's ABC affiliate WGGB-TV. The deal was completed on January 3, 2012. ^[5]

Columbus, Ohio connections

In WLWC's short history, there have been several interesting connections between WLWC and television stations in the Columbus market. WLWC's arrangement with WJAR was an outgrowth of a similar arrangement in Columbus with Outlet's WCMH-TV and Fant's WWHO. WLWC and WWHO continued to lead near-identical existences for nearly a decade sharing graphics, voiceovers, and more through several owners. Also, WCMH had used the WLWC calls from its 1949 sign-on until being bought by Outlet in 1976. In the mid-1990s, a Columbus low-power station owned by Premier Broadcasting Corporation announced that it would be using the WLWC call letters. Because of the historic value of the WLWC calls, Outlet arranged to have the callsign "warehoused" on channel 28 in order to keep its local competitors from using them. WWHO was sold in 2005 to the Providence-based LIN TV Corporation, who owns CBS affiliate WPRI and operates WNAC under an LMA.

Programming

When not airing CW network programming, WLWC airs a general entertainment format that includes talk shows, off-network sitcoms, dramas, syndicated programming, and movies which generally air on the weekends. As a primary WB affiliate, WLWC aired Kids' WB programming but this was dropped after the primary affiliation became UPN. It was not picked up again after UPN canceled its own children's block in 2003. The block, which was replaced with The CW4Kids in 2008, returned to WLWC when the station began airing CW programming. (The CW4Kids was renamed Toonzai in 2010.) In 2002, WBZ added its weekday morning newscast, Sports Final, and WSBK's Red Sox This Week to this channel's lineup. This was done to serve viewers inconvenienced by Cox's removal of WBZ from its Rhode Island systems.

By 2004, WLWC dropped the morning newscast and Red Sox This Week. In place of the morning show, the station began airing the nationally syndicated morning program The Daily Buzz. Sports Final was retained (on a half-hour tape delay) and WLWC also added Phantom Gourmet from WSBK. Beginning with the 2005 season, WLWC (along with WSBK) began airing syndicated broadcasts of ACC college football and basketball games as Boston College's move to the conference created regional interest for the ACC.

Until May 2007, two of WBZ's weekday morning personalities were shown on WLWC's broadcast of The Daily Buzz as the station itself had none. During the program's weather reports, meteorologist Barry Burbank did a thirty second local weather cut-in. During commercial breaks, traffic reporter Rich Kirkland would give a quick traffic update. After CBS sold the station to Four Points, Sports Final was dropped and the WBZ morning personalities were removed from The Daily Buzz. That program currently airs weekday mornings from 6 to 8.

References

External links

• WLWC "CW 28"
• The CW
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WLWC