KARZ-TV


KARZ-TV is a television station in Little Rock, Arkansas, United States, affiliated with MyNetworkTV. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside NBC affiliate KARK-TV ; Nexstar also provides certain services to Fox affiliate KLRT-TV and de facto CW owned-and-operated station KASN under a local marketing agreement with Mission Broadcasting. The four stations share studios at the Victory Building on West Capitol Avenue and South Victory Street in downtown Little Rock; KARZ-TV's transmitter is located at the Shinall Mountain antenna farm, near the city's Chenal Valley neighborhood.

History

Early history

Leininger-Geddes Broadcasting filed the initial application for the UHF channel 42 license with the Federal Communications Commission on June 7, 1985. The group—which received approval for the construction permit in a proceeding by FCC administrative law judge Joseph Stirmer on November 4, 1986, later issued by the FCC on July 7, 1987—was granted the license over three other groups: Magnolia Communications ; Capitol Communications Corp. ; and Maumelle TV Inc. The construction permit remained dormant for nine years until Paxson Communications purchased a 49% share of the license—forming the joint venture Channel 42 of Little Rock, LLC—on June 21, 1996; Paxson entered into a local marketing agreement on August 21, 1996, deal was approved on September 17.
Channel 42 first signed on the air on December 1, 1997, as KVUT. Under Paxson, the station originally operated as an affiliate of the company's Infomall TV Network infomercial service, supplemented by overnight religious programming from The Worship Network and the contemporary Christian Praise TV. Channel 42 changed its call letters to KYPX on March 16, 1998. Six months later, on August 31, KYPX became a charter affiliate of Paxson's fledgling family-oriented network Pax TV. The station originally maintained studio facilities located on South Shackleford Road in southwestern Little Rock. On April 2, 1999, Paxson purchased the 51% interest in KYPX held by Leininger-Geddes for $1.25 million in stock; the purchase of the majority share was approved by the FCC on May 17, and was finalized on June 24. Subsequently on March 8, 2000, Paxson announced it would sell the station to Little Rock-based Equity Broadcasting Corporation, owner of Camden-licensed WB affiliate KKYK-TV and Little Rock repeater KKYK-LP, for $7.5 million; the sale received FCC approval on August 3, and was finalized on August 28. The station subsequently relocated its operations into Equity's Shackleford Drive headquarters in northwestern Little Rock.

WB affiliation

In order to provide the network broader signal coverage within the Little Rock market, on January 29, 2001, Equity transferred KKYK's WB network and syndicated programming to channel 42; the intellectual unit of KYPX—which changed its calls accordingly to KLRA-TV, in reference to its city of license—concurrently moved to channel 49. Alongside WB prime time and children's programming, channel 42—which accordingly began branding as "WB42"—maintained a general entertainment format consisting of first-run syndicated shows, recent off-network sitcoms and drama series, syndicated cartoons, weekend movie presentations and religious programs. Seven months later on August 22, the station's call letters were changed again to KWBF, a dual reference to its WB affiliation and network mascot Michigan J. Frog, from whom the nickname used by KWBF until The WB shut down was borrowed. Under Equity ownership, channel 42 served as the group's flagship station. KWBF also relayed its programming on two low-power translators: KWBF-LP in Sheridan and KWBK-LP in Pine Bluff.

MyNetworkTV affiliation; Nexstar ownership

On February 22, 2006, News Corporation announced the launch of MyNetworkTV, which it developed as a programming option for UPN- and WB-affiliated stations that were not chosen to affiliate with The CW, which was founded by CBS Corporation and Time Warner on January 25 and would incorporate UPN and The WB's higher-rated programs within its initial lineup. On April 24, Equity Media announced that KWBF would become the market's MyNetworkTV charter affiliate. KWBF was rejected for the CW affiliation in favor of UPN affiliate KASN, which then-owner Clear Channel Television confirmed on April 19 would become that network's Little Rock affiliate under a broader long-term deal that also involved its sister stations in Cincinnati and Salt Lake City. KWBF joined MyNetworkTV upon the network's launch on September 5, two weeks before The WB formally ceased operations; at that time, the station began branding itself as "My 42".
On October 7, 2008, Channel 42 was acquired by Irving, Texas–based Nexstar Broadcasting Group, which had owned NBC affiliate KARK-TV since 2003, for $4 million. On December 8, amid attempts by creditor Silver Point Finance to force the company into liquidation, Equity Media filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. The FCC approved Nexstar's purchase of KWBF on December 23, and the sale was finalized on January 30, 2009. Nexstar assumed operational control of Channel 42 on February 1, 2009, with its operations being integrated into KARK's Victory Building studios in downtown Little Rock; concurrently, the station changed its callsign to KARZ-TV and began branding as "Z 42".
On July 19, 2012, Nexstar reached an agreement to acquire 12 stations owned by Kansas City–based Newport Television, including the duopoly of KLRT and KASN, for $285.5 million. Because the FCC bars a single company from owning both two of the four highest-rated stations and more than two stations overall in the same market, the licenses of KLRT and KASN were transferred to Westlake, Ohio–based Mission Broadcasting for $60 million. The sale of KLRT/KASN to Mission received FCC approval on December 10, 2012, and was completed on January 3, 2013; Nexstar took over the operations of KLRT and KASN, which were relocated to KARK/KARZ's Victory Building studios, under a local marketing agreement on February 2, 2013. As a result, Nexstar/Mission's Little Rock cluster became one of only two "virtual quadropolies"—four local full-power stations managed by one company—in existence in American television.

Programming

KARZ may occasionally take on the responsibility of running NBC network shows in place of regular programming in the event that extended breaking news or severe weather coverage is carried on KARK-TV. From 2001 to 2012, channel 42 frequently aired ABC sports telecasts and occasional non-sports programs preempted by KATV due to its commitments to Arkansas Razorbacks sporting events or to run infomercials for additional revenue. In January 2006, three years before it was purchased by Nexstar, the station made headlines when it decided to air the NBC comedy-drama series The Book of Daniel after KARK-TV station management declined to carry it amid complaints about controversial material revolving around the vices of the Episcopalian minister lead and his dysfunctional family, its depiction of Jesus as tolerant of perceived sinful behaviors, and openly gay characters that some conservative Christian groups found objectionable. KWBF came under fire for their decision to air Daniel, even hiring extra security following threats made to the station. KWBF aired the program in its regular 9 p.m. network timeslot following The WB's Friday night lineup. The controversy soon became moot as The Book of Daniel was canceled by NBC after four episodes, with its remaining nine episodes eventually being released on the network's website.

Sports programming

From 2001 to 2008, KARZ held the local broadcast rights to NFL preseason games from the Kansas City Chiefs through the team's Chiefs Television Network syndication service. In September 2009, KARZ debuted Fearless Live, showcasing weekly regular season high school football games sanctioned by the Arkansas Activities Association ; since 2013, the KARZ game telecasts have been replayed on KASN on a one-night delay.

Newscasts

On February 21, 2005, KWBF began producing a half-hour weeknight 5:30 p.m. newscast. Anchored by Doug Krile, it featured a wrap-up of the day's headlines as well as a long-form discussion of notable current events; the program was canceled in August 2006.
On February 1, 2009, as Nexstar assumed management responsibilities for channel 42, KARK-TV began producing an hour-long weeknight 7 p.m. newscast for KARZ. Titled KARK 4 News: First in Prime, and originally anchored by Sonseeaharay Tonsall and longtime KARK weather anchor Tracy Douglass, the newscast's launch resulted in KARZ moving MyNetworkTV's prime time lineup to a one-hour delay. On August 29, 2010, KARK began producing a two-hour extension of its weekday morning newscast, KARK 4 News Today for KARZ; the program—originally anchored by Matt Mosler, Mallory Hardin and Wendy Suares—competed against the national morning news programs seen on the "Big Three" networks.
On April 20, 2011, KARK became the third television station in the Little Rock–Pine Bluff market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition; the KARZ broadcasts were included in the upgrade. The 7 p.m. newscast was discontinued on September 2, 2011; on September 5, the station added a half-hour late-evening sports program, Arkansas Sports Nation, a co-production of KARK and Fayetteville sister station KNWA-TV. All KARK-produced news programming on KARZ was discontinued on February 1, 2013; the morning newscast was repurposed as a KLRT broadcast on February 4, 2013, after production of that station's newscasts was absorbed into KARK's news department through the KLRT/KASN duopoly's JSA/SSA with Nexstar.

Technical information

The station's ATSC 1.0 guest and 3.0 lighthouse signals are multiplexed:
ChannelRes.AspectShort nameProgramming
42.1720p16:9KARZ-DTMyNetworkTV
42.2480i16:9BounceBounce TV