KGMB
KGMB is a television station in Honolulu, Hawaii, United States, serving the Hawaiian Islands as an affiliate of CBS. It is owned by Gray Media alongside dual NBC/Telemundo affiliate KHNL and Kailua-Kona–licensed KFVE, which relays KHNL's second and sixth digital subchannels. The stations share studios on Waiakamilo Road in Honolulu's Kapālama neighborhood; KGMB's transmitter is located in Akupu, Hawaii.
History
The station first signed on the air on December 1, 1952, as the second television station in Hawaii. KGMB-TV was originally owned by J. Howard Worrall along with KGMB radio and operated from studios on Kapiolani Boulevard in Honolulu. The station carried programming from three of the four major networks at the time, but was a primary CBS affiliate owing to KGMB-AM's long affiliation with CBS Radio. The station lost NBC programming when KONA-TV signed on two weeks later, and lost ABC when KULA-TV launched in April 1954. In 1973, a partnership led by future Hawaii congressman Cecil Heftel bought KGMB-AM-TV, then turned around and sold the KGMB stations to Lee Enterprises in 1977. Lee sold off the radio station in 1980. In 1982, the station dropped the "-TV" suffix from its call sign.The real-life KGMB news crew was often featured in one of the longest-running police dramas on CBS in the 1970s, Hawaii Five-O. The station also had ties to the iconic series' reboot, as CBS allowed KGMB to let its viewers preview the season premiere episode early at the Waikiki Shell each September during the rebooted series' run.
Image:KGMB9 Logo 2007.png|thumb|Former KGMB logo, used from 2007 to 2009. In 2012, KGMB brought back the "9" logo for its 60th anniversary with the "9" flipping to a "6" in promos.
In 2000, Lee exited from television broadcasting and sold most of its television holdings to Emmis Communications. Emmis already owned KHON-TV, so it had to obtain a cross-ownership waiver for the purchase of KGMB from the Federal Communications Commission, to bypass the recently passed duopoly rules that forbid common ownership of two of the four highest-rated stations in a single market. This waiver was renewed several times while Emmis owned both stations. At that time, KHON moved its operations into KGMB's facility, though the two stations maintained separate news departments.
From September 2, 2002, to October 31, 2004, KGMB carried select UPN programming via a secondary affiliation shared with KHON; each station aired programs from that network that the other station did not air. The two stations began carrying UPN programming in September 2002 after KFVE disaffiliated from the network to become a full-time affiliate of The WB. KIKU, an independent station specializing in Japanese programming, became a secondary UPN affiliate on November 1, 2004, and remained with the network until its closure on September 15, 2006.
Emmis itself prepared to exit the television industry and sold KHON to the Montecito Broadcast Group in 2006. Emmis then announced on February 20, 2007, that KGMB and its satellites had been sold to MCG Capital Corporation for $40 million, resulting in one of the rare instances involving a complete separation of a television station duopoly. The FCC approved the sale in late May and was completed on June 4, 2007. Shortly after MCG Capital Corporation took over, KGMB adopted a logo similar to the one it used in the early 1980s and also rolled out a new graphics package for its newscast and a new website.
For many years, KGMB billed itself as "One of the Good Things About Hawaii" with its rich history of local television programming exclusively in Hawaii, especially in such shows as Skipper Al and Checkers & Pogo, The Hawaii Moving Company, and the 1982 television special Rap's Hawaii starring Rap Reiplinger. This slogan was made famous by an a cappella jingle which is still heard on KGMB today. At the end of KGMB's morning newscast, Sunrise, it can now be heard leading into CBS Mornings. Later, with an emphasis on weather, the station branded itself "Hawaii's Severe Weather Station".
Channel swap
On August 18, 2009, MCG Capital and Raycom Media announced a shared services agreement with Raycom as senior partner. As part of the deal, KGMB vacated its longtime studios on Kapiolani Boulevard; the combined operation would be based at KHNL/KFVE's studios on Waiakamilo Road. Though non-news programming would remain in place, news operations of the three stations would be combined into a single entity. The arrangement would also see a channel swap, with KGMB moving from virtual channel 9 to channel 5 and KFVE move from 5 to 9.The resulting ownership arrangement of the stations generated some controversy, as it had the effect of Raycom trading KFVE to MCG Capital in return for KGMB. Organizations such as media watchdog group Media Council Hawaii viewed the plan as a way to circumvent FCC rules preventing one company owning two of the four highest-rated stations in the same market—in this case, KGMB and KHNL. However, the FCC only recognizes ownership of facility identifications, which remain attached to their channel numbers, and not ownership of a station's intellectual unit. In this case, Raycom kept ownership of Facility ID 34445, now belonging to KGMB, while MCG Capital still owns Facility ID 36917, which now belonged to KFVE; the overall viewership of channel 5, as KFVE, fell outside the criteria that would have otherwise barred a duopoly between KHNL and KGMB if facility IDs were traded as well.
Raycom Media president Paul McTear staunchly defended the SSA, stating it would "preserve three stations that provide important and valuable local, national and international programming to viewers in Hawaii." Further controversy over the SSA grew after a November 7, 2009, report in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin revealed that Raycom would pay MCG Capital Corporation $22 million – which, in effect, would constitute a sale of KGMB from MCG Capital to Raycom. Both companies did not mention any monetary exchanges during its August SSA announcement, only "assets". The FCC, in response to Media Council Hawaii's filing of an objection over the SSA, asked Raycom for detailed, unredacted agreements in relation to the SSA.
The SSA and channel swap took effect on October 26, 2009, with KGMB moving from virtual channel 9 to channel 5 and changing its branding from "KGMB 9" to just "KGMB." An estimated 68 positions from a total of 198 between the three stations would be eliminated as part of the agreement. On May 8, 2010, the remaining items and memorabilia that were left at KGMB's former studios were auctioned off, with proceeds going to charity.
Removal from Nielsen ratings
Beginning in 2016, the Hawaii News Now group of KGMB, KHNL, and KFVE severed ties to the Nielsen ratings. After the November 25 sweeps, Raycom opted to use other research to track KHNL and KGMB audiences. KFVE, owned by HITV, is affected also. In Hawaii, Nielsen does not use electronic means to track audiences. Recently, only 914 of the printed Nielsen booklets, known as monthly diaries, were completed out of 11,400 diaries. KITV and KHON will continue to use Nielsen ratings.Sale to Gray Television
On June 25, 2018, Atlanta-based Gray Television announced it had reached an agreement with Raycom to merge their respective broadcasting assets under the former's corporate umbrella. In the cash-and-stock merger transaction, valued at $3.6 billion, Gray shareholders would acquire preferred stock currently held by Raycom. Because Raycom operates three stations in the Honolulu market, the companies were required to sell either KHNL, KGMB or KFVE to another station owner in order to comply with FCC ownership rules.On November 1, 2018, Nexstar Media Group – which has owned Fox affiliate KHON-TV since January 2017 – announced that it would acquire KFVE and the licenses of satellites KGMD-TV and KGMV from American Spirit Media for $6.5 million. Nexstar concurrently assumed the station's operations through a time brokerage agreement that took effect the day the transaction paperwork was filed with the FCC, under which Raycom forwarded the rights to certain managerial services involving KFVE – not counting certain other services to which Raycom would retain stewardship under the TBA – on a transitional basis. Under the deal, which is expected to receive regulatory approval in the first quarter of 2019, Nexstar also intends to integrate KFVE's operations into KHON's studio facilities at the Hawaiki Tower on Piikoi and Waimanu Streets. However, Raycom will retain rights to the KFVE intellectual unit, which will be shifted to a digital subchannel of either KHNL or KGMB as will KFVE-DT2's Bounce TV affiliation ; the KFVE calls will also be retained by Raycom for branding continuity. As such, Nexstar will likely assign new call letters to the channel 9 license as well as acquire programming to replace that being maintained by Raycom post-acquisition
The sale of KFVE to Nexstar was approved by the FCC on December 17; the Gray-Raycom merger was approved three days later. The sale was completed on January 2, 2019.
Programming
KGMB clears all CBS programming, although it will occasionally preempt prime time shows until the overnight hours in order to broadcast locally produced specials. In its early days, the only major CBS programs KGMB regularly preempted were Captain Kangaroo and the CBS Morning News, due to its morning broadcast of the popular in-house children's program Checkers & Pogo, which also aired in the afternoon. Like most of the other network-affiliated stations in Hawaii, KGMB had to shuffle CBS programs because the shows were flown in via air mail or shipped a week after the programs aired in the U.S. mainland; the CBS Evening News in particular would often air at 12 midnight or later depending on how late the tape was in arriving from the East Coast.KGMB airs CBS' daytime programs in a very different order from the main network feed; this is because the station airs the lineup in the order that it arrives from the network, which for unknown reasons is different from that of most CBS affiliates. From September 14, 1998, to the September 18, 2009, conclusion of Guiding Light, air times included The Price Is Right at 10 a.m., The Bold and the Beautiful at 11:30 a.m., Guiding Light at noon, The Young and the Restless at 1 p.m., and As the World Turns at 2 p.m. In most other markets, Y&R aired first, followed by B&B, ATWT, and GL. Let's Make a Deal assumed the noon slot when it debuted on October 5, 2009, while The Talk took over the 2 p.m. time slot on October 18, 2010. The station also airs the weekday edition of CBS Mornings an hour later, from 8 to 10 a.m. local time, due to its morning newscast Sunrise airing until 8 a.m. On weekdays outside of network hours, KGMB airs syndicated first-run shows during the daytime and sitcom reruns overnight. On weekends during the Hawaii Warriors football season, KGMB airs The Nick Rolovich Show, which recaps the last game played and previews the next one.