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KHON-TV

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KHON-TV, virtual channel 2 (VHF digital channel 8), is a Fox-affiliated television station located in Honolulu, Hawaii, United States. The station is owned by LIN Media. KHON maintains studios on Piikoi Street in Honolulu; and its main transmitter is also located in the city, just northwest of the Hawaii Convention Center.

KHON also has repeater stations on all the major Hawaiian Islands to rebroadcast programs outside of metropolitan Honolulu: KHAW-TV (channel 11) in Hilo; KAII-TV (channel 7) in Wailuku; and low-power K55DZ (channel 55) in Lihue. KHON can also be seen statewide on Oceanic Time Warner Cable analog channel 3.

History

As an NBC affiliate

KHON first signed on the air on December 15, 1952 as NBC affiliate KONA-TV. The station, which is Hawaii's second-oldest television station (behind KGMB, originally on channel 9, now on channel 5), was originally owned by Herbert Richards. Two years later in 1954, the Honolulu Advertiser purchased the station. In 1956, KONA was sold to Pacific and Southern Broadcasting, the forerunner of Combined Communications. In 1965, the station's call letters were changed to the current KHON-TV. In 1973, Pacific and Southern Broadcasting decided to spin off KHON to the company's president Arthur H. McCoy, in order for the company to be officially merged into Combined Communications (which would itself merge with the Gannett Company six years later) because the merged company was over the legal station ownership limit at the time.

In 1979, KHON and its Maui satellite station KAII-TV were sold to Western-Sun Broadcasting, a subsidiary of Cowles Communications; the Hilo satellite KHAW-TV was sold to Simpson Communications, but leased back to Cowles/Western Sun. In 1985, KHON and KAII were sold to Burnham Broadcasting as part of the Cowles family's liquidation of most of its media assets; Burnham would acquire KHAW outright the next year, reuniting the stations.

Station logo from when it was an NBC affiliate. The Peacock is shown on this logo.

As a Fox affiliate

In 1994 Burnham sold KHON, along with sister stations WALA-TV in Mobile, Alabama, WLUK-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and WVUE in New Orleans, to SF Broadcasting, which was a joint venture of Savoy Pictures and the Fox Broadcasting Company, then a division of News Corporation. As part of the deal, all four stations would become Fox affiliates. Fox was slated to control the voting stock in the venture, but before the sale closed in 1995, it was determined that Fox would still hold an interest in SF although it opted not to have voting stock in the company. Savoy Pictures controlled the day-to-day operations of the four stations. A fifth Burnham station, Bakersfield, California's KBAK-TV, was excluded from the SF deal and was instead spun off to a new company formed by several former Burnham executives.

On January 1, 1996, KHON-TV switched its affiliation to Fox (and changed its on-air branding to "Fox 2"); the NBC affiliation moved to former Fox affiliate KHNL (channel 13). Unlike the New World Communications-owned Fox affiliates that joined the network during the previous 18-month span, KHON ran Fox Kids programming on weekdays (until Fox discontinued the weekday block in December 2001,[1] by that point its airings on KHON were reduced to 10 a.m. on weekdays) and Saturday mornings (until November 2008, when 4Kids Entertainment ceased programming Fox's children's block, with the network discontinuing its children's programming altogether). KHON also expanded its local news programming on weekdays, seeing an increase in newscast ratings with the affiliation switch.[2] KHON currently has the distinction of having the highest-rated local news programming of any Fox affiliate nationwide, and also declares itself as "America's No. 1 Fox affiliate", though the network's Miami affiliate WSVN makes this claim as well.[3] Neither station mentions Fox in its logo or branding; when KHON was rebranded to KHON 2 in 2004, it became the first Fox station to ditch the network's brand standardization for is stations while it was still an affiliate.

KHON-TV 1996-2004 logo.

In 1997, Savoy Pictures and Fox ended their partnership and sold the SF Broadcasting stations, including KHON-TV, to the USA Networks division Silver King Broadcasting. Silver King, which later became known as USA Broadcasting, owned several stations on the United States mainland that were affiliated with the Home Shopping Network, which was also owned by USA Networks. In 1999, USA sold all four of its Fox stations to Indianapolis-based Emmis Communications to concentrate on its formerly-HSN-affiliated independent stations. A year later in 2000, Emmis purchased CBS affiliate KGMB, effectively bringing Hawaii's two oldest television stations under common ownership, though both stations retained separate operations – unlike what would become the common operational structure of most duopolies. Emmis received a crossownership waiver to acquire KGMB as Federal Communications Commission duopoly rules prohibit two of the four highest-rated stations in the same market from being owned by one company.

From 2002 to 2004, KHON carried select programs from UPN via a secondary affiliation shared with KGMB; each station aired programs the other one did not air. KFVE (then on channel 5, now on channel 9), which had served as Honolulu's UPN affiliate since the network's January 1995 inception, decided to drop its affiliation with that network in September 2002 and switch its main affiliation to The WB (whose programming aired on KFVE as a secondary affiliation from 1998 until that point). KIKU (channel 20), an independent station specializing in Japanese programming, became a secondary UPN affiliate in November 2004 and remained with the network until UPN shut down in September 2006.

Sale to Montecito

In 2005, Emmis decided to exit from television to focus on its radio stations, and sold KHON to the Montecito Broadcast Group (formerly SJL Broadcast Group). The acquisition resulted in one of the rare instances in which two stations operated in a duopoly were completely separated due to Emmis owning KHON and KGMB under a waiver; the sale closed on January 27, 2006. The sale was controversial due to Montecito's plan to replace 35 of KHON's 111 employees with automation. KHON employees first learned of the plan on January 12, when general manager Rick Blangiardi notified the staff of his intent to resign once the sale was finalized. At a station staff meeting that afternoon, SJL announced the layoffs, which would take place in two phases over the course of two months. Anchor Joe Moore announced the plan at the end of that evening's 6:00 p.m. newscast, and stated his concern that the change would impact the station's ability to serve its viewers.[4] Montecito responded on January 15, assuring the public that no reporters or anchors would be affected, and the 6:00 p.m. newscast would be largely unchanged from the viewer's perspective.[5]

The purchase of KHON was scheduled to close on January 26; however, Montecito was unable to complete the purchase of KHON that day, due to a mix-up in paperwork. As a result, Emmis announced that no employees would be fired as a result of the sale until at least March 31, and that Emmis would pay additional benefits to the affected employees.[6] Moore used the last minutes of the 6:00 p.m. newscast, the final newscast under Emmis' ownership, to bid farewell to Blangiardi (who continues to manage KHON's former sister station, KGMB) and to criticize Montecito. Among other charges, he claimed that the layoffs were tantamount to "the butchering of an already lean work force" and accused Montecito of being a "virtual company" with no physical offices. Montecito's chief operating officer, Sandy Benton, disputed the charges, saying that "what was said last night was not the truth."[7]

Since the purchase, KHON's new general manager, Joe MacNamara, changed the scope of the terminations: instead of a number of people to fire, a salary goal was given.[8] Eight of KHON's nine managers resigned over three days, each stating that they could not support Montecito's decision to terminate employees (only the chief engineer remained). The managers involved, including Blangiardi, denied that the mass exodus was planned.[9] Montecito continued to stand by the automation plan, pointing out that most of the markets it had entered have seen ratings increases as a result of Montecito management.

On June 28, 2006, Moore appeared to take another on-air dig at Montecito's automation plan. For two weeks, a noticeable echo could be heard during the newscast. At the start of that night's 10 p.m. newscast, it prompted Moore to stop and ask the technical crew if the problem could be fixed. A visibly disgusted Moore then blamed the new automated system, said "We're going to go to commercial. We're going to get this straightened out because I'm fed up with this crap." When the newscast returned, the problem was fixed, and Moore resumed as normal.[citation needed] Moore, who was rumored to be considering leaving KHON as a result of the sale, decided to remain as the station's chief anchor. In a February 6 email sent to staff members, Moore wrote, "How could I possibly work for owners I do not respect? After much deliberation, I reached this conclusion ... the owners are not KHON-2. We, the people who work here are KHON-2. I would not be working for the owners. I would be working for our viewers, and with fellow employees I deeply respect. I have decided not to let our owners drive me out of KHON-2."[citation needed]

Sale to New Vision Television, then LIN Media

On July 24, 2007, Montecito announced the sale of all of its stations (KHON, KOIN in Portland, KSNW in Wichita and its satellites, and KSNT in Topeka) to New Vision Television. On November 1 of that year, New Vision officially took over ownership of the stations.[10]

On May 7, 2012, LIN Media announced its acquisition of the New Vision stations for $330.4 million and the assumption of $12 million in debt.[11] The FCC approved the sale to LIN on October 2,[12] and the group deal was consummated ten days later on October 12, 2012, reuniting KHON-TV and its Oregon and Kansas sister stations with several former Emmis-owned stations which had been purchased by LIN seven years earlier, such as WALA-TV, WLUK-TV and Albuquerque, New Mexico's KRQE.[13] On October 11, 2013, KHON began broadcasting newscasts in HD with a new set and new logo. The debut was made during their 5PM newscast.

Digital television

Digital channels

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[14]
2.1 720p 16:9 KHON-HD Main KHON-TV programming / Fox
2.2 480i 4:3 KHON-CW The CW

Analog-to-digital conversion

KHON-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 2, on January 15, 2009,[15] the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts (six months before the June 12 transition date for full-power stations on the U.S. mainland). The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition VHF channel 8.[16] Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former VHF analog channel 2.

On that same date, KHAW-TV relocate its digital signal from UHF channel 21 to its former analog-era VHF channel 11; while KAII-TV relocated its digital signal from UHF channel 36 to its former analog-era VHF channel 7.[16] K55DZ currently broadcasts in analog only, though it has applied with the FCC to operate a digital signal on channel 28.[17]

Hawaii's CW

On October 23, 2006, KHON-TV was announced as the Honolulu affiliate of The CW, carrying the network on its second digital subchannel.[18] Beginning in March 2006 (two months after the network's launch was announced), The CW had struggled to find an affiliate in Honolulu after the market's then-WB affiliate KFVE, which was seen by many as the likeliest candidate to join The CW, signed with competing network MyNetworkTV, and former UPN affiliate KIKU (which aired the network's programming in the afternoons) declined to take the CW affiliation.

The network premiered on KHON's main channel on October 24 and 25 with airings of the regular CW schedule before moving to digital channel 2.2 on October 30; this was possible due to Fox's World Series coverage airing live at 2 p.m. Honolulu time,[19] freeing up prime time. On December 11, 2006, Oceanic Time Warner Cable began offering KHON-TV's CW subchannel on digital cable channel 93; until the fall of 2011, the subchannel used its cable channel position within its branding.[20] The channel is currently available only on cable on Kauai, since KHON's Lihue translator only operates an analog signal.

KHON-DT2 presently clears The CW's entire schedule, including its daytime and Saturday morning blocks. However, the subchannel had aired The CW's Sunday night lineup an hour off-schedule, from 5-10 p.m. until the Sunday lineup was dropped and the hours given to its affiliates in September 2009. Syndicated programming on the subchannel includes 'Til Death, The Jerry Springer Show and Maury, along with repeats of some KHON-TV programming. The subchannel is also available locally on DirecTV and Dish Network; the '93' in the subchannel's branding was removed for this reason, as its channel numbers are different on those providers. On August 20, 2007, "Hawaii's CW" began airing the nationally syndicated morning news program The Daily Buzz.[21] The show's former home in the Honolulu market, KGMB, dropped the show three days earlier on August 17 in favor of a local morning newscast titled Sunrise on KGMB9, which launched on September 17. Unlike KGMB, which only aired the first two hours of The Daily Buzz, "Hawaii's CW" airs the entire three-hour broadcast each weekday from 5 to 8 a.m.

Incidentally, KHON was a secondary affiliate of one of The CW's predecessor networks, UPN, from 2002 to 2004 – at a time when secondary affiliations were more common and the advent of digital subchannels was not as widespread as it is today. "Hawaii's CW" does not have its own website; the only mentions of the subchannel on KHON's website are in the station's programming schedule and a link to The CW's website.

Satellite stations

These stations rebroadcast KHON-TV's signal throughout Hawaii:

Station City of license Channel First air date Call letters’
meaning 		ERP HAAT Facility ID Transmitter Coordinates
KHAW-TV Hilo 11 (VHF) November 27, 1961 HAWaii 3.35 kW 30.5 m 4146 19°42′51″N 155°8′3″W / 19.71417°N 155.13417°W / 19.71417; -155.13417 (KHAW-TV)
KAII-TV Wailuku 7 (VHF) November 19581 HawAII 3.69 kW 753 m 4145 20°39′27″N 156°21′39″W / 20.65750°N 156.36083°W / 20.65750; -156.36083 (KAII-TV)

Notes:

  • 1. The Broadcasting and Cable Yearbook says KAII-TV signed on November 17, while the Television and Cable Factbook says it signed on November 19.

Programming

KHON clears the entire Fox network schedule (nightly primetime, Saturday late night, and Fox Sports programming, along with the network's Saturday morning infomerical block, Weekend Marketplace and the political talk show Fox News Sunday). However, the station presently airs Fox's Sunday night programming one hour later than other affiliates, from 7-10 p.m. Hawaii Time (instead of the 6-9 p.m. slot common with other network affiliates in Hawaii), and the network's Animation Domination HD late night lineup on Saturdays airs a half-hour later airing at 10:30 p.m., due to its nightly 10 p.m. newscast. In lieu of a primetime newscast, second-run syndicated programs air during the 9 p.m. hour Monday through Saturdays, while network programs air in that hour on Sundays (syndicated programs may air in place of network shows if Fox airs a sporting event that is scheduled for primetime on the U.S. mainland, but due to the time differences between Hawaii and the continental United States, airs on KHON earlier that day).

KHON's CW subchannel aired weekly CFL broadcasts for the 2007 season after former University of Hawaii star quarterback Timmy Chang earned a backup spot with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in the pre-season.[22]

For several years, both Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune aired on KHON. Jeopardy! has since moved to KGMB, this made Honolulu one of the few markets where Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune air on separate stations. Other syndicated programs airing on KHON include Live! with Kelly and Michael, The People's Court, Dr. Phil, Rachael Ray, The Big Bang Theory, The Arsenio Hall Show and Two and a Half Men.

News operation

File:KHON open.png
KHON newscast title card; seen nightly at 10.

KHON-TV presently broadcasts 29 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 5½ hours on weekdays, and one hour each on Saturdays and Sundays). KHON is the only news-producing Fox affiliate in the United States – and the only Fox station that runs any local news programming – that does not air a primetime newscast. In Hawaii, the major networks' primetime programming ends at 10 p.m., using the same scheduling as network-affiliated stations in the Central, Mountain and Alaska time zones in the continental U.S.; this means that Fox stations would generally air their late evening newscasts at 9 p.m., instead KHON airs its late newscast at 10 p.m., competing against KITV, KGMB and KHNL instead of only competing with KFVE (whose 9 p.m. newscast is produced by the joint Hawaii News Now operation also involving KFVE sister stations KGMB and KHNL).

KHON-TV's newscasts have been the highest-rated in Hawaii for almost 30 years, since the station hired former KGMB sports anchor Joe Moore to become its lead anchor in 1979. The station's news operation is so well respected that even after it began branding itself as "Fox 2", it still titled its newscasts Channel 2 News (later revised as KHON 2 News). For this reason, KHON's newscasts are not branded as Fox 2 News and its late newscast is not titled The Ten O'Clock News like with other Fox stations.

Joe Moore, "Hawaii's most watched television newscaster" according to KHON, is the station's lead anchor, who in addition to his duties on the 6 and 10 p.m. flagship newscasts, also anchors Hawaii's World Report at 5:30, a round-up of world and national news reports from CNN and Fox News. Moore is frequently the subject of controversy, but his popularity in the state usually prevents any attempts to rein him in.

As of 2012, KHON is the only major U.S. network-affiliated television station in Hawaii that has yet to make the upgrade to high definition or 16:9 enhanced definition widescreen local newscasts (KITV (channel 4) upgraded its newscasts to widescreen that year), as well as one of two LIN Media television properties that has yet to broadcast its local programming in high definition or widescreen (the other being WLFI-TV). On March 23, 2012, KHON president and general manager Joe McNamara stated in an a New Vision Television press release that "in the coming months, additional changes will be taking place inside our (KHON) studios with state-of-the-art HD upgrades of cameras, lighting and newsroom systems that will enhance our on-air look tremendously."[23]

News/station presentation

Newscast titles

  • "The Evening News"/"The Night News" (1960s)
  • "TV-2 Eyewitness News" (mid-late 1970s)
  • "Channel 2 Action News" (1979–1982)
  • "Channel 2 News" (1982–2003)
  • "KHON 2 News" (2003–present)

Station slogans

  • "Check The Big 2" (1965)
  • "2 Belongs" (1979–1982)
  • "Hawaii's Place To Be" (1985–1990)
  • "Hawaii's 24-Hour News Channel" (1990–1996)
  • "Hawaii's News Channel" (1996–2010)
  • "Hawaii's News Leader" (2010–present)

News team

Current on-air staff[24]

Anchors
  • Justin Cruz - weeknights at 5 p.m.; also weeknight weather anchor
  • Jai Cunningham - weekday mornings on Wake Up 2Day (4:30-5 a.m.); also reporter
  • Olena Heu - weekday mornings on Wake Up 2Day (5-8 a.m.); also reporter
  • Ron Mizutani - weekday mornings on Wake Up 2Day (5-8 a.m.); also reporter
  • Joe Moore - weeknights at 5:30 (Hawaii's World Report), 6 and 10 p.m.
  • Kathy Muneno - weeknights at 5 p.m.
  • Marisa Yamane - weekends at 6 and 10 p.m.; also reporter
KHON 2 Weather
  • Justin Cruz - chief weather anchor; weeknights at 5, 6 and 10 p.m.
  • Trini Kaopuiki - weather anchor; weekends at 6 and 10 p.m.
  • Kanoe Gibson - weather anchor; weekday mornings on Wake Up 2Day (5-8 a.m.)
Sports team
  • Kanoa Leahey - sports director; weeknights at 6 and 10 p.m.
  • Rob DeMello - sports anchor; weekends at 6 and 10 p.m.; also sports reporter
Reporters
  • Taizo Braden - general assignment reporter/video journalist, and weekday morning traffic reporter
  • Gina Mangieri - general assignment reporter
  • Kirk Matthews - general assignment reporter
  • Manolo Morales - weekday morning reporter
  • Tammy Mori - general assignment reporter
  • Brianne Randle - general assignment reporter
  • Vanessa Stewart - general assignment reporter
  • Kristine Uyeno - general assignment reporter; also fill-in anchor

Former on-air staff

References

  1. ^ Schneider, Michael (November 7, 2001). "Fox outgrows kids programs". Variety. Retrieved 2009-08-13.
  2. ^ "Herwitz jumps on as New World spins to Fox" - Electronic Media 19 August 1996
  3. ^ http://www.khon2.com/khon/display.cfm?sid=1175
  4. ^ KHON to slash work force, The Star-Bulletin, Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  5. ^ KHON-TV reporters, anchors will not be among the cuts, KPUA, January 15, 2006. Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  6. ^ Sale of KHON complicated by neglected paperwork, The Star-Bulletin, Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  7. ^ On-air criticism lands KHON’s Moore in hot water, The Star-Bulletin, Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  8. ^ Exodus takes shape at KHON, The Star-Bulletin, Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  9. ^ 8 of 9 KHON managers resigning amid cuts, The Star-Bulletin, Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  10. ^ New Vision Buys Montecito Stations, Broadcasting & Cable, July 24, 2007. Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  11. ^ Malone, Michael (May 7, 2012). "LIN Acquiring New Vision Stations for $330 Million". Broadcasting & Cable. Retrieved May 7, 2012. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  12. ^ http://licensing.fcc.gov/prod/cdbs/pubacc/Auth_Files/1498980.pdf
  13. ^ LIN Completes New Vision Stations, TVNewsCheck, October 12, 2012. Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  14. ^ RabbitEars TV Query for KHON
  15. ^ http://www.hawaiigoesdigital.com
  16. ^ a b "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and Second Rounds" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-03-24.
  17. ^ FCC database record for K55DZ
  18. ^ http://starbulletin.com/breaking/breaking.php?id=5032
  19. ^ http://www.khon2.com/news/local/4463572.html
  20. ^ http://www.khon2.com/news/local/4890046.html
  21. ^ http://www.khon2.com/programs?height=120&nav=y
  22. ^ http://www.trajectorysports.com/pr_june_28_2007.html
  23. ^ Joe Moore is Clearly Hawaii's Anchorman in the February 2012 Nielsen Ratings, New Vision Television, March 23, 2012. Retrieved May 14, 2013.
  24. ^ Talent Profiles

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