KDVR

KDVR (channel 31) is a television station in Denver, Colorado, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. It is simulcast full-time over satellite station KFCT (channel 22) in Fort Collins. The two stations are owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside CW owned-and-operated station KWGN-TV (channel 2). Studios and offices are located on East Speer Boulevard in Denver's Speer neighborhood. KDVR's transmitter is located atop Lookout Mountain, near Golden, while KFCT's transmitter lies atop Horsetooth Mountain just outside Fort Collins.

KFCT covers areas of northern Colorado, being that area's only full-power television station, that receive a marginal to non-existent signal from KDVR, though there is significant overlap between the coverage areas of both KDVR and KFCT's signals otherwise (including in Fort Collins proper and the nearby cities of Greeley, Windsor and Longmont). On-air references to KFCT are limited to Federal Communications Commission (FCC)–mandated hourly station identifications during newscasts and other programming. Aside from the transmitter, KFCT does not maintain any physical presence locally in Fort Collins.

History

Early history

Denver had a fairly long wait to receive a second independent station to compete with the longer-established KWGN, especially for a market of its size. On paper, the market's population had been large enough to support two independents since the early 1960s. However, the Denver market is geographically one of the most expansive in the country, stretching across large and mountainous swaths of eastern Colorado, eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska. Denver's four major commercial stations, as well as PBS member KRMA-TV, operated extensive translator networks to cover the vast area, and the expense of building so many translators to extend a new station's signal to these areas scared off potential owners. Additionally, the only available allocations were on the UHF band, and UHF stations do not cover mountainous territory very well.

By the late 1970s, however, cable television—then as now, a must for acceptable television reception in some parts of the market, even in the digital era—had gained enough penetration to make a second independent viable. Also around this time, satellite television providers also began to uplink Denver stations nationwide via C-band, allowing those stations to cover the entire market with less infrastructure and translators more confined to population centers than a traditional translator network would have required in the past.

In 1977, the FCC received two applications for the channel, from Trinity Broadcasting of Denver and La Unidad Broadcasting Corporation (later changed to LUB Television Associates). La Unidad proposed to build the first full-power Spanish-language television station in Colorado and won the construction permit for what was initially dubbed KTMX-TV on February 24, 1981. In the meantime, channel 31 in Denver made television history in February 1980 as the first ever satellite-fed translator with a direct program source, KA2XEG, was launched by the Spanish International Network. While LUB seemed poised to upgrade this service to full-power status, it ultimately opted to sell the construction permit to Centennial Broadcasting Corporation, a group associated with KTXL in Sacramento, California. It was only in October 1990 that Univision finally gained a full-power affiliate of its own in Denver in KCEC (channel 50).

Having changed plans to become an English language general-entertainment independent under new KDVR call letters, channel 31 first signed on the air on August 10, 1983. It was the first new commercial television station to sign on in the Denver market since KCNC-TV (channel 4) debuted in December 1953 and the first full-service UHF television station in the state of Colorado. The station originally operated from studio facilities located near 7th Avenue and Auraria Parkway. Channel 31 originally operated as a typical general entertainment independent station, running a lineup of cartoons, classic sitcoms, drama series, movies and religious programming. After KWGN turned down an offer to affiliate with the new Fox network prior to its launch in 1986, KDVR stepped in and became a charter affiliate of Fox when it launched on October 9 of that year. KDVR eventually changed its on-air branding to "Fox 31" in the late 1980s. Centennial sold KDVR to Chase Broadcasting in 1990; Chase subsequently merged with Renaissance Broadcasting in 1992.

On September 1, 1994, Renaissance signed on KFCT (channel 22) in Fort Collins (located north of Denver) to serve as a full-time satellite to improve KDVR's over-the-air coverage in northern portions of the market (expanding its coverage area north to the Wyoming border) that could not receive its signal.

Fox Television Stations ownership

Renaissance sold KDVR and KFCT to Fox Television Stations for $70 million on November 15, 1994, in exchange for acquiring that network's owned-and-operated station in Dallas–Fort Worth, KDAF (which was set to lose Fox programming to that market's longtime CBS affiliate, KDFW, as a result of a ten-station affiliation deal with New World Communications); As part of a series of attempts to prevent News Corporation (the parent company of Fox at the time) from acquiring additional stations, NBC filed a request to the FCC to reject the trade, on the grounds that the company was in violation of foreign ownership rules (which prohibit a foreign-owned company from maintaining more than a 25% interest in a U.S. television station).

However, the deal was approved by the FCC and subsequently finalized on July 3, 1995, effectively making channel 31 a Fox owned-and-operated station and the second O&O of a major English language network in the Denver market (KCNC had been owned by NBC from 1986, when the station's owner General Electric added it to NBC's owned-and-operated stations division, until September 9, 1995, when it was traded to CBS along with KUTV in Salt Lake City (which was acquired by NBC the year before) as part of a multi-station trade deal that also involved WCAU and KYW-TV in Philadelphia and the transmitter facilities of WCIX (now WFOR-TV) and WTVJ in Miami due to a multi-part affiliation deal between the network and KYW-TV's then-parent Westinghouse Electric Corporation, thru its broadcasting division Group W, which was resulted in all three companies' owned stations (including WBZ-TV and WJZ-TV) becoming CBS affiliates).

The deal with New World that spurred Fox's trade of KDAF with KDVR would play a factor in the Denver market on September 10, 1995, when CBS affiliate KMGH-TV (channel 7) switched to ABC, NBC affiliate KCNC-TV took over the CBS affiliation, and ABC affiliate KUSA-TV (channel 9) switched to NBC; with the sale to Fox being finalized on July 3, 1995, KDVR was not affected by the switches (it is currently the only television station in the Denver market to have never changed its network affiliation). Fox never intended to hold on to KDVR for long; it initially planned to divest the station to Qwest Broadcasting (a company backed by Quincy Jones and Tribune Broadcasting) and move its affiliation to KWGN. In turn, KDVR would have inherited KWGN's WB affiliation. However, this deal never came to fruition. After becoming a Fox-owned station, KDVR added first-run talk and reality shows to its daytime schedule, while continuing to carry sitcoms during the evening and late night hours. In September 2006, KDVR, along with other Fox-owned stations, had their websites migrated to the MyFox platform, featuring expanded multimedia and social networking features.

Local TV and Tribune ownership

On December 22, 2007, Fox Television Stations entered into an agreement to sell KDVR and seven other Fox owned-and-operated stations to Local TV (a holding company operated by private equity firm Oak Hill Capital Partners), adding to the nine stations that the group had acquired in May of that same year when it bought the broadcasting division of The New York Times Company. The sale was finalized on July 14, 2008. On September 17, 2008, Tribune Broadcasting announced that Local TV would begin managing KWGN under a local marketing agreement and consolidate its operations with KDVR effective October 1, as a result of the formation of a "broadcast management company" that was created to provide management services to stations owned by both Tribune and Local TV. KWGN vacated its longtime studios in Greenwood Village and consolidated its operations with KDVR at its Speer Boulevard facility. As part of the Local TV-Tribune partnership, on January 22, 2009, KDVR's website switched from the MyFox platform to a website platform managed by Tribune Interactive. Tribune bought KDVR outright on July 1, 2013, as part of its $2.75 billion acquisition of Local TV; the sale was finalized on December 27, forming a legal duopoly between KDVR and KWGN.

Sinclair purchase attempt; sale to Nexstar

Sinclair Broadcast Group announced that it would acquire Tribune Media on May 8, 2017 for $3.9 billion, plus the assumption of $2.7 billion in debt held by Tribune. KDVR was then identified as one of 23 stations that Sinclair would divest to obtain regulatory approval for the merger with Fox Television Stations agreeing to a repurchase as part of a $910 million deal. Both transactions were nullified on August 9, 2018 following Tribune Media's termination of the merger and FCC lead commission Ajit Pai's public rejection of the deal.

Nexstar Media Group announced it would acquire the assets of Tribune Media on December 3, 2018 for $6.4 billion in cash and debt. The deal closed on September 19, 2019. As Nexstar already owned or managed the state's other two Fox affiliates ( KXRM-TV/Colorado Springs and KFQX/ Grand Junction), along with KRQE-DT2 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which serves the southern reaches of Colorado with Durango satellite KREZ-TV, Nexstar consolidated its ownership of all Fox stations in Colorado with the deal.

Programming

KDVR clears the entire Fox network schedule (nightly prime time, Saturday late night, and Fox Sports programming, along with the network's Saturday morning infomercial block ''Weekend Marketplace'', the E/I block '' Xploration Station'' on weekdays, and the Sunday political talk show ''Fox News Sunday''). In addition, the station produces ''Everyday'', an hour-long lifestyle program which originated as an afternoon program on sister station KWGN in 2008 as ''Everyday with Libby and Natalie'' (then hosted by evening anchor Libby Weaver and reporter Natalie Tysdal); the program moved to KDVR on March 1, 2010, effectively moving to late mornings with the move.

Syndicated programming

Syndicated programs broadcast by KDVR include ''Wheel of Fortune'', ''Jeopardy!'', ''Live with Kelly and Ryan'', ''Judge Judy'' and ''The Simpsons'' (which also airs first run episodes).

In late August 2014, KDVR acquired the Sony game shows ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel of Fortune'' to premiere on September 8 of that year after they moved from their longtime home of KMGH due to Scripps (KMGH's owner) continually removing the shows from their stations throughout the country for lower-cost internally produced programming and local newscasts. The two game shows displaced the longtime hour of ''The Simpsons'' leading into prime time to after KDVR's 10 p.m. news.

KDVR is one of ten Fox affiliates to air both ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel''; the others are WBFF in Baltimore; WSYT in Syracuse, New York; WXIX-TV in Cincinnati; WLUK-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin; WVUE-DT in New Orleans; KVHP in Lake Charles, Louisiana; WALA-TV in Mobile, Alabama; WLUC-DT2 in Marquette, Michigan; and WDAF-TV in Kansas City.

Sports programming

Since 1994, with the startup of Fox's own sports division, KDVR has been involved in the Denver pro sports teams through Fox Sports. KDVR is given at least two Denver Broncos games to be aired (when an NFC team plays at Empower Field at Mile High); starting in 2014, with the institution of the NFL's "cross-flex" rules, games that involve the Broncos either playing another AFC opponent or games on the road can be arbitrarily moved from KCNC to KDVR, and since 2018, via Fox's exclusive contract, all ''Thursday Night Football'' games air on KDVR. The station aired the Broncos' second Super Bowl championship in Super Bowl XXXIII, as well as the team's appearance in Super Bowl XLVIII.

Since 1996, through Fox's MLB broadcast contract, select Colorado Rockies games have aired on KDVR, including the team's appearance in the 2007 World Series. In addition, when Fox held the NHL over-the-air broadcast contract from 1995 to 1999, games involving the Colorado Avalanche were also televised on KDVR. During the Avalanche's 1996 Stanley Cup run, games 1 and 3 were aired on KDVR.

On August 7, 2014, KDVR entered into a partnership with the Denver Broncos to broadcast head coach John Fox's weekly analysis show (which had been airing on KMGH-TV as ''The John Fox Show'' since 2012); the program, which moved to KDVR under the new title ''Fox on Fox'' on September 5 (preempting the second half-hour of the 9:00 p.m. newscast on Fridays), is hosted by sports director Nick Griffith.

News operation

KDVR presently broadcasts 66½ hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 11½ hours each weekday and 4½ hours each on Saturdays and Sundays). On KDVR only, it has the highest output of local newscasts on a single channel in Colorado (combined with sister KWGN-TV however, Nexstar's media properties in Denver have a combined output of 100 hours of local newscasts).

In early 2000, KDVR began plans to produce a prime time newscast to compete with KWGN's longer-established 9:00 p.m. newscast. The station built a "news and technology center" at 100 East Speer Boulevard (near downtown Denver), to house the new news department; KDVR moved its operations into the building on April 15, 2000. The news department launched three months later on July 16, with the premiere of ''Fox 31 News at 9 O'Clock''; as a result, KDVR became the last Fox-owned station to begin producing local newscasts (until WJZY in Charlotte, North Carolina, which Fox had acquired in April 2013, launched its news operation in January 2014). The program was originally anchored by Ron Zappolo (who previously served as a sports anchor at KCNC and KUSA) and Libby Weaver (who joined the station from WMAQ-TV in Chicago and had formerly hosted the syndicated entertainment news program '' Extra''), who both served as lead anchors for the newscast from its inception until Weaver's departure in 2012.

KDVR expanded news programming to mornings on March 22, 2004, with the debut of ''Good Day Colorado'', which was created to compete with KWGN's weekday morning newscast, ''WB2 Morning News'' (now titled ''Daybreak''). Initially a 2½-hour newscast beginning at 5:30 a.m., ''Good Day'' expanded over time into a four-hour block beginning at 5:00 a.m. In January 2005, KDVR began producing a 5:00 p.m. newscast on Saturday evenings; this was later followed by the launch of a half-hour 5:30 p.m. newscast on weekdays in September 2008.

After entering into the local marketing agreement, major changes were made to KDVR and KWGN's news programming to benefit both stations as best as possible. While it does hinder both stations, KDVR and KWGN each produce weekday morning newscasts that run concurrently from 5:00 to 9:00 a.m. Besides competing with KWGN, the final two hours of the newscast also compete with the KUSA-produced weekday morning newscast on KTVD. KWGN discontinued its 5:30 p.m. newscast on January 12, 2009, while KDVR pushed back its early evening newscast to 5:00 p.m. and expanded it to an hour. Two months later on March 30, KWGN moved its prime time newscast two hours earlier to 7:00 p.m. (an unusual timeslot for a network-affiliated station in the Mountain Time Zone) to avoid competition with KDVR's 9:00 p.m. newscast and scaled back the program to weekdays only, leaving a KUSA-produced prime time newscast on KTVD as KDVR's only news competition in the latter slot. There is a considerable amount of sharing between KDVR and KWGN in regards to news coverage, video footage and the use of reporters; though both outlets maintain their own primary on-air personalities (such as news anchors and meteorologists) that only appear on one station; several KWGN on-air staffers that remained with the station after the LMA was formed joined KDVR's news staff with the consolidation of news departments, with most of KDVR's news staff appearing on KWGN's newscasts as well. On June 28, 2010, KDVR added a half-hour 10:00 p.m. newscast titled ''Fox 31 Nightside'', which focuses on more hard-hitting stories than the local news programs seen on the other major network affiliates during the same timeslot.

During breaking news coverage of the fatal crash of a news helicopter rented by KOMO-TV in Seattle on March 18, 2014, the station briefly aired a Twitpic image of an adult penis sticking out from unzipped pants (immediately following images of Johnny Depp as Edward Scissorhands, and a baked food dish) as ''Good Day Colorado'' co-anchor Kurt Yuhnke searched for user-submitted pictures from the crash's aftermath on social media during the segment; some of the four anchors could be heard gasping, as master control operators quickly tossed back to the studio while Yuhnke switched to a photo from the crash site. In a statement apologizing for the incident, KDVR/KWGN news director Ed Kosowski clarified that the photo "did not come from the tablet" being used by Yuhnke and stated that the station would be "taking immediate steps to prevent such an accident from happening again." On June 1, 2014, KDVR debuted ''#COpolitics – From the Source'', an unconventionally formatted Sunday morning political discussion program that is taped at The Source food market in Denver.

Notable former on-air staff

* Crystal Egger – ''Good Day Colorado'' meteorologist (2006–2010; later at The Weather Channel, last at KNBC in Los Angeles)
* Phil Keating – weekend anchor-reporter (2000–2004; now at Fox News Channel)
* Tom Martino – "Troubleshooter" consumer reporter and host of ''Martino TV'' (2000–2011, now radio host on KHOW (630 AM); Martino filed a federal discrimination lawsuit against KDVR in 2013, alleging that the station refused to renew his contract in September 2011 after he announced that he was filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection; the suit was settled in June 2014)
* David Treadwell – sports director (2000–2005)

Technical information

Subchannels

The stations' digital signals are multiplexed:

KDVR became a charter affiliate of Antenna TV upon the network's launch on January 1, 2011; it is carried on digital subchannel 31.2. Local TV-owned KDVR was given the Antenna TV affiliation in the Denver market despite the fact that the network's corporate parent, the Tribune Company, owned KDVR's sister station KWGN-TV.

On December 7, 2017, TBD was added as KDVR and KFCT launched a third subchannel.

Analog-to-digital conversion

KDVR shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 31, on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 32. Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 31. On April 28, 2020 KDVR switched broadcast channels to UHF 36 from 32 as part of the FCC Repack, retaining the same PSIP information and virtual channel numbers.

Translators

In addition to KFCT, KDVR is relayed on the following translator stations:

References

External links

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Kdvr
Fox network affiliates
Antenna TV affiliates
TBD (TV network) affiliates
DVR
Nexstar Media Group
Television channels and stations established in 1983
1983 establishments in Colorado
Former News Corporation subsidiaries