the HOT List

The nation's leading multimedia company superserving African American consumers has taken an important step toward bringing the second casino gaming resort it is connected with to fruition. It involves a multimillion-dollar upfront payment to the City of Richmond.

On Feb. 11, 2018, Ray Moran, the founder of Ramar Communications, passed away. The Lubbock, Tex., TV stations it owned were sold in October 2020. Now, an Albuquerque spin has been agreed upon by the children of Mr. Moran. The broker: Kalil & Co.

In just four years, Bill Christian and Mike Reed launched, from scratch, a group of television stations serving Lafayette, Ind. They'd go on to acquire other TV stations, building up operations in Jonesboro, Ark., and the Tri-Cities of Tennessee.  Now, Christian and Reed are selling nearly all of their TV stations and all of their radio stations. Kalil & Co. is the broker.

The FCC has moved forward with a Forfeiture Order that imposes a $512,228 per-station penalty against 17 stations that enjoy shared services agreements with Sinclair Broadcast Group, while reducing a penalty assessed to one licensee but not eliminating it.

Despite the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, the television deal market delivered $4.16 billion deal volume in the first half of 2021. However, that volume would have been a mere $35 million had it not been for one company: Gray Television.

Under his leadership, Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS)'s three radio stations in its home market of Miami-Fort Lauderdale have emerged as some of the nation's top Hispanic media properties. Now, he's being promoted to an executive VP role.

Pew Research Center on Tuesday released statistics that paint the present-day portrait of the local TV newsroom staff. What's the diversity among those employed by TV news departments across the U.S.? We have a first look.

For the 97 news outlets whose primary domain, its website, averaged at least 10 million unique visitors per month, traffic rose 11% in the fourth quarter of 2020. That's according to a fresh Pew Research Center analysis of the state of the U.S. news media.

Where does HD Radio stand today? Jeff Jury, the Senior Vice President and General Manager for the Connected Car division of Xperi, offers his thoughts in a fresh InFOCUS Podcast, presented by dot.FM, hosted by RBR+TVBR Editor-in-Chief Adam R Jacobson.  LISTEN HERE

Here's what to expect with respect to when each earnings call and Q2 2021 report release occurs — along with a time change for Gray Television's earnings call and a just-released time and date for Salem Media Group's Q2 '21 call.

To date, the proposed "American Music Fairness Act" has the support of six co-sponsors. They all gave their yea nod to the bill on the day it was introduced. No other House members have joined them. Instead, a resolution in both chambers of Congress has only been fortified.

Three Democratic Senators on Thursday teamed together to introduce legislation that, if passed, would help financially support local news organizations through tax credits to incentivize hiring more journalists, subscriptions, and advertising from local small businesses. The NAB's soon-to-retire President/CEO applauded their action.

Despite efforts in court to squelch the donation-based, IP-distributed "free" TV service, Locast has just entered its 35th market. It brings stations owned by Hearst Television, ViacomCBS, Cox Media Group, The E.W. Scripps Co., Sinclair Broadcast Group and public broadcasting giant WQED to those in Western Pennsylvania's biggest market.

BIA Advisory Services has revised upward its 2021 forecasts for U.S. Local Advertising Revenues by 3.9% from its November 2020 estimates. The projection is split between traditional and digital media. But, it shows that the divide is narrowing, BIA notes.

As many radio industry executives struggle with ways to combat local digital's nonstop suction of dollars from AM and FM radio stations, Cox Media Group has opted to link up with Amazon Advertising as part of a Local Solutions plan to bring advertisers a 360-degree consumer touchpoint option.