For years, cable TV subscribers in two Western New York counties have had the ability to watch CBS programming from either Buffalo or Rochester, N.Y.
Not anymore. Charter Communications’ Spectrum has dropped the affiliate serving the latter market from its systems in those two Empire State locales.
Interestingly enough, both CBS affiliates are owned by the same company — Nexstar Media Group. And, Nexstar has put the blame on the MVPD for not wanting to pay for it.
Spectrum sees it differently.
According to The Daily News of Batavia, N.Y., the largest city in Genesee County, N.Y., Spectrum removed Nexstar’s WROC-8 in Rochester, N.Y., from the lineup there and in neighboring Wyoming County, a largely rural area known for Attica Correctional Facility and Letchworth State Park.
As such, Nexstar sibling WIVB-4 in Buffalo, N.Y., is now the lone CBS station available to viewers in these counties. The primarily reason for this change comes down to DMA carriage rules. Both Wyoming and Genesee Counties are in the Buffalo market, and as such Nexstar would have to negotiate with Spectrum for carriage of WROC-8.
Until now, WROC-8 has been provided without any compensation to Nexstar. The company wanted that changed, and sought dollars for carriage from Spectrum. The MVPD declined, hence the station being dropped.
“Spectrum made the decision to drop WROC in certain areas rather than pay for the local news, weather, sports, and network entertainment and live sports events provided by the station,” Nexstar EVP/Chief Communications Gary Weitman told The Daily News. “This was their decision. We would prefer to be available to Spectrum subscribers in these areas, but cannot provide our programming for free.”
Spectrum sees it somewhat differently. In an e-mail to The Daily News, Charter’s senior manager for field communications in the northeast, Heidi Vandenbrouck, said, “We carry the in-market CBS affiliate, WIVB-TV, as designated by Nielson for all TV providers. We’ve eliminated the duplicate.”
Yet, as The Daily News pointed out, NBC and ABC affiliates from both Rochester and Buffalo remain on Spectrum systems in both Wyoming and Genesee Counties.
Nexstar acquired WIVB-4 in 2017 following its merger with Media General. That company had gained WIVB in its merger with LIN Media.
For Spectrum customers in Genesee and Wyoming Counties, the loss of WROC-8 was an unexpected one. And, it came as Spectrum “instituted cost increases on certain services with billing cycles that began January 30,” The Daily News reports.
Spectrum said customers were notified of the change; the newspaper disputed this statement, and how Spectrum was not transparent in sharing the news with customers.
Meanwhile, Spectrum in the Mid-Hudson Valley cities of Kingston, Poughkeepsie, Rosendale, Saugerties, Olive and Shandaken saw an update to their channel lineup with the elimination of any station from the Albany-Schenectady-Troy market, as Ulster County is within the New York DMA.
This change came even though the lone commercially licensed broadcast TV service in Kingston is a translator associated with WRGB-6, the Sinclair Broadcast Group-owned CBS affiliate licensed to Schenectady, N.Y. — the first television station in the U.S.
With non-duplication rules developed by the FCC some 40 years ago as cable television channels expanded and services evolved, a rule determining if an out-of-market station was “significantly viewed” came into effect. In Kingston, N.Y., Spectrum precursor Kingston Cablevision offered no less than three CBS affiliates — WCBS-2 in New York, WRGB-6 and WFSB-3 in Hartford, as each are accessible via a TV antenna depending on the hill one resides on.
Is WROC-8 a “significantly viewed” station in Genesee and Wyoming County?
The Daily News says yes. Spectrum told the newspaper it isn’t required to carry the out-of-market station, without offering additional comment — and, in this case, any penny to Nexstar to try to keep WROC-8 on in the two counties.
