Milwaukee’s own Journal Communications has closed on a second signal in the Palm Springs CA market. It already has NBC KMIR-TV there; now it has added a low powered little sister, KPSE-LP, which carries MyNetworkTV fare. Kalil & Co. handled brokerage chores for the 4.7M transaction. Journal’s Doug Kiel noted that Palm Springs is expected to enjoy a 16% population growth spurt over the next five years, making it a good place to invest. The seller was Mirage Media, headed by Billy Williams.
TVBR/RBR observation: We suspect that Palm Springs is well short of the number of broadcast television stations necessary to support a duopoly. However, the duopoly rules only apply to full power signals. As far as the FCC is concerned, there is no problem whatsoever marrying a full power television station to an LPTV or Class A. KPSE-LP has the cachet of a national network affiliation, and even if it is one of the new kids on the block, it is a program stream that likely wouldn’t get into a small market any other way. All Journal has to do is get it on the local MVPD services and they’re good to go.
