KIRO-TV


KIRO-TV, virtual channel 7, is a CBS-affiliated television station licensed to Seattle, Washington, United States and also serving Tacoma. The station is owned by Atlanta-based Cox Media Group. KIRO-TV's offices and studios are located on Third Avenue in the Belltown neighborhood of Seattle, and its transmitter is located in the city's Queen Anne neighborhood, adjacent to the station's original studios.
KIRO-TV is one of five local Seattle television stations seen in Canada via Shaw Broadcast Services for the purposes of time-shifting and can be viewed from many eastern Canadian cities including Toronto and Montreal and on satellite providers Bell TV and Shaw Direct. It can also been seen on cable systems in British Columbia as the quasi-local CBS affiliate.

History

Early years

After KOMO-TV signed on in December 1953, Seattle's channel 7 was the last commercial VHF channel allocation available in the Puget Sound area. As such, its construction permit was heavily contested among several local broadcast interests. Three radio stations—KVI, KXA and KIRO —were locked in a battle for the frequency over several years of comparative hearings at the Federal Communications Commission. Following an initial decision in 1955 and a reaffirmation in 1957, the ultimate victorious party was Queen City Broadcasting, owners of KIRO radio, who signed-on channel 7 on February 8, 1958. Queen City was led by president and general manager Saul Haas, who purchased KIRO radio in 1935 and included U.S. Senator Warren Magnuson and CBS News correspondent Edward R. Murrow amongst its shareholders. The station's original studios were located on Queen Anne Avenue, adjacent to its broadcast tower and directly across the street from KIRO radio. The first program shown on channel 7 was the explosion of Ripple Rock, a hazard to navigation in Seymour Narrows, British Columbia.
KIRO radio had been a CBS Radio affiliate for over 20 years and KIRO-TV subsequently became an affiliate of the CBS television network upon signing on. Channel 7 took the CBS affiliation from Tacoma-licensed KTNT-TV prompting that station's owners at the time, the Tacoma News Tribune to file an antitrust lawsuit accusing CBS of having a standing agreement with KIRO to affiliate with the television network before Queen City's permit to build channel 7 was even approved. In May 1960, KIRO-TV was forced to share CBS with KTNT-TV as part of a settlement reached between the three parties. This arrangement lasted for the next two years with KIRO-TV again becoming the market's exclusive CBS affiliate in September 1962.

The Mormons take over

In April 1963, the Deseret News Publishing Company, the for-profit media arm of the Salt Lake City-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, began purchasing stock in Queen City Broadcasting starting with a 10 percent share from several minority partners including Sen. Magnuson. Six months later the LDS Church purchased an additional 50 percent, giving them majority control of the KIRO stations. Along with having earned a handsome return on his original investment of 28 years earlier, Saul Hass subsequently joined the board of the LDS Church's broadcasting subsidiary, which was renamed Bonneville International in 1964.
Soon after the FCC approved the sale, Bonneville executives Lloyd Cooney and Kenneth L. Hatch arrived in Seattle to lead the renamed KIRO, Inc. division. Upon Cooney's departure to run for U.S. Senate in 1980, Hatch became president, CEO and chairman, positions he held until 1995. Under Hatch's leadership, KIRO, Inc. became one of the nation's premier regional broadcast groups. KIRO's corporate board included many notable leaders including Mary Gates ; Pay 'n Save chairman M. Lamont Bean; Washington Mutual chief executive officer Tony Eyring and Gordon B. Hinckley, a future president of the LDS Church. The KIRO stations moved their offices and studios to "Broadcast House" at Third Avenue and Broad Street in Seattle's Belltown district in 1968, where KIRO-TV remains to this day.
Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, KIRO-TV still faced competition in some parts of Western Washington from Bellingham-based KVOS-TV, which was also then a CBS affiliate. After years of legal challenges and negotiations with CBS and KIRO-TV, KVOS began to phase out most CBS programming by 1980. KVOS retained a nominal affiliation with CBS until 1987, during which it would run any CBS network programs that were preempted by channel 7.

From CBS to UPN

In 1994, CBS found itself without an affiliate in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex after KDFW-TV left the network to become a Fox affiliate as a result of the station's owner, New World Communications, signing an affiliation deal with Fox. Consequently, CBS began to negotiate with Gaylord Broadcasting to secure an affiliation agreement with the independent station it had long owned in Fort Worth, KTVT. As part of the deal, CBS would also affiliate with Gaylord-owned independent KSTW in Tacoma; both KSTW and KTVT had been scheduled to affiliate with The WB Television Network. The deal was announced on September 15, 1994, and CBS programs that had been preempted by KIRO-TV moved to KSTW soon afterward. Other CBS programs such as The Late Late Show with Tom Snyder were shown on KSTW beginning in January 1995, although the show aired an hour later at 1:35 a.m., whereas other CBS affiliates aired the program directly after the Late Show with David Letterman at 12:35 a.m. Even when channel 11 regained the CBS affiliation for the third time in its history in March 1995, the program continued to air at 1:35 a.m.
Two days before the affiliation switch was announced, Bonneville announced that it would sell KIRO-TV to the Belo Corporation, while retaining ownership of KIRO radio. In addition, in anticipation of the affiliation change, Belo stated that it would run channel 7 as a news-intensive independent station. However, on December 6, the station reached an affiliation deal with another then-forthcoming network, UPN.
More changes descended upon channel 7 after Belo took control of the station on January 31, 1995. The station began carrying UPN programming upon its startup on January 16, 1995; however, until CBS moved completely to KSTW on March 13 of that year, UPN programs generally aired on weekend afternoons, though KIRO-TV did preempt CBS programming so that it could air the series premiere of in primetime.
Local newscasts on channel 7 expanded during this time to nearly 40 hours each week with expansions to its morning and early evening newscasts to compensate for UPN not having national news programs. Outside of UPN's program offerings, the rest of KIRO-TV's schedule was filled with first-run syndicated talk shows, reality shows, off-network dramas, a couple of off-network sitcoms and movies. This format was unusual for a UPN affiliate as most UPN affiliates had a general entertainment format outside of network programming hours. In 1996, Belo acquired the Providence Journal Company, which owned Seattle's NBC affiliate KING-TV. Belo could not own both KING-TV and KIRO-TV under FCC rules at the time, and as a result, the company opted to sell KIRO-TV.

Rejoining CBS

Though there was speculation that Belo would swap KIRO-TV to Fox Television Stations in exchange for KSAZ-TV in Phoenix and KTBC-TV in Austin, Texas, Belo announced on February 20, 1997, that it would swap channel 7 to UPN co-owner Viacom's Paramount Stations Group subsidiary, in exchange for KMOV in St. Louis. At the time, Paramount Stations Group was in the process of selling off the CBS and NBC affiliates that it inherited from Viacom through its 1994 purchase of Paramount Pictures.
Concurrently, Paramount/Viacom traded KIRO-TV to Cox Enterprises in exchange for KSTW, just one month after Cox announced it would acquire that station from Gaylord Broadcasting. The trades were completed on June 2, 1997. The two stations retained their respective syndicated programming, but swapped network affiliations once again—with KSTW becoming a UPN owned-and-operated station and KIRO-TV regaining its CBS affiliation on June 30, 1997.
In February 2019, it was announced that Apollo Global Management would acquire Cox Media Group and Northwest Broadcasting's stations. The sale would give KIRO-TV in-state sisters in Spokane's KAYU-TV, the Tri-Cities' KFFX-TV, and Yakima's KCYU-LD—all of which are Fox affiliates. Although the group planned to operate under the name Terrier Media, it was later announced in June 2019 that Apollo would also acquire Cox's radio and advertising businesses, and retain the Cox Media Group name. The sale was completed on December 17, 2019.

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:
ChannelVideoAspectPSIP Short NameProgramming
7.11080iKIRO-DTMain KIRO-TV programming / CBS
7.2480iKIRO-SDgetTV
7.3480iKIRO 3Laff

Analog-to-digital conversion

KIRO-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 7, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 39, using PSIP to display KIRO-TV's virtual channel as 7 on digital television receivers.

Programming

As of September 2018, syndicated programs broadcasting on KIRO-TV presently include Right This Minute, Judge Judy and Entertainment Tonight. KIRO-TV runs the entire CBS programming lineup with minimal preemptions, generally only for the award-winning special, InColor. However, the station's alternate feed for Canadian viewers has more preemptions than the regular feed, particularly infomercials replacing programs like Let's Make a Deal, KIRO 7 News at Noon, and Right This Minute.

Past programming

One of the most famous and longest-running regional children's television programs in the United States, The J. P. Patches Show was produced in-house by KIRO-TV and broadcast steadily from 1958 to 1981. The program starred Chris Wedes as Julius Pierpont Patches, a shabby clown and self-professed mayor of the City Dump and Bob Newman as J. P.'s "girlfriend" Gertrude, in addition to a number of other characters. Nightmare Theatre was KIRO-TV's weekly horror movie series, seen from 1964 to 1978 and hosted by "The Count" from 1968 to 1975. Towey, who also directed The J. P. Patches Show, died in 1989.
During the 1970s, KIRO-TV preempted the first half hour of Captain Kangaroo each morning in order to air J. P. Patches. Many parents protested by writing letters to the station because they preferred more educational value from Captain Kangaroo than with "J. P.", while children preferred J. P. Patches. From 1987 to 1995, under Bonneville ownership, KIRO-TV refused to air The Bold and the Beautiful, which normally aired at 12:30 p.m.; the station aired a 60-minute local newscast from 12 noon to 1:00 p.m. instead. As a result, the station received many protest letters from fans of the show during that period and even one from the show's creator himself, William J. Bell. The show was cleared when KSTW had CBS for their brief time from 1995 to 1997, and was eventually cleared on KIRO-TV after they went back to CBS from UPN and a change of ownership to Cox. In 2014, KIRO-TV once again went back to an hour of local news at noon, delaying B&B to 3 p.m., and later 2 p.m. when Let's Make a Deal moved to 9 a.m. On September 10, 2018, KIRO-TV went back to an hour of news at noon. The Bold and the Beautiful stayed at 2 p.m., with Right This Minute moving to 2:30 p.m.
In 1990, KIRO-TV tape-delayed the Daytona 500 by six hours to show a Seattle SuperSonics game as it was the flagship station of the team. The race was won by Derrike Cope in an upset over Dale Earnhardt in the final lap after a cut tire. Prior to joining UPN in 1995, KIRO-TV ran the CBS Evening News at 6 p.m. between local newscasts at 5 and 6:30 p.m.

Sports programming

KIRO-TV was also the flagship station for pre-season game broadcasts of the Seattle Seahawks from 1976 to 1980. Play-by-play announcers were Gary Justice and Wayne Cody, who was also the station's sports anchor. For years, KIRO-TV was the flagship station for Seattle Supersonics broadcasts, coinciding with the NBA's broadcast contract with CBS that it held from 1973 to 1990. KIRO-TV also carried the Seattle Mariners from 1986 to 1988 as well as in 1992 and again from 1995 to 2000, in addition to any games aired through CBS' MLB contract from 1990 to 1993. KIRO-TV carried the Tacoma Stars from 1986 to 1988.
The station also airs Seahawks games when the team hosts an AFC team at CenturyLink Field, via the NFL on CBS, and beginning in 2014, with the institution of the new "cross-flex" broadcast rule, any games in which they play another NFC team that are moved from Fox to CBS.
KIRO-TV had also broadcast the Albert Lee Appliance Cup H1 Unlimited hydroplane races on the culminating day of Seattle's Seafair festival. The rights also include coverage of other Seafair events, including Seattle's Fourth of July fireworks on Lake Union, as well as the Torchlight Parade. In 2017, full-day coverage of the races were discontinued, marking the first time since 1951 that the races were not broadcast live, and the end of a 31-year run of live broadcasts on the station. KIRO cited the costs of producing the telecast as reasoning, and replaced the live broadcast with a 90-minute recap show aired in the evening. However, full-day coverage of all Seafair races returned via Tegna-owned KONG-TV in 2018 in association with SWX Right Now.

News operation

KIRO-TV presently broadcasts 39½ hours of locally produced newscasts each week.
In 1969, KIRO-TV made major upgrades to its news programming, implementing the now-commonplace Eyewitness News format with chief correspondent Clif Kirk, sportscaster Ron Forsell and assistant anchor Sandy Hill, who later left KIRO-TV to become a co-host of Good Morning America. Throughout the 1970s, KIRO-TV was known in Seattle for hiring women in the roles of "assistant anchors" and "weather presenters", including Sandy Hill, Ann Martin, Mikki Flowers and Ann Busch. Throughout the decades, KIRO-TV placed a high emphasis on news programming and investigative stories. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Eyewitness News team of anchors John Marler and Gary Justice, meteorologist Harry Wappler and Wayne Cody overtook KING-TV for supremacy in local news.
Beginning in the 1970s, KIRO-TV's newscasts also included op-ed segments prepared by Lloyd R. Cooney. After Cooney left the station in 1980 to pursue an unsuccessful U.S. Senate campaign, the station editorials were handled by a series of commentators: KIRO, Inc. CEO and chairman Ken Hatch, followed by former Seattle City Council member John Miller and then by former Seattle Post-Intelligencer editor Louis R. Guzzo. In 1986, KIRO-TV debuted Point Counterpoint featuring conservative John Carlson and liberal Walt Crowley; the segment aired on what was then KIRO-TV's most popular newscast, The Sunday Newshour with Crowley and Carlson becoming well known for their pointed and bombastic debates.
In 1990, KIRO-TV became one of the first television stations in the United States to expand its weekday morning newscast into the 4:30 a.m. timeslot—long before it started to become commonplace nationwide in the late 2000s and 2010s ; the program eventually reverted to a 5:30 a.m. start by 1993.
By the early 1990s, the well-worn, "happy talk" format faltered and KING-TV's newscasts had overtaken KIRO-TV in the local news ratings. As a result, KIRO-TV reformatted its newscasts in January 1993, with an approach unofficially known as "News Outside the Box," which was an attempt to synergize both the KIRO-TV radio and television staffs in an open newsroom that also doubled as a set for the station's broadcasts. The Seattle Symphony was commissioned to record the station's news theme and ballet instructors coached KIRO-TV anchors in the art of walking toward a moving camera while simultaneously delivering the news. The result was an unmitigated disaster; viewers quickly complained they were distracted by the moving anchors, the constant buzz of assignment editors in the background of newscasts and periodic "visits" into the KIRO radio studios. The television reporters' primary assets were lost on radio listeners, while many of the radio reporters were clearly uncomfortable on camera. The original concept also called for live airing of raw, unedited field tape, which only called attention to the importance of proper news editing. In addition, KOMO-TV and KING-TV were fighting for first place in the Seattle market.
By September 1993, the concept was scrapped for a more traditional format with a fixed anchor desk and a rebranding to KIRO NewsChannel 7 before ultimately returning to Eyewitness News when Cox purchased the station in 1997. On October 3, 2015, KIRO-TV introduced a new set, refreshed logo, and dropped the Eyewitness News title in favor of KIRO 7 News.

On-air staff

Notable current on-air staff

Notable former on-air staff

KIRO-TV is rebroadcast on the following translator stations:
Digital translators
CallsignChannelCity of license
'17Everett
'18Point Pulley, etc.
'18Puyallup
'26Bremerton
'28Mount Vernon
'29Centralia
'30Port Angeles
'34Olympia
18Seattle