Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1958)

GOVERNMENT continued NON-NETWORK MULTIPLE OWNERS HIT BARROW REPORT PROPOSALS • Meredith, Storer, Westinghouse testify before FCC • Wailes suggests possibility of fourth tv network The three biggest non-network multiple owners in television delivered body-blows last week against the Barrow Report — and especially the report's recommendations to restrict multiple ownership in the 25 top markets. Testifying last week were spokesmen for Meredith Publishing Co. (Tuesday), Storer Broadcasting Co. (Thursday) and Westinghouse Broadcasting Co. (Thursday-Friday). They spoke out against restriction of multiple ownership, option time, must buys and other of the Barrow Report's proposals. They backed, though not unanimously, a few of the recommendations. Last week's witnesses completed testimony by multiple owners before the FCC. Testifying earlier were three other non-network multiple owners [Government, March 24] and the tv networks [Government, March 17; Lead Story, March 10]. Witnesses this week: tomorrow (Tuesday), ABC affiliates; Thursday, CBS affiliates; Friday, NBC affiliates. Westinghouse Broadcasting Co.'s prepared statements are covered in the following story. For Friday question-and-answer testimony, see At Deadline. Present for last week's hearings were FCC Chairman John C. Doerfer and Comrs. Rosel H. Hyde, Frederick W. Ford, Robert T. Bartley, Robert E. Lee and T.A.M. Craven. Interrogating Tuesday was Herbert Schulkind, assistant chief of the rules and standards division, Broadcast Bureau; on Thursday, Robert Rawson, chief of the hearing division, Broadcast Bureau. First Up: Meredith Payson Hall, director of radio and tv for Meredith Publishing Co., said the Barrow Report is content with "assumptions, superficial reasoning and speculative evils," as far as it covers multiple ownership. The Barrow recommendations, he said, are "a classic example of proposing legislation and regulation for their own sake regardless of consequence — good or bad." Following Mr. Hall on the stand were two Meredith station general managers: Frank P. Fogarty, WOW-AM-TV Omaha, and Richard B. Rawls, KPHO-AM-TV Phoenix. Two other Meredith general managers, Paul Adanti, WHEN-AM-TV Syracuse, and E. K. (Joe) Hartenbower, KCMOAM-FM-TV Kansas City, were present; Meredith's fifth station manager, Frank Lane, KRMG Tulsa, was not present. Mr. Hall showed sample copies of Meredith's Better Homes & Gardens and Successful Farming magazines, plus two dozen books, periodicals and other publications pointed at homemaking and farming to demonstrate the company's interest in serving the public in these two fields. He then described Meredith's pioneering in television with its Syracuse station, built Broadcasting in 1948, noting the station had losses of $440,000 until October 1950. Mr. Hall felt that while Meredith station management may not be superior to that of independently-owned stations, the company's overall operation assures that the stations are consistently well-managed where this may not be assured in the case of a death, illness or financial problem at another singly-owned station. Benefits also accrue from pooling of ideas and experience from among Meredith's station managers and home broadcast executives, he said. He said Meredith's central office "guides — it does not run — [the] five broadcasting enterprises." Mr. Hall said Meredith's record of integration through local management speaks for itself and that a station's service to the community is assured through professional management which "can be replaced if it fails — a result hardly possible where management is solely in the hands of a local owner who by accident, or otherwise, happens to be a poor broadcaster." Before the present system of multiple ownership is changed, he said, it should first be determined if better programming would be forthcoming; if a single-owner station would bring better service to a community where a multiple owner now operates; and if the single-station owner could make equivalent financing available for investment in programming and technical equipment, particularly in a "marginal" community such as Phoenix, where Meredith operates KPHO-TV at a loss in competition against three network-affiliated outlets, using profits from its other operations. Mr. Hall was questioned by Comr. Ford on his views about multiple ownership. Did he think multiple ownership to be ideal? Should all tv outlets be licensed to multiple owners? Would he place a limit on the number of stations one licensee could own? Would absentee and multiple ownership of all stations be good? The Meredith executive felt multiple owners are "on the whole good broadcasters"; that the FCC should "let the economy work unhampered" and "not discourage" multiple ownership. He felt the five-vhf limit is good and that a six-vhf ownership rule would be good, too, but he didn't want to see any reduction of the limit; the amount of multiple and absentee ownership, he felt, should be a "matter of degree." On option time, Mr. Hall felt this way: Meredith's best programs come from the networks; the networks say option time is indispensable to them; therefore, option time is indispensable to Meredith. He thought the present three-hour limit on option time should be retained because, he feels, the system is working so well and is so profitable for stations that it shouldn't be changed. He felt stations prefer to be identified with one network and thus would oppose the option of station time by another program source. He later said Meredith stations certainly would "consider" programs if offered by the NTA Film Network. Asked for a comparison of network tv and national magazines insofar as they compete with each other, Mr. Hall said that while all media compete with each other for advertising dollars each has its own selling points — and weaknesses. Mr. Hall told the commissioners that MEREDITH Publishing Co.'s broadcasting executives who testified or were on tap last Tuesday for the publishing-broadcasting company's testimony before the FCC on the Barrow Report's multiple ownership recommendations were (I to r) Richard B. Rawls KPHO-AM-TV Phoenix; Payson Hall, Meredith radio and tv director, who presented the bulk of Meredith testimony; E. K. (Joe) Hartenbower, KCMO-AM -FM-TV Kansas City; Frank P. Fogarty, WOW-AM-TV Omaha, and (standing) Paul Adanti, WHLNAM-TV Syracuse. April 14, 1958 • Page 53