Just announced, Palm Beach NBC affiliate WPTV will produce the newscasts for FOX affiliate WFLX as of January 1, 2011.
Currently all newscast on WFLX are produced by CBS affiliate WPEC, owned by Freedom Communications, trough an agreement with WFLX owner Raycom Media and have been since 1989 when the FOX network mandated all its affiliates must have a newscast.
The announcement on WPTV.com says more than a dozen staffers will be hired to produce the WFLX-branded newscasts from WPTV’s main studios in West Palm Beach. What remains to be seen however is who will anchor the new shows as all current WFLX anchors work for WPEC as well.
An interesting development for sure, especially in light of the Freedom Communications bankruptcy situation, the news can’t be good for WPEC or those working there.
Maybe WPTV will have their 5pm anchors – Jay Cashmere and Shannon Cake – anchor at 10pm. Damn, Suzanne Boyd was fun to watch at 10pm.
wflx made a big mistake partner up with wptv. wptv news are so boring you will fall a sleep suzzane boyd and eric roby are great anchors together.wflx ratings will go down. wflx just should sell the station to newscorp it will be better than partner up with wptv.please do not but jay cashmere on the 10 o’clock news he so boring wpec should try to partner up with wtvx34 or wtcn15 to do news
Well, WTCN isn’t even available on DirecTV (as it’s still a low-power, analog station and therefore not affected by the recent DTV transition), or over-the-air south of West Palm Beach.
CBS 12 News on The CW West Palm…one to consider.
That would be interesting because WPEC hired many people like Curt Fonger and Chris Farrall who were laid off from WTVX in 1989 when their new owners at the time, Krypton Broadcasting, shut the news dept down after CBS left them for WPEC.
Am I the only one in shock right now?
any news on who will anchor these newscasts?
Join Bob Mayer and Kelly Craig on the Fox29 Morning News….starting Monday, January 3rd…
2cents… Er… I don’t think so.
Why the switch? Some sort of breakdown in relations between Raycom and Freedom? I don’t know what numbers have been like recently, but back in the mid 90’s WFLX had one of the top performing Fox station newscasts in the country. Maybe ratings have dropped?
well they also were a Fox affiliate from the get go…which helped. It was stable. I don think Freedom’s bankruptcy was too attractive for a renewal. Their ratings however, are really good right now. Fox was actually interested in this station a few months back. Dont know if that was partial influence….
The switch is PAAAST overdue. WPTV has been number 1 for years. Why you continue to partner with a loosing station? 12 sucks and so does their equipment and overall final product. 12’s target audience is old conservative farts and WFLX is looking to attract a younger crowd. Cathy Younkin struggles to keep up with all the intricacies of computers and social networks while Jeff brogan is young and has worked every position in a newsroom all the way to news director. No brainer….can’t wait for the breath of fresh air coming to 29!
Thanks for posting Jeff!!!!!!
WPEC-produced newscast ending… WPTV taking over in 2011. Another idea would be WFLX getting its own in-house produced news broadcast (separate from WPTV, WPEC, and WPBF)… if Raycom is interested. Just a thought.