Just before last year’s presidential election, the Baltimore-based conglomerate that owns Portland’s CBS affiliate, Sinclair Broadcasting, announced that it would be airing an anti-Kerry documentary on WGME and most of the 61 other television stations it controls around the country.
The announcement unleashed a storm of controversy in Portland, a Democratic bastion, where many viewers were already upset with Channel 13’s not-so-subtle editorial bias. (“The Point,” a regular segment in WGME’s local news broadcast, features the Conservative, pro-administration views of Mark Hyman, Sinclair’s vice president for communications, which are carried on most of its stations.) The Kerry documentary sparked an advertising boycott against Channel 13 and a noisy protest outside its offices.
Regardless of one’s political persuasions, the Sinclair controversy should serve as a wake up call on the dangers of media deregulation. As our news outlets become controlled by fewer and fewer companies — some with overt political biases — we see fewer original stories, less investment in local reporting and less diversity of views, particularly in regards to controversial coverage that might conflict with the interests of corporate owners.
Fortunately, President Bush’s recent attempt to further deregulate media markets has been blocked by the Republican-controlled Congress, a move supported not only by Maine’s Democratic congressmen, but by both our Republican Senators and even Frank Blethen, chairman of the Seattle Times subsidiary that owns three of Maine’s five largest newspapers. But since the last round of deregulation in 1996, a great deal of damage has already been done.
Here on the Maine coast, 90 percent of our commercial television stations are owned by out-of-state media companies, as are dozens of radio stations, several major newspapers, and a surprising number of local weeklies. Not all of these out-of-state owners are gigantic conglomerates — by today’s standards, the Blethen family’s two-state chain is almost quaint — but the fact is that in most cases, decisions about the content, flavor and budgetary priorities of our coast’s media outlets are ultimately in the hands of people far away, who may or may not understand life in far-off Portland, better yet Bangor, Jonesport, and Lubec.
So exactly who does own the coast’s media? I spent some time recently on the Internet and a series of electronic databases and came up with some answers:
Television (Portland)
WCSH (6, NBC) — Gannett Co, McLean, VA., which owns 21 other television stations and 118 daily newspapers in the U.K. and U.S., including USA Today.
WMTW (8, ABC) — Hearst-Argyle Television, a subsidiary of The Hearst Corporation, which owns a dozen major daily newspapers, A&E, ESPN, New England Cable News, and 25 television stations.
WGME (13, CBS) — Sinclair Broadcasting Group of Baltimore, Md., which owns 61 other television stations, reaching 25 percent of all US households.
WPFO (23, FOX) — Corporate Media Consulting of Toledo, OH, which owns one other TV station in the Virgin Islands.
WPXT (51, WB) — Pegasus Communications, PA, which owns 10 other TV stations and is the largest independent provider of DirecTV in the US. The company also runs Portland’s UPN affiliate, WPME (35).
Television (Bangor)
WLBZ (2, NBC) — Gannett Co. (see WCSH above)
WABI (5, CBS) — Diversified Communications of Portland, which owns two other TV stations (in Florida and South Carolina) and publishes National Fisherman, Seafood Business, and Workboat.
WVII (7, ABC) and WFVX (22, FOX) — Rockfleet Broadcasting Inc. of Cadillac, MI, through its subsidiary, Bangor Communications. Rockfleet owns a half-dozen other TV stations in small markets in Michigan and Wisconsin.
Daily Newspapers
Portland Press Herald, Kennebec Journal, Morning Sentinel – Blethen Maine Newspapers, a subsidiary of the Seattle Times Company, which owns six newspapers in Washington state.
Bangor Daily News — Independent. Also owns The Weekly.
Lewiston Sun Journal — Independent. Also owns the Forecaster weeklies.
Brunswick Times-Record — Independent.
Portsmouth Herald— Dow Jones Company of New York City, publisher of the Wall Street Journal, Barron’s Magazine, and 40 other newspapers.
Weekly Newspapers
While many weeklies remain locally owned and operated, others are part of out-of-state chains.
The Dow Jones Company controls the newspapers of the Seacoast Newspaper group including The York Weekly, York County Coast Star, and New Hampshire’s Dover Community News, and Exeter News-Letter.
Crescent Publishing of Greenville, SC, owns Courier Publications and, thus, the Waldo Independent, Bar Harbor Times, Camden Herald, Capital Weekly, Rockland Courier-Gazette, Lincoln County Weekly, and Belfast Republican Journal.
The Bath Coastal Journal and Falmouth’s Community Leader are controlled by the Seattle Times, while the Portland Phoenix’s Boston-based parent, Phoenix Newspaper Group, owns WFNX and both the Boston and Providence Phoenix.
Radio
Ownership concentration is greatest in radio with 46 of Maine’s commercial stations owned by just four companies.
Citadel Communications of Las Vegas, NV, owns 213 stations in 24 states, including WBLM, WCLZ, WCYY, WHOM and six other Maine stations.
Nassau Broadcasting of Princeton, NJ, owns 50 stations in six states including 11 in Maine, among them the W-Bach stations, “The Wolf,” The Bone,” “Frank-FM” and Portland’s Air America affiliate.
Saga Communications, Grosse Point Farms, MI, owns seven Maine stations including WGAN, WPOR and WMGX. Its extensive U.S. holdings include over 130 radio and eight television stations.
Clear Channel Communications, the largest national chain, owns WABI, WTOS, WIGY and 15 other Maine radio stations. The San Antonio-based behemoth controls 41 US television stations and some 1400 radio stations in the US, Australia, Mexico and New Zealand.
— Colin Woodard’s most recent book, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier, comes out in paperback from Penguin in April. He lives in Portland and has a website at www.colinwoodard.com.