Get ready for my best Thin Lizzy impression: “The news is back in town! The news is back in town!”
Thin Lizzy, yeah? Philip “Phil” Lynott? Come on, you know the song: “The boys are back in town … .” Ah, you ruined it.
I can’t stay mad at you, though, so I’ll tell you what I learned via the Internet just a short while ago: KCOY wants its viewers to know it misses them and is coming home. Where exactly “home” is wasn’t clear to everyone, but here’s what somebody posted via the company’s Facebook page around noon on March 11 (I left in the all-caps words for my readers’ benefit; try reading this out loud and shouting those parts):
“KCOY 12 is bringing back YOUR LIVE, LOCAL NEWS! We are constructing a new studio, newsroom and control room RIGHT HERE on the Central Coast where they belong! What does that mean to you? It means a REFOCUS ON NEWS from the Santa Maria Valley, Lompoc, the Santa Ynez Valley, San Luis Obispo County and everywhere in between. BIG changes are on the way!”
Fans (or social media passersby) were not as thrilled as, I’m sure, the KCOY directors were hoping. Many of the ensuing comments could best be described as backhanded compliments, perhaps best summed up by the brief, “It’s about time.” I definitely got an “I hated it when you moved, and I stopped watching you after that, but if you really are coming back to Santa Maria, I’ll give you another chance” vibe.
But are they coming back to Santa Maria?
One commenter posted: “So by ‘right here on the Central Coast’ do you mean closer than Salinas or Monterey? I truly miss the Santa Maria station anchors and weather people, and won’t be watching again until what I consider ‘local’ (somewhere closer to Lompoc than Salinas) is included in the programming.”
Ouch.
If you’ll recall, early 2012 saw the unwilling exodus of a slew of employees, and the station started anchoring its broadcasts in about 160 miles north. San Luis Obispo County’s KSBY quickly slipped into the journalistic void, emphasizing local coverage as former KCOY news director John Zuchelli gave them his stamp of approval in pro-KSBY commercials.
KCOY’s Facebook poster answered select questions and responded to one out of every half-dozen or so comments. It seems that the new studio is a mere weeks away from opening, will get rid of the hated “split-screen” format, and is local, LOCAL, LOCAL!
More than a few comments tried to pin down a physical location to something more specific than Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties, but the KCOY rep was a bit—ahem—coy. He or she also posted a link to the station’s current hiring needs, which—as of this writing, at least—sat at a baker’s dozen. They’re looking for a news producer, a morning anchor, a morning meteorologist, an evening meteorologist, a marketing specialist, and more. It sounds like they’re outfitting a news army, and applicants are to send their résumés, salary expectations, and the like to a person in Santa Barbara.
Even the application is a bit vague, as it notes that KCOY is seeking to create “the largest television newsgathering operation between Los Angeles and San Francisco.”
I’d like to believe that the team is coming back to its old stomping grounds, but who knows?
Well, our editor does, apparently. After trying several numbers and ultimately getting someone in “operations” in Santa Barbara, he was told that the station was coming to Santa Barbara and would have a team in Santa Maria.
So there’s that, I guess. Our editor also apparently called General Manager Mark Danielson and left a voicemail, but I didn’t hear anything else from the boss by the time my deadline rolled around. What does it mean? I’m not sure, exactly, but whatever it shakes out to be, it’s apparent that reporters talking about stuff going on in Santa Barbara County will actually be headquartered in Santa Barbara County, not Monterey.
Danielson’s comments to a Noozhawk reporter in January indicated good things for locals; he actually demonstrated an understanding of this slice of coastal California geography, drawing a distinction between Santa Marians and Santa Barbarans and the things they find important.
I truly hope that this will be a good, positive, beneficial change for the station—and I can’t see why it wouldn’t be. I hope the switch gives KCOY a jolt, because the more professional and caring voices in this crazy world we call media, the better. It keeps us competitive. It keeps us honest. It keeps us hungry and busy and eager for the truth.
And in situations like that, the readers and viewers—the members of the public at large—are the winners.
The Canary is ready to watch and see. Send comments to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Mar 13-20, 2014.