Gray Television

WICHITA — KWCH 12 and KSCW, the local CBS and CW affiliates found over-the-air on channels 12 and 33 respectively, today announced that pay-TV provider Dish Network has decided to stop carrying our programming on Tuesday at 6 p.m. CT.

“We are shocked and disappointed to learn that Dish Network has decided to impose yet another blackout on its customers by taking away our stations, which broadcast some of the most highly rated programming on any broadcast or cable channel in their market,” said KWCH 12Vice-President and General Manager Brad Moses.

Parent company, Gray Television, owns the number one- or number two-ranked television station in over 50 markets. In many of these markets, Gray’s television station has higher ratings than every other broadcast station and cable channel combined in certain time periods. Despite the obvious popularity of Gray’s stations, Dish has refused after many months to even begin negotiating carriage terms that are consistent with those that Dish has provided to other broadcasters and cable channels.

Recently, Gray offered Dish an extension that would have allowed them to carry KWCH 12 and KSCW beyond tomorrow’s deadline, but Dish refused to accept it. Unfortunately, neither our stations nor the government nor Dish’s millions of fee-paying customers can force Dish to continue carrying our stations when, as here, it chooses to take leading stations off of its system for perceived leverage in private carriage negotiations

For these reasons, it is not likely that the blackout imposed by Dish today will end soon. Sadly, Dish customers who wish to receive KWCH 12’s award winning newscasts and CBS’ highly rated programming over the next several months will most likely need to switch to another pay-TV provider.

Dish’s actions will not affect customers of Directv, Cox Cable, AT&T U-verse, and other local providers. Gray has reached long term agreements with several hundred other major cable and satellite distributor, virtually all without any disruptions or even public statements about our negotiations. In contrast, in just the last two years alone, Dish has dropped more than 200 local television stations.

“It is unfortunate that Dish does not see the same value in our programming as every other operator. Regardless, we will continue to offer the same high quality programming as we always have, and we will continue to serve our community as we have done for decades,” said Moses.

For more information, visit keeptvlocal.com.