Koin - History - Television Station

Television Station

KOIN-TV began operating on October 15, 1953, as Portland's first VHF TV station. At the time, it was jointly owned by Mount Hood Radio and Television Broadcasting Corporation; Newhouse Broadcasting Corporation (now Advance Publications), owner and publisher of The (Portland) Oregonian; local investors and Marshall Field's department stores. Newhouse and Mount Hood also shared ownedship of KOIN radio (AM 970 and 101.1 FM). Eventually, Marshall Field sold its stake to Newhouse. Lee Enterprises purchased KOIN-TV in April 1977 from Mt. Hood Broadcasting Corporation (50-percent owner) and Newhouse Broadcasting (50-percent owner).

On February 27, 1971, both transmitter towers used by KOIN-FM and KOIN-TV—the 1,000-foot main tower and the 700-foot auxiliary tower—collapsed during an ice and wind storm. The two KOIN (AM) towers, located on the same property, were not damaged. Nine days later, on March 9, 1971, KOIN-FM and KOIN-TV returned to the air when a temporary tower was erected on the site of the collapsed auxiliary tower. During those nine days off the air, CBS programming was provided to the Portland market (and, by extension, most of Oregon) by independent station KVDO-TV of Salem. (Oregon Public Broadcasting later purchased KVDO and moved the station to Bend as KOAB-TV. In 1978, a production company MIRA Mobile Television was founded.

During the 1970s, KOIN had a few locally-produced programs on the air, including KOIN Kitchen (cooking show), and public affairs programs such as News Conference Six and Northwest Illustrated.) In 1976, KOIN-TV became the second TV station in the Portland market (after KPTV) to broadcast Portland Trail Blazers basketball games. Selected Trail Blazer games aired on KOIN-TV until 1996. KOIN-AM was the first flagship station of the Trail Blazers' radio network, beginning in the inaugural 1970-71 season, and ending when the station was sold shortly after the Trail Blazers won the 1976-77 National Basketball Association (NBA) championship.

By the 1980s, one of KOIN's past general managers - Richard M. "Mick" Schafbuch - served one term in 1981 as President of the CBS Network Affiliates Group. During KOIN-TV's 30th anniversary week in 1983, the station aired classic CBS programming from the 1950s and 1960s. By this time, the station had moved into its new location at KOIN Center. In 1984, the station aired the Japanese program From Oregon With Love.

In 1982, C. Stephen Currie, KOIN's program operations manager, was elected to serve as the president of the National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE International).

In October 2000, the Lee Enterprises television group, including KOIN, was purchased by Emmis Communications. On January 27, 2006, Emmis sold KOIN (along with KHON-TV/Honolulu, KSNT/Topeka, and KSNW/Wichita) to Montecito Broadcast Group for $259 million.

Due to a dispute over fees, Comcast did not offer KOIN in HDTV for over two years after it started offering other local channels in HDTV. After Montecito took ownership, Comcast started carrying KOIN in high-definition on February 28, 2006. KOIN was also in a dispute with DirecTV over HD broadcast, as both sides claimed the other to be the problem.As of August 2008 KOIN HD is now carried on DirecTV.

KOIN updated its website in September 2006 as part of a partnership with WorldNow. KOIN expects the switch to lead to over $1 million in revenue during its first year; the switch was characterized by Bob Singer, KOIN's general sales manager, as a "creative new way" to boost revenue for a station with a "somewhat average ratings position."

On July 24, 2007, Montecito announced the sale of all of its stations (KOIN, plus KHON-TV in Honolulu and its satellites, KSNW in Wichita and its satellites, and KSNT in Topeka) to New Vision Television. The sale closed on November 1, 2007.

In March 2008, KOIN relaunched its website through Newport Television subsidiary Inergize Digital, replacing the old World Now-powered site. The Web sites of several of its sister stations in other markets also joined the Inergize Digital Network in late December 2008 and early January 2009.

In October 2008, KOIN converted its central Oregon translators into a locally-focused semi-satellite, KBNZ, which was sold off in 2010.

On December 30, 2008, one of the 15 guy wires on the main transmitter tower snapped, putting the tower in danger of collapsing. (As with the 1971 tower collapse, this incident followed a prolonged snow and ice storm.) The Portland Police Bureau evacuated about 500 local residents and closed several roads around the tower, including a portion of Skyline Boulevard, the main north-south road through the West Hills of Portland. At first, officials feared that the wire itself—which is over 1000 feet long and weighs several tons—had snapped. If the wire had snapped, it would take several weeks to manufacture and install a replacement. Upon inspection it was revealed that one of the high frequency insulators incorporated into the guy wire assembly had shattered. Repair crews replaced the insulator by 4:00 p.m. the next day and the surrounding neighborhood was reopened to residents and car traffic. KOIN had to pay $1,500 to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

On May 7, 2012, LIN TV announced that it will acquire the New Vision Television station group, including KOIN, for $330.4 million and the assumption of $12 million in debt. On October 2, the FCC approved the proposed sale to LIN TV. The group deal will reunite KOIN, KHON, KSNW and KSNT with several former Emmis-owned stations which had been purchased by LIN seven years earlier, such as KRQE in Albuquerque, New Mexico, WALA-TV in Mobile, Alabama and WLUK-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The deal was completed on October 12, 2012. Currently, the websites of all of the former New Vision stations are hosted and managed by Inergize Digital (which itself is currently in the process of being acquired by the Nexstar Broadcasting Group and merged into Nexstar's existing CMS operations), but will transition to the LIN Media Interactive (LIN Media's branding for EndPlay) platform in the coming months.