 | |
| |
|---|---|
| City | Santa Fe, New Mexico |
| Channels | |
| Branding | Telemundo Nuevo México;Noticias Telemundo Nuevo México |
| Programming | |
| Affiliations | |
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
|
| KTEL-CD,KRTN-LD,KUPT-LD | |
| History | |
First air date | October 31, 1983 (41 years ago) (1983-10-31) |
Former call signs |
|
Former channel number(s) | Analog: 2 (VHF, 1983–2009) |
| |
Call sign meaning | Based onSpanish wordcasa, meaning "home" or "house" |
| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 32311 |
| ERP | 380kW |
| HAAT | 1,278 m (4,193 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 35°12′49.8″N106°27′3.3″W / 35.213833°N 106.450917°W /35.213833; -106.450917 |
| Translator(s) | see§ Rebroadcasters |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | www |
KASA-TV (channel 2) is atelevision station licensed toSanta Fe, New Mexico, United States, serving theAlbuquerque area and most of the state as anowned-and-operated station of the Spanish-language networkTelemundo. KASA-TV's studios are located on Monroe Street NE in Albuquerque; its transmitter is located onSandia Crest, with translators in much of the state and southwesternColorado extending its signal and on subchannels of two high-power stations, KTEL-TV inCarlsbad and KUPT inHobbs.
Channel 2 in Santa Fe was established in 1983 and struggled for its first decade on air as an independent station. It went silent in 1992 during a merger withKGSW-TV, which resulted in 1993 in its relaunch asFox affiliate KASA-TV. KASA remained the Albuquerque market's Fox affiliate until a merger led to Fox's move to a subchannel ofKRQE; at that time, channel 2 and its translators were sold toLubbock, Texas-based Ramar Communications and switched to Telemundo, which had previously aired on that company's KTEL-CD. Telemundo's parent company,NBCUniversal, purchased all of Ramar's stations in New Mexico in 2021.
The New Mexico Media Co., a group ofSanta Fe businessmen backed by California industrialist John J. Pollon,[2] applied on September 10, 1977, for a new television station to serve Santa Fe onvery high frequency (VHF) channel 11 (amended two months later to specify channel 2).[3] Both the New Mexico Media application and the other channel 11 bid, which becameKCHF, were contested by theAlbuquerque television stations for specifying the use ofSandia Crest as the transmitter site, which they contended would have meant an insufficient signal over the city of license.[4]
TheFederal Communications Commission (FCC) approved the application on May 10, 1982.[3] By that time, the application had been amended to change the transmitter site to No Name Peak in theJemez Mountains.[5][6]
Channel 2 came to the air on October 31, 1983[7]—a day later than announced,[8] prompting the station to apologize on local radio stations and claim it was "a day late but ... not a single program short"[9]—asindependent station KSAF-TV. Based in a new studio building at the corner of St. Francis and St. Michael's Drive in Santa Fe, channel 2 promised a strong signal for Santa Fe and Albuquerque, as well as the first live newscast for New Mexico's capital city;[10] the 9 p.m. newscast was scrapped just three months after launch, with the general manager calling it a "drain" on the station's resources as a startup operation.[11][12]
In October 1984, a California-based investor group bought into KSAF-TV.[13] The new ownership upgraded the programming by acquiring 600 films from a financially troubledKNAT-TV; in order to avoid confusion with radio stationKAFE and "KSFE-TV", a former cable channel in Santa Fe, the call letters were changed to KNMZ-TV (stylized as "KNM2") on March 1, 1985.[14][15]
The station filed for bankruptcy in August 1987, citing $11 million in assets but $15 million in liabilities.[16] Coronado Communications Company, a subsidiary of theLas Vegas–basedSunbelt Communications Company, purchased channel 2 for $3 million in early 1988.[17] Founding investor Pollon bought back the studio building, and KNMZ-TV moved its Santa Fe offices to smaller quarters on Calle Nava while shifting the bulk of operations to Albuquerque.[18][19] Coronado also laid off 17 staffers to cut back to the "bare bones" necessary for operation.[20]
Coronado made its own repositioning of channel 2 in 1989, changing the call letters to KKTO-TV.[19]
By mid-1992, KKTO-TV was economically struggling: Coronado had lost $6.6 million in its ownership of the station, and it warned that it could not continue to operate KKTO-TV much longer.[21] That July, theProvidence Journal Company (ProJo)—owners ofKGSW-TV (channel 14), New Mexico's Fox affiliate—reached a deal to purchase KKTO from Coronado. The deal was made with the express purpose of moving the Fox affiliation and channel 14 programming to the VHF station, which in turn would move its transmitter to Sandia Crest in a $1 million upgrade.[22][23] ProJo immediately took control of KKTO under alocal marketing agreement, firing its 18 staff and rehiring 10.[23]
Programming from KKTO ceased at midnight on September 6, 1992.[24] That same week, theAssociated Press news agency had sued the station for $78,700 in unpaid wire service bills.[25] The FCC approved the ProJo purchase of KKTO in January 1993, along with new KASA-TV call letters for channel 2.[26] On April 5, 1993, at 6 p.m., KGSW-TV signed off channel 14, and KASA-TV began telecasting on channel 2.[27]
In 1997,Belo acquired the Providence Journal Company. However, it found that there was no synergy between KASA-TV and its clusters of stations in Texas, the Pacific Northwest, and the mid-Atlantic states and put the station up for sale, along withKHNL inHonolulu,Hawaii, in May 1999.[28] The Albuquerque and Honolulu operations were purchased byRaycom Media for $88 million.[29] Under Raycom ownership, KASA began airing a 9 p.m. local newscast produced for it byKOB-TV in November 2000.[30]
After purchasing theLiberty Corporation in August 2005, Raycom announced its intent to sell KASA and several other stations. On July 27, 2006, Raycom announced thatLIN TV, owner of CBS affiliateKRQE, would purchase KASA for $55 million and take over operations at the end of August.[31] The creation of a television duopoly involving two "Big Four" affiliates—typically the four highest-rated stations in a market, which cannot be commonly owned—was allowed since KASA was New Mexico's fifth-rated station at the time. The deal also saw KASA move out of its Albuquerque studio site—which had been used by KGSW-TV since its start—to KRQE's facility and switch from airing a 9 p.m. newscast produced by KOB to one from KRQE.[32]
While LIN was able to retain both KRQE and KASA in its merger withMedia General in 2014, this would prove not to be the case in 2016 whenNexstar Broadcasting Group reached a deal to purchase Media General for $4.6 billion. KASA and KRQE were both ranked among the top four stations in the market during the November 2015 sweeps period, which meant that the company had to divest one of the two stations to comply with the FCC duopoly rules.[33] On June 30, 2016, it agreed to sell KASA-TV and associated translators to Ramar Communications, owner ofTelemundo affiliate KTEL-CD (channel 15),Movies! affiliateKUPT-LD (channel 16), andMeTV affiliateKRTN-LD (channel 33), for $2.5 million.[34]
On January 18, 2017, Fox programming moved to a subchannel of KRQE, as Ramar did not acquire the Fox affiliation in the transaction. KASA switched to Telemundo; Ramar also converted its three existing full-power stations in the market—KRTN-TV (channel 33) inDurango, Colorado, KTEL-TV (channel 25) inCarlsbad, and KUPT (channel 29) inHobbs—into satellites of KASA.[34][35]
Ramar announced the sale of its entire Albuquerque-market television operation—KASA-TV, the other three full-power stations, and all of their dependent translators—toNBCUniversal on July 30, 2021. The $12.5 million deal gave NBCU Telemundoowned-and-operated stations in 31 markets and marked the end of 23 years of Ramar's ownership of the Telemundo affiliation in the city.[36][37] The sale was completed on October 5.[38]
Initially, local news on Telemundo Nuevo México originated from the studios ofKJTV-TV, formerly owned by Ramar, inLubbock, Texas, with reports from Albuquerque-based reporters. As part of the sale, NBC entered into a transitional services agreement withGray Television, which had purchased KJTV-TV and other Ramar television assets in Lubbock earlier in 2021, to continue news production in the short term;[39] in announcing the purchase, NBC declared its intention to start its own local news service for KASA.[36]
On October 18, 2021, Albuquerque's NBC affiliate,KOB, assumed production of the local newscasts.[40]
KASA-TV operates twosatellite stations to rebroadcast the station's programming to southeastern New Mexico.
| Station | City of license | Channel | Facility ID | ERP | HAAT | Transmitter coordinates | First air date | Public license information |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KTEL-TV | Carlsbad | 25 | 83707 | 41 kW | 120 m (394 ft) | 32°26′9.6″N104°11′16″W / 32.436000°N 104.18778°W /32.436000; -104.18778 (KTEL-TV) | October 27, 1997 | |
| KUPT | Hobbs | 29 | 27431 | 50 kW | 157 m (515 ft) | 32°43′28″N103°5′48″W / 32.72444°N 103.09667°W /32.72444; -103.09667 (KUPT) | July 5, 1983 |
KASA-TV has 23 low-power rebroadcasters in New Mexico and Colorado.[41] In early 1987, KGSW-TV began building translators in such cities as Alamosa, Durango, and Farmington.[42] Around the same time, the then-KNMZ-TV built its first rebroadcaster, to serve Farmington.[43]
The stations' signals aremultiplexed. The use of major channel numbers 15 and 33 for KASA-TV's other subchannels correlates to the other full-power former Ramar stations in New Mexico.
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | KASA-HD | Telemundo |
| 15.1 | 480i | TeleX | TeleXitos | |
| 33.1 | TBD | TBD | ||
| 47.1 | 720p | COZI HD | Cozi TV (KTEL-CD) | |
| 47.5 | 480i | 4:3 | Nosey | Nosey |
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25.1 | 720p | 16:9 | KTEL-HD | Cozi TV |
| 25.2 | 480i | COZI | TBD | |
| 25.3 | CHARGE | TeleXitos | ||
| 25.4 | KASA-SD | Telemundo |
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.1 | 480i | 16:9 | KASA | Telemundo |
| 15.1 | MeTV | Cozi TV | ||
| 29.1 | H & I | TBD | ||
| 29.2 | KMYL-LD | MyNetworkTV (KMYL-LD) | ||
| 33.1 | CHARGE | TeleXitos |
KASA-TV shut down its analog signal, overVHF channel 2, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television in the United Statestransitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transitionUHF channel 27, usingvirtual channel 2.[47]
Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the state ofColorado | ||
|---|---|---|
| ABC | ||
| CBS | ||
| Fox | ||
| NBC | ||
| The CW | ||
| MyNetworkTV | ||
| Ion Television | ||
| PBS |
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| Telemundo | ||
| Univision | ||
| UniMás | ||
| Other |
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(*) – indicates station is in one of Colorado's primaryTV markets (**) – indicates station is in an out-of-state TV market, but reaches a small portion of Colorado | ||
