City Chico | ||
Branding NBC 24 (general)
Action News Now (newscasts) Slogan Your Community, In-Depth Channels Digital: 24 (UHF)
Virtual: 24 (PSIP) Subchannels 24.1 NBC
24.2 Telemundo
24.5 The AccuWeather Channel Translators K42HL-D 42(UHF)/24.3 (PSIP)Oroville | ||
KNVN, virtual and UHF digital channel 24, is a NBC-affiliated television station located in Chico, California, United States, that also serves Redding. The station is owned by Maxair Media and operated by Heartland Media through a local marketing agreement as part of a virtual duopoly with CBS affiliate KHSL-TV (channel 12). The two stations share studios located at the intersection of Eaton Road and Silverbell Road on the northwest side of Chico, while its transmitter is located northeast of Red Bluff.
Contents
History
Channel 24 first hit the airwaves on September 24, 1985 as KCPM, making the northern Sacramento Valley one of the last regions of the country with full network service. It also brought a full NBC affiliate to the area for the first time since KRCR-TV switched from NBC to ABC in 1978. Since then, assorted NBC programs had been available via off-hours clearances from both KHSL and KRCR.
KCPM signed on during a very prosperous time for NBC, and it did quite well for the first several years on the air. But by 1998, the station was sinking in debt and on the verge of closing down. At this point, KHSL stepped in, not wanting to see the loss of full network service in the area. Then-owner Grapevine Communications sold the station to Evans Broadcasting, which changed the calls to the current KNVN on August 10th and turned the station's operations over to KHSL (owned by Catamount Broadcasting at the time) under a shared services agreement.
A report in the Chico News & Review on January 3, 2013 said that there were rumors of a sale of KHSL and KNVN to Nexstar Broadcasting Group. However, on February 6, KNVN was instead sold to K4 Media Holdings. Operations of the station were taken over by GOCOM Media, LLC, which concurrently bought KHSL. The FCC approved the sale on April 19; it was consummated on May 6. On July 14, 2015, it was announced that K4 would sell KNVN to Maxair Media. Concurrently, GOCOM will sell KHSL-TV to Heartland Media, through its USA Television Holdings joint venture with MSouth Equity Partners, for $40 million; Heartland will provide services to KNVN and sell up to 15 percent of channel 24's advertising time. The sale was completed on December 1.
News Operation
KHSL and KNVN currently share a single news operation; for information, see KHSL-TV#Action News.
KCPM aired its own newscasts for a time after going on the air. After Grapevine sold the station, KNVN relaunched its own news department, this time targeted toward younger viewers. However, this attempt at local news failed to make much of an impact. FInally, the news departments of both stations formally merged into a single news department in February 2000.
Digital television
KNVN has been broadcasting all-digital on UHF channel 24 since December 22, 2008, with its main channel and The Local AccuWeather Channel on DT2. It broadcasts an SD feed on cable channel 4 on every major cable system in Northern California.
See KHSL-TV for additional information on digital programming.
Digital channels for KNVN
Digital channels for K42HL-D
Analog-to-digital conversion
KNVN shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 24, on December 22, 2008. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 36 to channel 24.
High-Definition
KNVN airs all NBC-produced and most syndicated shows in HD, such as Live! with Kelly and Michael, Anderson, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, NUMB3RS, The New Adventures of Old Christine, and Without a Trace.
Although KNVN and KHSL began airing local commercials (including their own promos) in high definition in January 2012, no details have been released if local newscasts will ever be produced in HD.
KNVN began airing high definition local newscasts on January 7, 2014.
KNVN-DT2 Telemundo
KNVN-DT2 is the digital subchannel broadcasting locally on channel 24.2 as an affiliate of the Spanish-language Telemundo network. The station's Telemundo affiliation originally started with KXVU-LP Channel 17 in 2006. It was founded by Chester Smith of Sainte Partners II, L.P., joining sister station KUCO-LP (their Univision affiliate) as the only two Spanish-language stations in the North Valley until they also founded KKTF-LD (the UniMás affiliate). After the sale of Sainte's assets to Bonten Media Group, the new owners sold the rights to Telemundo to K4 Media Holdings and moved the network from KXVU's channel 17 to channel 24.2. (KXVU has since become an affiliate of Antenna TV.)
KNVN-DT2 is seen on Comcast channel 193 (SD) and 714 (HD) in Chico, as well as Charter channel 189. It is the first local Spanish-language station in the Northstate to broadcast a locally-produced Spanish-language newscast called Acción Noticiero Telemundo with Josh Navarro and Daniela Contreras as anchors.