LocalNewser dispatches from the frontlines of local news

A “Rebound” That Won’t Change Anything

Hey great news from the folks who brought you big bonuses on Wall Street!  It's more corporate recovery that will not be trickling down to you.

TVNewsCheck reports "since the end of the first quarter, Belo shares are up over 500 percent; Gray, nearly 500 percent; Nexstar, more than 300 percent; and LIN, nearly 300 percent."

And station group owners are, as you'd expect, encouraged by those numbers.

That's not to say this "rebound" has put the station groups anywhere near where they once were.  As TVNewsCheck's Price Colman writes, the stock prices that may have been upgraded from "dead" to "critical" aren't quite ready to be released from ICU: "That's probably going to have to wait until the second or third quarter of next year. And even then, it's likely to be up so little as to be nearly invisible."

But here's one thing you can take to the bank:  just the way Wall Street took all that bailout money and padded their own pockets with it--what?  you thought we'd use the government's money to ease credit for consumers? where'd you get that idea?--any recovery for station groups will absolutely not translate into real recovery in hard-hit newsrooms.

Overtime will remain a rarity.  The scaled-back staff size will stay scaled-back, and that means yep, you'll still be multi-tasking your way through long work weeks.  Outdated equipment?  You know we were forced to invest in HD.  Well, that's basically the last new spending you'll see in your lifetime.  And those switching errors coming from the dialed-back staff in the control room?  Cost of doing business, my friend.

Some of you will undoubtedly do furlough days in the weeks and months after corporate stock shows signs of "recovery," which should really give you a few hours to think about the new lay of the land.

Am I wrong?  Is your company passing along every penny of recovery to the people who do the day in and day out work?  Please share your story.