Common Cause blitzes FCC with Los Angeles Times/KTLA-TV cross-ownership protests

Over 2,500 supporters of Common Cause have filed comments asking the Federal Communications Commission to deny the Tribune Company the right to own both the Los Angeles Times and local TV station KTLA.

“For more than 30 years, the Federal Communications Commission has had a rule in place that prevents one company from owning both the local newspaper and the local TV station in one community,” the Common Cause missive reads. “The reason for the ban on newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership is clear: consolidated media fail to serve the public interest when they reduce the amount of independently produced programming available in a local community.”

Although most commenters signed off on the public interest lobby Web form’s suggested remarks, some added their own.

“I was working at KTLA when Chicago Tribune bought it,” wrote Sumi Sevilla Haru, a labor organizer in Los Angeles. “As a result, the station did away with most of its public affairs programs and hosts, including me.”

The Tribune Company owns KTLA thanks to a waiver on the FCC’s ban on an entity owning a newspaper and a TV station in the same market. Tribune acquired the Los Angeles Times in 2000. The FCC permitted the company to cross-own the southern California print and TV outlets until KTLA’s license renewal deadline of December 1, 2006.

An electronic filing snafu delayed completing the renewal application, as did several petitions asking the FCC to deny renewal of the KTLA’s license, L.A. Congressmember Maxine Waters’ among them.

Since then real estate mogul Sam Zell has acquired the Tribune Company, which owns the Los Angeles Times, the Baltimore Sun, nine other daily newspapers, and 23 broadcast stations. Zell beat out a competing bid from Los Angeles investors Eli Broad and Ron Burkle.

On March 6th, the FCC announced that “a full and complete record should be assembled with respect to the KTLA-TV license renewal application,” and opened a 30 day public comment window. Common Cause seized that moment to solicit comments from its supporters, whose filings create a 2654 page document.

Maxine Waters’ petition against the cross-ownership waiver charged that both media outlets engaged in a campaign to close the King/Drew trauma unit in Los Angeles.

“I, along with the community, organized the ‘Save King/Drew Coalition’ to find ways of improving the hospital,” Waters wrote, “while The Times abused its domination of the local media by launching aggressive and malicious investigations of the L.A. County Board of Supervisors, elected officials, and community leaders who were working to keep the hospi

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