Durango – It’s the season for football, politics and, for many in southwestern Colorado, the reminder that, in the eyes of the FCC and Nielsen Media Research, they are New Mexicans.
La Plata and Montezuma county are in the Albuquerque-Santa Fe viewing area, which means they watch Albuquerque television news, listen to Gov. Bill Richardson instead of Gov. Bill Owens and, despite the tearing of hair and rending of garments, they occasionally must watch the Dallas Cowboys instead of the Denver Broncos.
“It’s starting all over again. It’s only one or two games a year that we miss, but if you’re a fan, you’re a fan,” says Steve Harris of Durango. It hurts.”
KASA, the Fox affiliate in Albuquerque, opts for the Cowboys over the Broncos if there is a scheduling conflict.
“Last year when they didn’t show a Broncos game, I called KASA. They said it wasn’t their fault. It was the decision of Fox headquarters in Beverly Hills,” Harris says. “I called them. They said: ‘It’s not our fault. It’s the NFL.’ I called the NFL. The NFL said it was the FCC. The FCC said it was Nielsen. … I called my congressman.”
It was Congress that asked the FCC to divvy up the country into 210 viewing areas for the networks. The FCC delegated the task to Nielsen, the global leader in TV audience measurement. Nielsen put the two sparsely populated Colorado counties, with a combined 26,730 TV households, with the closest “big” market, Albuquerque-Santa Fe, also known as a Designated Market Area.
Colorado has three DMAs: Denver, which is 18th largest in the country; Colorado Springs-Pueblo, which is 93rd; and, Grand Junction-Montrose, which is 187th.
State Rep. Mark Larson, R-Cortez, says the arrangement is an artifact from when Denver television signals couldn’t penetrate the mountains, and only New Mexico stations were willing to install transmitters for southwestern Colorado. Contractual obligations are in place that were based on obsolete technology, he says.
“It’s going to take an act of Congress to change it,” he says.
Designated Market Areas are based on viewership patterns, Nielsen spokesman Jack Loftus says.
In other words, what people are allowed to watch on TV in southwestern Colorado, whether transmission is by cable, satellite or the airwaves, hinges on DMAs that were created based on what is was possible to watch decades ago.
Sen. Ken Salazar and his brother, Rep. John Salazar, who represents a district that includes southern Colorado, are trying to get more Colorado channels on southwestern Colorado TV
But New Mexico broadcasters are eager to keep the two counties in their universe because their market is the 46th biggest in the country – and only a few thousand viewers away from slipping out of the top 50 and its valuable advertising.
John Salazar couldn’t effect a change in the House. Ken Salazar still has a shot in the Senate.
“In many parts of my district, television and radio are the only way we can be connected with our communities,” John Salazar says. “And on a big game day, or political debate night, we don’t need to know what’s going on in New Mexico. We need to know what’s going on in our own state.”
When John Salazar appealed to the FCC for answers, the commission told him the problem was with Nielsen’s DMAs.”Pursuant to federal law, a local television station is one that is located and serves the Designated Market Area as defined by Nielsen Media Research Inc.,” FCC spokesman Michael Perko wrote to Salazar. “Nielsen, an independent commercial entity that is not subject to regulation by the commission, assigns each county in the United States to one of the 210 DMAs based on, among other things, audience surveys and viewership levels.”
Not so fast, says Nielsen’s Jack Loftus.
“People should be outraged. Nielsen DMAs were never designed to determine what people could watch,” he says. “There was no other easy definition available so Congress plugged in the DMAs. We were innocent bystanders. … Congress should come up with a different definition.”
John Salazar staffer John Whitney said, barring a legislative fix, they would attempt this fall to negotiate a less formal agreement with New Mexico network affiliates, the FCC and NFL.
There is a precedent. Cable provider Bresnan Communications has arranged with New Mexico affiliates for PBS, CBS and NBC to air some Denver programs for Durango subscribers.
Die-hard Broncos fans and couch potatoes have found other partial solutions. Harris pays an extra $240 a year for a satellite package that includes the NFL Sunday Ticket. Because any games otherwise available are blacked out with his package, he essentially pays that much for the one or two games he would miss.
Others, who declined to be named, subscribe to satellite TV and give bogus Denver or Archuleta County addresses, which makes them eligible for the Denver feeds.
Staff writer Electa Draper can be reached at 970-385-0917 or at edraper@denverpost.com.
