KEYT-TV (channel 3) is a

television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity, such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth ...

licensed to

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara ( es, Santa Bárbara, meaning "Saint Barbara") is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coas ...

, United States, serving the

Central Coast of California The Central Coast is an area of California, roughly spanning the coastal region between Point Mugu and Monterey Bay. It lies northwest of Los Angeles County and south of San Mateo and Santa Clara counties, and includes the rugged, undevelope ...

as an affiliate of

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

, and

MyNetworkTV MyNetworkTV (unofficially abbreviated MyTV, MyNet, MNT or MNTV, and sometimes referred to as My Network) is an American commercial broadcast television syndication service and former television network owned by Fox Corporation, operated by its ...

. It is owned by the

News-Press & Gazette Company The News-Press & Gazette Company (NPG) is a media company based in St. Joseph, Missouri, wholly owned and operated by the Bradley family. It is presided by Brian Bradley and David R. Bradley, with Hank Bradley (retired), Eric Bradley and Kit Bra ...

(NPG) alongside

San Luis Obispo San Luis Obispo (; Spanish for " St. Louis the Bishop", ; Chumash: ''tiłhini'') is a city and county seat of San Luis Obispo County, in the U.S. state of California. Located on the Central Coast of California, San Luis Obispo is roughly halfwa ...

-licensed low-power, Class A

Fox Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

affiliate

KKFX-CD KKFX-CD (channel 24) is a low-power, Class A television station licensed to San Luis Obispo, California, United States, serving the Central Coast of California as an affiliate of the Fox network. It is owned by the News-Press & Gazette Company ...

(channel 24); NPG also provides certain services Santa Maria-licensed

Dabl Dabl () is an American lifestyle-oriented digital multicast television network owned by the CBS Media Ventures subsidiary of Paramount Global. The company's formerly-owned other subchannel network, Decades, through CBS News and Stations was l ...

affiliate

KCOY-TV KCOY-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Santa Maria, California, United States, serving the Central Coast (California), Central Coast of California as an affiliate of the digital multicast network Dabl. It is owned by VistaWest M ...

(channel 12) through a

shared services Shared services is the provision of a service by one part of an organization or group, where that service had previously been found, in more than one part of the organization or group. Thus the funding and resourcing of the service is shared and th ...

agreement (SSA) with VistaWest Media, LLC. KEYT-TV's studios are located on Miramonte Drive on TV Hill, overlooking downtown Santa Barbara; KCOY-TV and KKFX-CD share separate facilities at West McCoy Lane and Skyway Drive in Santa Maria north of

Santa Maria Public Airport Santa Maria Public Airport (Capt. G. Allan Hancock Field) is three miles (5 km) south of Santa Maria, in northern Santa Barbara County, California, United States. History The airport was built by the United States Army during World War ...

. KEYT-TV's transmitter is located atop Broadcast Peak, between Santa Barbara and

Santa Ynez Santa Ynez (; Spanish for "St. Agnes") is a census-designated place (CDP) in the Santa Ynez Valley of Santa Barbara County, California. The town of Santa Ynez is one of the communities of the Santa Ynez Valley. It features the Santa Ynez Airport ...

in the

Santa Ynez Mountains The Santa Ynez Mountains are a portion of the Transverse Ranges, part of the Pacific Coast Ranges of the west coast of North America. It is the westernmost range in the Transverse Ranges. The range is a large fault block of Cenozoic age created ...

History

Early years

KEYT-TV first

signed on Signing may refer to: * Using sign language * Signature A signature (; from la, signare, "to sign") is a handwritten (and often stylized) depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on do ...

the air on May 31, 1953, after obtaining a

construction permit Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building perm ...

from the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction ...

(FCC) on November 13, 1952. It was owned by the Santa Barbara Broadcasting & Television Corporation. Harry Butcher, who owned

KIST Kist or KIST may refer to: Abbreviations * Kigali Institute of Science and Technology, a former university in Kigali, Rwanda, now part of the new University of Rwanda * K. International School in Tokyo, Japan *Konark Institute of Science and Tech ...

(1340 AM), was a 14% owner of the new TV station. During the 1950s, the station ran programming from all four TV networks: ABC,

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

and the

DuMont Television Network The DuMont Television Network (also known as the DuMont Network, DuMont Television, simply DuMont/Du Mont, or (incorrectly) Dumont ) was one of America's pioneer commercial television networks, rivaling NBC and CBS for the distinction of being ...

. Dumont discontinued operations in 1956. The original owners sold the station to Key Television in 1957. KEYT-TV lost its NBC affiliation in 1964 when

in nearby Santa Maria signed on. KEYT then shared CBS with KCOY until 1969, when the inclusion of

San Luis Obispo County San Luis Obispo County (), officially the County of San Luis Obispo, is a county on the Central Coast of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 282,424. The county seat is San Luis Obispo. Junípero Serra founded the Mission ...

into the Santa Barbara—Santa Maria

media market A media market, broadcast market, media region, designated market area (DMA), television market area, or simply market is a region where the population can receive the same (or similar) television and radio station offerings, and may also incl ...

resulted in KEYT becoming exclusively affiliated with ABC. KCOY became the CBS affiliate, and

KSBY KSBY (channel 6) is a television station licensed to San Luis Obispo, California, United States, serving the Central Coast of California as an affiliate of NBC and The CW Plus. The station is owned by the E.W. Scripps Company, and maintains s ...

in San Luis Obispo became the region's NBC affiliate. KEYT was purchased by Shamrock Broadcasting in 1984.

Later developments

In September 1998, KEYT-TV owner Smith Broadcasting purchased radio station

KTMS KTMS (990 AM, "News Talk AM 990") is a commercial radio station in Santa Barbara, California. It is owned by Rincon Broadcasting and airs a talk radio format. KTMS is simulcast on FM translator station K250BS at 97.9 MHz, licensed to Solimar ...

(1250 AM) for $1.6 million and launched an

all-news All-news radio is a radio format devoted entirely to the discussion and broadcast of news. All-news radio is available in both local and syndicated forms, and is carried on both major US satellite radio networks. All-news stations can run the ...

format with new call letters KEYT to match those of its new TV sister. "KEYT 1250" featured news reports from the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...

and simulcasts of KEYT-TV newscasts. (The previous

news/talk Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often featur ...

format and call letters of KTMS moved to

990 AM 99 may refer to: * 99 (number), the natural number following 98 and preceding 100 * one of the years 99 BC, AD 99, 1999, 2099, etc. Art, entertainment, and media * '' The 99'', a comic series based on Islamic culture Film, television and radio ...

upon the sale to Smith.) The radio operation was a financial drain on Smith Broadcasting from the beginning, losing $1 million over five years, and the station was sold to Lazer Broadcasting in October 2003. Between March and September 2007, as the station transitioned to a high definition signal, KEYT-HD was initially unavailable to cable subscribers in the Central Coast due to a carriage dispute with the local cable companies. KEYT eventually reached an agreement with

Cox Communications Cox Communications, Inc. (also known as Cox Cable and formerly Cox Broadcasting Corporation, Dimension Cable Services and Times-Mirror Cable) is an American digital cable television provider, telecommunications and home automation services. It i ...

in Santa Barbara,

Comcast Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...

in Santa Maria, and

Charter Cable Charter Communications, Inc., is an American telecommunications and mass media company with services branded as Spectrum. With over 32 million customers in 41 states, it is the second-largest cable operator in the United States by subscribers, ...

in San Luis Obispo to carry its HDTV signal. In 2012,

Time Warner Cable Time Warner Cable, Inc. (TWC) was an American cable television company. Before it was acquired by Charter Communications on May 18, 2016, it was ranked the second largest cable company in the United States by revenue behind only Comcast, operat ...

Ventura County Ventura County () is a county in the southern part of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 843,843. The largest city is Oxnard, and the county seat is the city of Ventura. Ventura County comprises the Oxnar ...

began carrying the HDTV signal. On September 7, 2012,

announced that it had entered into an agreement to purchase KEYT-TV from Smith Media for $14.3 million. The transaction was approved by the FCC on November 6 and was completed on November 19, 2012. Smith Media had owned KEYT since 1987. On January 28, 2013, KEYT retired the longtime ''KEY News'' branding and, with the new owner's purchase, rebranded as ''NewsChannel 3''. The branding is similar to that of

Palm Springs Palm Springs (Cahuilla: ''Séc-he'') is a desert resort city in Riverside County, California, United States, within the Colorado Desert's Coachella Valley. The city covers approximately , making it the largest city in Riverside County by land ...

sister station

KESQ-TV KESQ-TV (channel 42) is a television station licensed to Palm Springs, California, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for the Coachella Valley. It is owned by the News-Press & Gazette Company (NPG) alongside five low-power stations: C ...

. KEYT's newscasts and site now include a graphics package that is similar to all NPG stations and is operated by

Internet Broadcasting Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...

. On April 1, 2013, KEYT began broadcasting its news in high definition. Until that point, KEYT aired network and syndicated programming in HD but the newscasts were still in standard definition.

Programming

Syndicated programming featured on KEYT includes ''

Live with Kelly and Ryan ''Live with Kelly and Ryan'' (or simply ''Live'') is an American syndicated morning talk show hosted by Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest. Executive produced by Michael Gelman, the ''Live with...'' show formula has aired under various hosts since ...

'', ''

Extra Extra or Xtra may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Film * ''The Extra'' (1962 film), a Mexican film * ''The Extra'' (2005 film), an Australian film Literature * ''Extra'' (newspaper), a Brazilian newspaper * ''Extra!'', an American me ...

'', ''

TMZ TMZ is a tabloid news website owned by Fox Corporation. It made its debut on November 8, 2005, originally as a collaboration between AOL and Telepictures, a division of Warner Bros., until Time Warner divested AOL in 2009. On September 13, 202 ...

'' and ''

Access Hollywood ''Access Hollywood'', formerly known as ''Access'' from 2017 to 2019, is an American weekday television entertainment news program that premiered on September 9, 1996. It covers events and celebrities in the entertainment industry. It was created ...

'', while KEYT-DT2 syndicated programs include '' The Doctors'', '' Dr. Phil'', ''

Judge Judy ''Judge Judy'' is an American Court show#Arbitration-based reality court show, arbitration-based reality court show presided over by former Manhattan Family Court Judge Judy Sheindlin, Judith Sheindlin. The show featured Sheindlin as she adjudi ...

'', ''

Family Feud ''Family Feud'' is an American television game show created by Mark Goodson. It features two families who compete to name the most popular answers to survey questions in order to win cash and prizes. The show has had three separate runs, the ...

'', and ''

Entertainment Tonight ''Entertainment Tonight'' (or simply ''ET'') is an American Broadcast syndication, first-run syndicated news broadcasting news magazine, newsmagazine program that is distributed by CBS Media Ventures throughout the United States and owned by Para ...

''.

News Now

When KEYT acquired the

affiliation in June 2006, it initially showed only MyNetworkTV programming, with a test pattern running outside of network programming hours. By the fall of 2007, the station had managed to obtain

syndication Syndication may refer to: * Broadcast syndication, where individual stations buy programs outside the network system * Print syndication, where individual newspapers or magazines license news articles, columns, or comic strips * Web syndication, ...

broadcast rights to ''

Family Guy ''Family Guy'' is an American animated sitcom originally conceived and created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The show centers around the Griffin family, Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter Griff ...

'' and ''

South Park ''South Park'' is an American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone and developed by Brian Graden for Comedy Central. The series revolves around four boys Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormickand th ...

'', and officially launched its second digital subchannel under the branding "MyNetworkTV Central Coast" in October 2007, replacing

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

-based MyNetworkTV affiliate

KCOP KCOP-TV (channel 13) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast flagship of MyNetworkTV. It is owned and operated by Fox Television Stations alongside Fox outlet KTTV (channel 11). Both stations ...

on all cable systems in the Central Coast region. The subchannel initially ran a

standard-definition Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...

simulcast of KEYT's primary channel outside of MyNetworkTV programming. On October 30, 2007, KEYT-DT2 added a secondary affiliation with the Luken Communications-owned

Retro Television Network Retro TV (stylized as retrotv), formerly known as Retro Television Network, is an American broadcast television network owned by Get After It Media. The network mainly airs classic television sitcoms and drama series from the 1950s through th ...

to RTV programming outside of MyNetworkTV

prime time Prime time or the peak time is the block of broadcast programming taking place during the middle of the evening for a television show. It is mostly targeted towards adults (and sometimes families). It is used by the major television networks to ...

program slots. The subchannel subsequently changed its branding to "My RTN" to coincide with the new affiliation, later changing to "My RTV" after the network modified its on-air acronym to "RTV", then finally "My Retro TV". On April 18, 2017, the 3.2 subchannel dropped Retro TV because station management was unsure of it continuing as a going concern with a declining affiliate base, along with contractual restrictions on using it as an overflow channel for breaking news. (Before that date, it was the only "Big Three" network affiliate nationwide left still carrying the network as a subchannel). In the interim, the station relaunched KEYT-DT2 as ''News Now'', airing simulcasts and rebroadcasts of newscasts from KEYT-TV and KKFX-CD, along with live rolling coverage of local political events, news coverage and other public affairs and local interest programming; the subchannel continues to carry MyNetworkTV programming in primetime. The News-Press & Gazette Company announced on October 10, 2018, that it was converting KSBB-CD to

ATSC 3.0 ATSC 3.0 is a major version of the ATSC standards for television broadcasting created by the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC). The standards are designed to offer support for newer technologies, including HEVC for video channels of u ...

operations, airing ''News Now'' in that format, with its own ATSC 1.0 signal and programming being moved to a subchannel of KEYT-TV. On January 1, 2021, CBS programming moved from sister station KCOY to KEYT-DT2, moving ''News Now'' and MyNetworkTV programming to a new third subchannel.

Notable former on-air staff

*Joey Buttitta and Kelsey Gerckens, reporters; winners of ''

The Amazing Race 27 ''The Amazing Race 27'' is the twenty-seventh season of the American reality television show ''The Amazing Race''. It featured eleven teams of two competing in a race around the world. The season premiered on CBS September 25, 2015, and the fina ...

'' *

Christine Craft Christine Ann Craft (born December 18, 1944) is an American attorney, radio talk show host and former television news anchor. She became known in the broadcast industry in the 1980s for her age and sexual discrimination lawsuit against a televisio ...

, anchor/reporter (1970s) *

Giselle Fernández Giselle Fernández (born May 15, 1961) is an American television journalist and anchor for Spectrum News 1. Her appearances on network television include reporting and guest anchoring for ''CBS Early Show'', ''CBS Evening News'', ''Today'', and ...

, reporter (circa 1983) *

Michelle Franzen Michelle Renee Franzen (born August 30, 1968) is a New York-based midday anchor for ABC News Radio. From 2001 to 2013 she was a national correspondent for NBC News. She has reported on a wide range of issues and events for various television st ...

, reporter/fill-in anchor (1993–1994) *

Edie Lambert Edie Lambert (born November 26, 1968) is a well-known TV journalist in Sacramento. She currently anchors the 5 pm, 6 pm and 11 pm newscasts on KCRA reports. Career Lambert joined KCRA in July 1995 as a reporter and morning anchor. Later she beca ...

, anchor/reporter (now at

KCRA-TV KCRA-TV (channel 3) is a television station in Sacramento, California, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Hearst Television alongside Stockton, California, Stockton-licensed MyNetworkTV affiliate KQCA (channel 58). Both stations ...

in Sacramento) *

Indra Petersons Indra Valija Petersons (born June 22, 1980) is an American meteorologist. She formerly worked as the weather anchor for CNN's early morning program "New Day". She is also formerly a meteorologist for KABC-TV in Los Angeles, where she was born an ...

, reporter (now with

ABC News ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...

)

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is

multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource - a ...

Analog-to-digital conversion

KEYT-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 3, on February 17, 2009, the original target date in which full-power television stations in the United States were to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate (which was later pushed back to June 12, 2009). The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 27. Through the use of

PSIP The Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) is the MPEG (a video and audio industry group) and privately defined program-specific information originally defined by General Instrument for the DigiCipher 2 system and later extended for the AT ...

, digital television receivers display the station's

virtual channel In most telecommunications organizations, a virtual channel is a method of remapping the ''program number'' as used in H.222 Program Association Tables and Program Mapping Tables to a channel number that can be entered via digits on a receiver's ...

as its former VHF analog channel 3.

Translators

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Keyt-Tv ABC network affiliates CBS network affiliates News-Press & Gazette Company EYT-TV Television channels and stations established in 1953 1953 establishments in California