Thank you for sharing

Viewers at home can’t see what Mayor Jerry Sanders sees. They see him making pronouncements on the budget or water conservation or whatever, and he gazes beneficently at them as they sit comfortably in their living rooms. But Sanders isn’t really part of this idyll: From his podium he sees a bristling topiary garden of black cameras, their proverbial unblinking eyes gazing right back at him, less beneficently. Normally, he has five or six staring at him, each backed by a burly cameraperson, and occasionally flanked by well-coifed TV reporters. Slumped nearby or standing to one side will be the ink-stained wretches of the print and online media, but this isn’t about them.

What it’s about is the fact that the topiary garden shrank by one camera last week. Probably Sanders didn’t notice, since he sees so many. But the folks in the local TV industry did. The missing camera was owned by either Channel 7/39 KNSD or Channel 8 KFMB, depending on what day it was. The two TV stations, normally rivals, have entered into a camera-sharing deal for routine press conferences and car crashes. Instead of each sending a cameraperson, now they send one and share the video. The agreement is formal and contractual, but it doesn’t even have a proper name. Within the halls of the two stations, it’s known as the “local news service”—not even raised to the level of capital letters.

In practice, the sharing functions much as pool reporting does in a court or a political campaign, where space and access is limited. For any given eight-hour period, KNSD or KFMB will have a camera, a photographer (in TV parlance, the cameraperson is a photographer) and an assignment editor. As alerts for press conferences, ribbon cuttings or even run-of-the-mill fires roll into the assignment desk, the editor will deploy the photographer and message the news directors for the two news stations that the event is covered. Then, when it’s been shot, both stations get the raw footage to edit and personalize as they see fit.

“So far, so good,” said Greg Dawson, vice president for news at KNSD. “Obviously, we’re reviewing it constantly. I think the key thing here is that what we’re doing is just trying to more efficiently gather those things that we’re all getting anyway. Anything that sets us apart really has nothing to do with this. I don’t think there’s any change in what’s on air and how we do it.”

And while the creation of a local news service is new to San Diego, content and resource sharing has become quite the trend nationally, as news organizations struggle to keep their heads above the rising tide of red ink. NBC Local Media, which owns KNSD, has a similar deal worked out with the Fox station in Philadelphia. In February, five New York and New Jersey daily newspapers joined forces to share content from Albany, N.Y., to Newark, N.J.

“It frees up resources to focus on those enterprise stories.“ said Liz Fischer, a spokesperson for NBC Local Media.

Then again, the overall resources are shrunk even with the local news service, considering that last week both KNSD and KFMB laid off a minimum of two camera operators each. Neither station would confirm the layoffs, but the information was pretty widespread among multiple sources interviewed by CityBeat.

“So we’re exactly where we were before, with fewer people,” said a news staffer at one of the stations who preferred not to be identified by name. “It’s all about money.”

Within the newsrooms of the two stations, there’s some nervousness. No one knows if these will be the last layoffs of this downturn, for one thing, and there’s also the fact that the newsrooms are theoretically trying to out-scoop one another.

“But it’s still a conflict, but we’re still competing,” said the anonymous staffer. “At bottom, you’re still very strong competitors. Here you’re like, OK, we’re waving the white flag; now for this story we’re not competitors anymore. I don’t know. Theoretically, it’s not something I would be that alarmed about. Practically, it’s pretty flawed.”

KFMB news director Fred D'Ambrosi did not return calls for comment.

Tim Wulfemeyer, a journalism professor at San Diego State University, was initially optimistic about the program.

“ There is a lot of routine news work,” he said. “You cover meetings and ribbon-cuttings, and there still is individual editing that can occur. It’s not as draconian to a free press as you might think at first blush.”

But he grew more concerned as he talked.

“So, today you’re covering an event for two stations. Soon you’re covering for three stations,” he said. “Now what drives you to getting the fresh angle, the unique interview? What’s the motivation for being anything other than mediocre?”    

Send comments and news tips to ericw@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com.