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For more than 30 years, John Kiesewetter has been the source for information about all things in local media — comings and goings, local people appearing on the big or small screen, special programs, and much more. Contact John at johnkiese@yahoo.com.

WKRC-TV Continues News Dominance In July

WKRC-TV remained No. 1 in all weekday newscasts in July – but Channel 12 wasn’t the station most viewers watched for Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters’ live press conference Wednesday.

More watched WCPO-TV (Channel 9) at 1 p.m., when local news viewing nearly doubled for the breaking news about the murder indictment of University of Cincinnati police officer Ray Tensing.

Channel 12 maintained its streak of winning the weekday morning, noon, early evening and late night local news ratings in July sweeps (July 2-29), even with news director Kirk Varner stepping down July 3. At 11 p.m., Channel 12 had more viewers (8.3 rating) than the combined audience for competitors WCPO-TV (4.3) and WLWT-TV (3.9). One ratings point equals 8,762 TV homes here.

Nielsen’s overnight meters revealed that the viewing habit shifts in May sweeps reverted to the status quo. Channel 9 regained second place at 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. with new co-anchor Craig McKee, after falling to third behind WLWT-TV (Channel 5) in May.  Channel 9 was second in all weekday newscasts; Channel 5 was third.

Channel 9 also saw a huge bump 1-2 p.m. Wednesday for Deters’ announcement, leading all stations with a 6.8 rating. Channel 12 was next (5.2), followed by Channel 5 (2.9) and Channel 19 (0.6). Overall, the live 1-2 p.m. press conference total audience jumped 96% over the July weekday average until then, drawing 45% of all available viewers. Deters was seen live in 144,573 TV homes here, up from the July average of 73,609 homes.

But Channel 12 won the ratings for all regularly scheduled newscasts Wednesday.

WXIX-TV (Channel 19) was third for local news 6-7 a.m., but jumped to second 7-9 a.m. behind “Good Morning America” on Channel 9. Channel 19’s local news beat the “Today” show and “CBS This Morning” here 7-9 a.m.

At 10 p.m., Channel 19 again was the local news leader, with twice more viewers 10-10:30 p.m. when head to head with a half-hour newscast on WSTR-TV (5.3 rating to 2.3 rating). For the hour, Channel 19 averaged a 3.9 rating.

John Kiesewetter, who has covered television and media for more than 35 years, has been working for Cincinnati Public Radio and WVXU-FM since 2015.