Local TV Coverage: Election 2005

This past Tuesday saw another Election Day, with local leaders being chosen across West Michigan. Up for grabs were city commission seats in Grand Rapids, the mayor’s office in Muskegon, Wyoming and Kalamazoo, as well as numerous smaller city elections and ballot initiatives. Turnout is typically low for local elections, one of the most common reasons given by people for not voting is that they didn’t know about the election or about the candidates. For the past seven years GRIID has monitored the local TV news to find out if these stations are using the public airwaves in a manner that would allow citizens to be informed voters. We have found that local elections consistently get insufficient coverage in the local media, this current election being no excerption.

GRIID monitored the thirty days prior to the November 8 election, recording the weekday evening newscasts of channels 8, 13 and 17. All three stations ran stories on the election, with most of them being aired in the week prior to the election. WOOD TV 8 was the only station to run any election stories more than ten days before the election, and had the most election coverage with 16 stories totaling just less than 28 minutes of airtime. WZZM 13 ran 11 stories for a total of 20 minutes of airtime while WXMI ran 5 stories totaling about 18 minutes.

All three stations covered the City Commission races in Grand Rapids and the mayoral race in Wyoming and Muskegon, albeit in a limited and superficial manner. WOOD 8 and WXMI 17 also did stories on the mayoral race in Kalamazoo. WOOD 8 reported on the school bond ballot in Comstock, WZZM reported on some ballot initiatives in Ottawa County as well as a vote on legalizing snowmobiles in Whitehall. All three stations ran stories in which they played clips of the candidates for the Grand Rapids city commission and Muskegon and Wyoming mayoral races. These clips were very short; the most speaking time of any candidate on any one channel was Muskegon mayoral candidate Ric Scott who spoke 162 total words on WXMI 17. None of the stations interviewed or even told viewers the names of the candidates for the Kalamazoo City commission/mayoral race on-air.

The information that was provided on the local candidates was limited to a few issues and generally included little information as to past voting records, organizational endorsements or sources of funding. The on-air statements made by the candidates tended to be very general statements without many specifics offered as to platforms and proposals. The only exception to this was the coverage of the Wyoming mayoral race which included the candidates giving details about their plans to increase public safety services.

All three stations aired stories the day before the election reporting that turnout was expected to be low. These stories did nothing to inform voters about issues and candidates. In the case of WZZM 13, they spend three and a half minutes reporting on low projected turnout, an amount of time representing 17 % of their total election coverage air-time.

For people who feel that the local media have, by not covering local elections, have failed to fulfill their obligation to serve the public interest, we would suggest contacting the news directors at the three local TV Stations and demand that they provide better coverage of these crucial news topics. We suggest that people urge the local TV stations to adopt the election coverage standards presented during GRIID’s FFC license renewals of the local TV stations. Those standards can be read here. For more information on election coverage, visit the GRIID website.

Contact:

WOOD TV 8
News Director: Patti McGettigan
Phone #: 771-9366
E-mail: patti.mcgettigan@lintv.com

WXMI FOX 17
News Director: Tim Dye
Phone #: (616) 364-1717
E-mail: tdye@wxmi.com

WZZM 13
News Director: Tim Geraghty
Phone #: (616) 785-1313
E-mail: tgeraght@wzzm.gannett.com

Grand Rapids Press
Editor: Mike Lloyd
Phone #: (616) 222-5455