KNBC News Solidifies Ratings Lead

KNBC Channel 4 regained a solid lead over its two chief rivals in allnews time periods while KCAL Channel 9 made tiny strides with its three-hour prime-time newscasts, according to ratings for the just-concluded July sweeps period.

Buoyed by a surprisingly strong showing by “Donahue,” which finished just a fraction behind longtime ratings queen “The Oprah Winfrey Show” at 3 p.m., KNBC made especially strong moves with its 4 and 5 p.m. newscasts, improving on its performance in May. KNBC’s numbers for its afternoon newscasts were off a bit from what they were the previous July, however.

Traditionally, viewing levels fall off during the summer, and the July sweeps, one of four ratings periods that help determine advertising rates, are generally perceived to be less consequential than the other three.

KABC Channel 7 fell back to second place in all news time periods as measured by Nielsen and Arbitron, losing a good chunk of the audience that had propelled its 4 and 5 p.m. newscasts to first-place finishes in May. KCBS Channel 2 continued to struggle, with all of its newscasts finishing third.

Meanwhile, KCAL’s numbers were up a fraction in all three hours of its prime-time newscast, a significant achievement considering that prime-time viewing levels were down markedly from May. KCAL may have benefitted from a slackening in the competition as the networks aired a glut of reruns.

KCAL’s 10 p.m. newscast nonetheless finished last among the four independent newscasts at that hour. As always, KTLA Channel 5 handily won that race, with KTTV Channel 11 and KCOP Channel 13 finishing in a virtual dead heat for second.

The good news for Channel 13 last month was that “The Arsenio Hall Show” continued to soar, finishing second among all programs broadcast between 11 p.m. and midnight. With vacationing school kids staying up late, the vibrant talk show actually beat the 11 p.m. newscasts on KABC and KCBS, according to Nielsen, and ended up only two-tenths of a rating point--about 10,000 households--behind late-night king Johnny Carson and “The Tonight Show” on KNBC.

“Jeopardy!” on Channel 2 at 7:30 p.m. again proved to be the most-watched locally programed show and outperformed the average for CBS’ entire weekday prime-time lineup in Los Angeles. “Love Connection” on Channel 9 made a big push last month, tying “Wheel of Fortune” for first in the 7 p.m. time period, according to Arbitron.

NBC won the national ratings race in prime time, even though the network’s total audience was off 12% from last summer. The combined audience for NBC, ABC and CBS was down 7% from last July. Tired of reruns and not too enthused with the few new network offerings, viewers turned elsewhere, sending the three-network share of the prime-time audience plummeting to a mere 53% of all those watching television.