[6] By April 1966, applications were on file with the FCC for a construction permit and the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare for grant money; it had been switched to channel 45.

The new plans called for the station's studios to be built at Chattanooga State Technical College, with a transmitter on Signal Mountain.

[9] However, it took several years to get WTCI in operation, due to channel changes and issues with the title to the Signal Mountain site.

The year before, WSJK-TV general manager Al Curtis had produced a 30-minute documentary on the successful 1978 gubernatorial campaign of Republican Lamar Alexander, The Extra Mile.

Gene Dietz, a Democrat and head of the state network, denied Curtis permission to broadcast the program.

However, when the issue came to light, state education commissioner Ed Cox abolished the position and began a formal audit.

[25] State legislator Bobby Wood did not obstruct the amendment but disapproved of the idea, fearing that WTCI under UTC control would simply become a promotional vehicle for the university.

[28] A 24-member board was convened in October to provide oversight to WTCI,[26] and by 1982, the 30-member Greater Chattanooga Public Television Corporation was in existence.

[30] The Tennessee Educational Television Network Act authorized the stations being spun out by the state to raise funds in the community for the first time; with WTCI needing to raise as much as 47 percent of its budget by 1985 from private sources, in order to offset declines in federal and state revenue, the station began airing pledge drives in August 1981 and ramped up its efforts to seek local donors.

[31] In 1991, Tennessee discontinued all financial subsidies for public television, leading to a 37-percent decrease in WTCI's operating revenue.

[37] Previously, station manager Victor Hogstrom had pointed out the location had poor visibility, as the Chattanooga State campus had grown around it.

[39] Previously, Chattanooga State had made overtures toward a merger with WTCI, a move rebuffed by station board members, who felt the proposed transfer amounted to a takeover.

[40] Later, in 2015, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga floated spinning off its public radio station, WUTC, and having it merge with WTCI to counter budget shortfalls.

[45] The station's signal is multiplexed: WTCI shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 45, on February 17, 2009, the original target date on 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).