XETV-TDT
While San Diego and Los Angeles are not close enough that one city's stations can be seen clearly over the air in the other, the unique geography of Southern California results in tropospheric propagation.
Channel 3 initially had been deemed unusable as a signal because KEYT-TV in Santa Barbara would travel in a straight line across the Pacific Ocean (it would ultimately be allocated to Tijuana Canal Once outlet XHCPDE-TDT).
One of the frequencies, channel 6, had originally been assigned to San Diego before the freeze; it was reassigned to Mexico as a result of the Sixth Report and Order.
The Azcárraga family, owners of Telesistema Mexicano (the forerunner of Televisa), quickly snapped up the concession for channel 6, and signed XETV on the air on April 29, 1953.
[9][10] Channel 6 also established a business office on Park Boulevard in the University Heights section of San Diego, which handled sales accounts from north of the border.
Both this permit and further requests from NBC and DuMont to transmit their programming to XETV were then opposed by TBC Television, Inc. and KFSD radio, the applicants for San Diego's remaining channel 10 allocation.
[16] However, Flanagan moved on to manage KCOP-TV in Los Angeles in January 1954, and the request for a full-time Section 325 permit was dismissed for good on April 26.
[19] Pending the outcome of an appeal by KFMB-TV and KFSD-TV, ABC signed a stopgap affiliation deal with XETV which allowed it to carry network programming via film and kinescope physically transported over the border, a practice known as "bicycling" which does not require FCC permission.
[21] The Commission again upheld the grant on April 22, 1958; in November of that year, KFMB-TV again asked for revocation, based on an ad in Broadcasting which XETV identified itself as a San Diego station.
[23] ABC was required to apply for its Section 325 permit annually, with the FCC reserving the right to determine whether the continued affiliation was in the public interest.
A regulatory lawyer representing KCST told The New York Times that XETV dropped network news coverage of drug trafficking across the border.
The commission concluded that the primary factor in the 1956 decision – that allowing XETV to carry ABC served the public interest since there were no other available U.S.-based television stations – no longer applied with KCST being "ready, willing and desirous" to affiliate with the network.
On October 9, 1986, XETV became one of the first stations outside of the original group of six television stations formerly owned by Metromedia (which had been purchased by Fox's parent company affiliate, News Corporation, earlier that year) to sign deals to join the newly launched Fox Broadcasting Company, becoming a charter affiliate of the network when it launched on October 6.
[42] The commission also changed its stance on XETV's local programming, ruling that serving the American public interest was irrelevant for a foreign station.
[46] That same year, the station became a Grupo Televisa-owned property[47] outright after the Azcárragas transferred the ownership of XETV to their family-run, Mexico City-based multimedia company.
[56] XETV, upon switching networks, replaced KSWB-TV on DirecTV as a default affiliate in the few areas of the western United States where a CW-affiliated station is not receivable over-the-air or through cable television.
[57] The station's morning newscast provided special coverage of the festivities, including separate proclamations of "XETV Channel 6 Day" by the San Diego City Council and San Diego County Board of Supervisors (the latter made on April 30 to general manager Chuck Dunning and chief financial officer Rodrigo Salazar).
[63] The station would reveal its plans on January 26; on that date, it announced that news programming on XETV would be discontinued following the conclusion of the 10 p.m. newscast on March 31, 2017.
By Dunning's estimate, about 150 full-time, part-time, and freelance staffers were laid off between the closure of the news department on March 31 and the corporate shutdown.
[65][62] In addition to ending channel 6's affiliation with The CW three months earlier than scheduled, the closure of Bay City Television concluded XETV's 64-year history of serving San Diego with English-language programming; the move left MyNetworkTV affiliate XHDTV-TDT as the sole Mexican-licensed station providing English-language programming to the San Diego market until just over a year later in September 2018, when it was replaced with Milenio Televisión.
[67] KFMB-TV's "The CW San Diego" has replaced XETV on the American cable systems, as well as satellite television providers DirecTV and Dish Network.
XETV is carried by all Mexican cable systems in its coverage area, as carriage of local broadcast stations is mandated by the Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT).
[3][10][70] Prior to the CW disaffiliation, syndicated programs broadcast by XETV (as of September 2016[update]) included Maury, Seinfeld, The Insider, Rules of Engagement, The Doctors and 2 Broke Girls.
Although then-general manager Martin Colby originally stated that XETV would not offer a newscast, in response to then-Fox President Barry Diller's comments during the 1991 Television Critics Association Convention in pushing for Fox's affiliates to produce local newscasts that the network "won't tolerate any affiliate that is not in the news business", XETV began reconsidering the possibility of launching a news department.
After the station appointed Richard Doutre Jones as its vice president and general manager in the fall of 2001, XETV overhauled its news presentation in January 2002, adopting a more traditional style mixed with faster story pacing and investigative reports.
[76] On January 20, 2007, XETV debuted a two-hour edition of its morning newscast on Saturday and Sundays; the programs originally aired at 7 a.m., but were moved to 8 a.m. after the CW affiliation switch.
From the station's August 2008 switch until the March 2017 closure of their news department, XETV was one of only five CW affiliates with a local newscast on weekend mornings (along with KTLA in Los Angeles, KMAX-TV in Sacramento, WISH-TV in Indianapolis and WPIX in New York City).
[79] On April 23, 2011, XETV became the sixth television station in the San Diego market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition.
[88] As the original American digital television transition date of February 17, 2009, approached, XETV had expressed intentions to follow other San Diego-area stations in ceasing transmission of its analog signal.
The original Tijuana switchover date of April 16, 2013, was delayed by Cofetel because the local population had not yet attained the required 90% readiness for free over-the-air digital service to trigger the transition.
