Panama City, FL Welcomes CBS
Viewers in Panama City, Florida get their own CBS affiliate as of today, instead of having a station imported from Dothan, Alabama. WECP represents the market’s first CBS affiliate since the ’60s, reports the local News Herald.
They’ll have to rescan their digital converters to get the signal, at least until WECP gets picked up on cable and satellite systems in the coming weeks.
The station is a sister of Gray Television’s NBC affiliate, WJHG, along with WTVY Dothan.
“The opportunity for us to do local news here on WECP is something they are looking into,” GM Curt Molander said. “It’s something we are not ready to jump into immediately. We are going to be maintaining Channel 7 operations, but in the future we will look into it.”
Eric commented:
I'm aware that Panama City has NBC on WJHG-TV Channel 7... ABC on WMBB-TV Channel 13... and Fox on WPGX-TV Channel 28. It looks like new CBS station WECP will be in the form of cable and satellite, as well as a possible WJHG sub-channel.
Another CBS affiliate idea, in my opinion, could be in the form of WPCT-TV Channel 46... Beach TV channel. CBS and Local shows on the main channel... Beach TV being moved to a sub-channel. WPCT not being owned by either Gray, Hoak, or Raycom. I'm not sure if Dothan, AL has its own ABC and NBC affiliate either. Local news broadcast would have to be a different story.