¡Romper noticias!

Breaking news: WWSI-TV broadcasts Philadelphia's first Spanish-language news magazine.

by Amy L. Webb

COMMUNITY SERVICE: WWSI general manager Uriel
Rendôn hopes his Spanish-only local news
program will spawn more original programming.

COMMUNITY SERVICE: WWSI general manager Uriel Rendón hopes his Spanish-only local news program will spawn more original programming. Photo By: Michael T. Regan

In a tiny office on Delaware Avenue near Girard, 15 people are attempting to change local television. Every day, they venture into the city to collect news about politicians, civic groups and businesses. Later, that team produces and edits a news magazine using software and equipment now defunct by industry standards. The lights overhead flip on, and an announcer takes her seat at a glass-top desk that balances delicately on four concrete blocks painted black. She looks to an old Mac Pismo laptop for updates and goes over her notes.

When the tape rolls, she turns to the camera and opens a program that, for the first time in Philadelphia, broadcasts local news only in Spanish.

WWSI-TV (Channel 62), Philadelphia's Telemundo network affiliate, just aired the 100th episode of its news magazine, De Todo un Poco (A Bit of Everything). The nascent show is Philadelphia's first Spanish-language local news program, and so far, managers say it's attracting thousands of viewers each weeknight. But while the Hispanic community supports De Todo, advertisers haven't been as eager to buy time for a bit of everything in Spanish.

"It may be hard to believe, but until now there has really been no local, original programming for Philadelphia's Hispanic community," says Uriel Rendón, WWSI's general manager. "We're covering this city from a Hispanic perspective for a Spanish-speaking audience that's hungry for shows geared toward them, which means that not every episode is going to be about some Hispanic guy who shot someone in North Philly."

De Todo un Poco broadcasts weeknights at 6 p.m. with host Maria Del Pilar, who had previously hosted a Spanish-language radio show combining community news, profiles of popular entertainers and public announcements on WEMG-FM in Egg Harbor City, N.J. She uses the same concept for De Todo's 30-minute show.

Producers tape and edit De Todo the day before it airs, though breaking news — such as the Delimar Vera kidnapping case last spring — forces producers to broadcast in real time from the studio.

Before De Todo, there was no local news magazine format to copy. When WWSI aired its first episode of De Todo on Feb. 23, station managers risked competition with the 6 p.m. news broadcasts on KYW-3, Action News 6 and NBC 10. Not only would it need to compete for ad dollars, it'd have to convince Hispanic viewers that the value of news isn't necessarily determined by the number of murders or car accidents every night.

"I think there is actually too much news in this town," Rendón says. "Too much negative news focuses on Hispanics and other minorities. We feel that our viewers deserve to see the good in their communities, and the good that Hispanics do for Philadelphia."

One of the episodes that aired this spring centered on an ill man who had been living in an abandoned basement in North Philly. Rather than scripting a five-minute spot on yet another anonymous homeless guy and the trouble he caused for neighbors, producers decided to tell his story in a 30-minute segment about the plight of a jobless Hispanic man in this city. By the time the episode ran, Pilar and the producers had worked with the community to find him an apartment, health care, furniture and a computer.

"That show touched my heart," says Ben Hernandez, a retired North Philly mechanic. "On the regular news, they would have just said, "Here's a homeless guy who's a pest to the city.' That show made me learn about the man. It gave me pride for Hispanics in Philadelphia, that we can help each other."

WWSI also produces Minuto Roho, or the Red Hot Minute, a 60-second hard-news update with Pilar that runs once every hour during prime-time soap operas. The hope is that as the station builds De Todo and Minuto Roho, it will eventually produce a Spanish-language 11 p.m. hard-news show to compete with the Philadelphia network affiliates.

"When you get news in your own language, from people that are in your community, it carries a different meaning," says Hector Ramon, a King of Prussia office manager. "Although I don't like every part of the show — I'm not into entertainers, for example — I think that De Todo un Poco and Minuto Roho are giving me information relevant to me, as a Hispanic person in Philadelphia. I can watch another channel to get the weather and traffic if I want it."

WWSI-TV, which reaches the Greater Philadelphia area and parts of New Jersey, is an affiliate of Miami-based Telemundo. Telemundo is not yet as prominent as Los Angeles-based Univision, the nation's fifth-largest network, but it was acquired by NBC in 2002 and has been gaining audience and market share since then. WWSI and NBC 10 occasionally share content — during the Vera story, WWSI shared some of its feed -- but their editorial operations are separate.

Telemundo has 15 owned and operated stations, 32 broadcast stations and 450 cable affiliates in 118 U.S. markets. Univision owns WUVP-TV (Channel 65), but it broadcasts no local news content. Telemundo began using Hispanic anchors to broadcast NBA games in Spanish two seasons ago. This year, the network will be the first to produce and air the Olympics in Spanish using Spanish feed — a testament to the growing Hispanic population in the U.S.

In Philadelphia, Hispanics make up only about 7 percent of the regional market. Nationally, the region ranks 17th in market size behind, among other cities, Phoenix, San Francisco, Boston and Washington, D.C., according to Nielsen Media Research, the nation's largest broadcast rating service. Los Angeles ranks first, with 7 million Hispanics, the majority of whom are Mexican.

At the same time, the Philadelphia Hispanic population is expanding. In terms of market growth, Philadelphia now ranks seventh — the number of Hispanics has increased 40 percent over the past decade, according to the 2000 U.S. Census. Philadelphia's Hispanic community is now growing at a faster rate than any other minority.

Nielsen ranks market size, but its Hispanic-American Television Index does not track WWSI or WUVP because the estimated viewing audience is still too small. That makes soliciting ad dollars a challenge.

"We're not charting with Nielsen, and that makes it difficult for us to convince advertisers that we're a viable channel," Rendón says. "Our local programming relies on money we get from advertisers. In this market, there is huge competition for Hispanic ad dollars. Spanish-language newspapers have been around longer, and they got to the advertisers first. We try to look at ourselves as a television station competing for TV dollars, and this market has about $600 million to go around."

Rendón's immediate plan for the station is to grow De Todo slowly, careful not to overspend.

"At some point we'll have more local news, more original shows in Spanish," he says. "The FCC allows us to broadcast, but really our license, and every television station's license, belongs to the public. I take that to heart. WWSI must serve its community. We are a for-profit business, and ultimately we have to pay the bills. But we are here to serve Hispanics in Philadelphia, and that's what we're going to do, with a little bit of everything."