Certainly, you know of the weekend’s tragedy on a street in Minneapolis. We’re not going to debate here the issues of what happened and whether or not it was justified. We believe, as we have for many years, that each individual has to choose to be informed, evaluate all the facts and make their own determinations about what they believe to be the truth.

That is exactly why a free press matters and why the nation’s founders put the guarantee of a free press in the First Amendment.

Last Saturday, local newsrooms across the Twin Cities swung into action to cover the major breaking news of another shooting by federal agents of a person on the scene of a protest in South Minneapolis. (The third in 17 days.) The four major network affiliates entered continuing coverage of the story, which would evolve over the next 10 hours. Those hours were, at times, truly troubling. Televisions across the market could tune in to vital coverage provided by each station.

Right up until 7pm that evening.

At that hour, all four stations would end their news coverage and join their respective networks for their normal primetime schedule. Was the story over by this point? Hardly. By 7 pm, there were still thousands of people on the streets around the scene where 37-year-old Alex Pretti’s life was ended by nine or more bullets fired by US Border Patrol agents. At the same time, impromptu neighborhood candlelight vigils were popping up all over the Cities.

Clearly, the story wasn’t over. And it likely won’t be for days and weeks to come.

To be fair, we completely understand the choice that local TV station leaders faced at the time: Continue their coverage or allow viewers to watch what was scheduled to air. We’ve been in that position countless times, and it is often a difficult choice that has a definite “lose-lose” feel.

If only there were a way to serve both audiences at the same time.

Actually, there was.

Aside from the now all-too-generic promise of additional coverage via digital platforms like each station’s website or app, we wondered why not one station had taken advantage of the digital television technology they had access to since 2009?

If you remember back to then, it was in June of that year the transition to digital television was made. Every television station instantly had access to multiple channels, known as “subchannels” of its digital broadcast signal. This is when stations could deploy the technology to “multiplex” their broadcast signals and add a .2, .3, and the like to their main channel number.

This digital “subdivision” of each television station created the rough equivalent of adding four green houses to a property you owned on a Monopoly game board. Where you once had only one tv signal to broadcast, you now had three, four, or even more to work with.

So, on this important Saturday night in Minneapolis-St. Paul, did a single local network affiliated broadcaster continue their local news coverage on their broadcast platform by utilizing one of their 28 total digital television subchannels? Or did any choose to move their network programming to a digital subchannel so they could continue their local news coverage on their main channel?

No, they did not.

Instead, each station kept its scheduled programming not only on its primary (or “dot one”) signals, but also on the vitally important programming of non-stop courtroom replays, endless old TV reruns, home shopping offers, and whatever else could be found on your fancy digital-capable television set.

Certainly, you wouldn’t want to interrupt any of those offerings.

Wondering why that would be the case? Well, as is almost always the case, it comes down to money.

To begin with, some stations now use their second digital signal, their “dot two,” if you will, for carriage of another major or near-major network. This can range from a CW or MyNet operation to, as in Miami, the ABC Miami signal now carried on WSVN’s 7.2 signal.

Beyond that, many stations have sold off their added digital real estate to carry the so-called “digi-nets” that populate many of those decimal spots on your TV dial. The deals can put cold, hard cash in the pockets of local station owners, be they small or large groups. (We’ll also note that some stations lack the infrastructure to originate programming to each of their digital subchannels, which does have some expense associated with creating that capability.)

Thus, the decision to preempt any of a station’s digital channels is more complicated, to the point that many stations don’t even consider it an option.

Then there is the option of putting breaking news coverage on an alternative outlet, such as the much-touted “FAST” channels or a streaming TV app. But those all require internet access to view them, so they aren’t really equivalent in terms of serving the audience. A precious few stations do carry a news-centric offering as part of their digital broadcast “payload.” This can range from broadcasting a so-called “Plus” outlet of the local station to carrying something like the nascent “Fox Weather” offering. But these are still few in number. 

We keep hearing the argument that the industry’s proposed mega-mergers are absolutely essential for “local” broadcasters to survive the onslaught of the tech giants with whom they compete for ad dollars. That’s why it is so imperative (supposedly) for owners to be able to have two or more stations under one roof, so they can keep providing their “essential local news coverage” to the markets they hold federally-issued licenses to operate “in the public interest.”

If each broadcast television station can originate up to eight different subchannels (as one station here in the Twin Cities presently does), then an owner with two full-power, full-spectrum stations could (in theory, at least) have up to 16 different digital TV signals covering a market. Those would, as the industry likes to say, all be “free TV” channels.

Sure would be great if even one of those could be used to support local breaking news coverage that truly is essential in situations like this past weekend, not just in the Twin Cities, but in each of the many markets across the nation that ended up dealing with a major winter storm on Sunday.

And to quote all those late-night infomercials, “But wait, there’s more!"

The long delayed new digital standard for broadcast television, called “Next Gen TV” (technically known as ATSC 3.0) promises to allow broadcasters to slice up their signal even further. They’ll also be able to encrypt their signals and use them for subscription or “pay TV” services, should they wish. And they could even use part of their “Next Gen” signals to deliver wireless data to various “internet of things” devices, via a consortium that already includes the four largest broadcast groups.

Maybe they can use some of that new technology to keep delivering that essential local news whenever, say, an NFL championship game is on.

Based on how things have gone to date, we won’t be counting on that either.

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