Channel 10 Finds There’s No Emmy in the Word <i> Team</i>

Swen Net won’t win an Emmy this year, and Paul Sands is upset about it.

When he was told that the local chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the sponsor of the Emmys, wouldn’t accept “The 10 News Team” as Channel 10’s entry in the spot news category for coverage of the Craig Peyer verdict, Sands, the station’s news director, submitted the name of Swen Net.

There is no Swen Net at the station; it’s simply Ten News spelled backward.

No dummies at NATAS, though; they figured it out. When the nominations were released last week, Sands alone was listed as the nominee.

“When we issue the call for entries, it includes a booklet that sets the rules and regulations,” NATAS chapter administrator Jonathan Dunn-Rankin said. “The rules are very specific about what is allowed. It doesn’t allow an Emmy to be awarded to any entity or a station.”

That just made Sands even more angry. More than 20 people worked on the coverage, Sands said. He feels it is unfair to nominate one without nominating all of the participants.

According to the rules, he could have entered all the names--at $75 a person.

“The award should not go to me or the station (if the entry wins), but to the team of people who put it together,” Sands said. “But their arbitrary rules make it impossible.”

In the editorial category, Sands thought it appropriate for all five members of the station’s editorial board, who participate in the formation and writing of all editorials, to be listed as nominees. But NATAS rules require that only the general manager and editorial director receive awards.

Sands said he even offered to pay for the extra statuettes in the editorial category. But rules are rules, he was told.

Particularly galling to Sands are the thousands of dollars each station spends to enter and attend the awards ceremony each year.

“There is no question it’s a fund-raiser for the organization, we just assume that,” said Danny Mendez, KNSD-TV director of news services, who believes that the only way to improve the awards is for all the stations to work together. “Short of changing the structure of the contest, there’s really nothing to be upset about.”

But Sands is upset, particularly with the unbending nature of the award regulations. He wants to raise the issue of whether his station should participate in the awards in the future.

He joins KFMB-TV (Channel 8) News Director Jim Holtzman, who has never been a fan of the local Emmys. The annual competition is open to all television productions in San Diego County.

Holtzman said this year he gave his staff the option of using the money budgeted for the awards on something else, but the staff opted to enter.

“I don’t know that it is always set up or judged in the right way,” said Holtzman, who has not attended the awards ceremony in eight years. “It’s much ado about nothing.”

Sands simply wants NATAS to recognize the individuals who deserve to be recognized. “Let’s not make the rules the reason for the games,” Sands said.

Dunn-Rankin said Sands is free to petition the NATAS board of directors to change the rules next year.

XTRA-FM (91X) has sent a letter to local stations warning them against trying to give away tickets to the upcoming Who concert, an exclusive 91X event. The station has prepared legal materials “designed to allow judicial action within 24 hours in the event of any attempt by another radio station to engage in a ticket giveaway,” the letter says.

“We have no plans to do much of anything” with the Who, said Tom Baker, general manager of KGB-FM (101.5), the station most likely to promote the Who. “The fact we’re playing the Who is promotion enough.”

“It was really a prudent measure on their part,” KCBQ (Eagle 105) General Manager Jeff Apregan said. “I think they’ve done their homework.”

Another station’s promotions director was not so impressed. “I’m appalled,” he said. “I thought it was really unnecessary.”

More than 428 entries were received for this year’s local Emmys. There are 216 nominees in 56 categories, with KNSD-TV (Channel 39) leading the list with 69 nominees, followed by Channel 8 with 52 and Channel 10 with 33. “First Tuesday,” a show for Instructional Television, the educational channel available on cable, was nominated for an impressive seven awards. . . . Channel 8’s hourlong special on the homeless Thursday night was excellent, a rare chance to see the human beings behind the political rhetoric. . . .

Del Mar resident Chris Engholm, author of the recently released “The China Venture: America’s Corporate Encounter With the People’s Republic of China,” was a guest on the Financial News Network last week discussing the country’s current political turmoil. . . .

If the “radio and TV personality” category is any indication, the San Diego Business Journal’s annual list of “Big Hitters” is pretty wimpy. According to the list, the result of a survey of readers issued last week, the Biggest Hitters in local radio and television are KFMB radio’s Clark and Cavett, Allison Ross, Jack White, Hudson and Bauer, and Clark Anthony (half of Clark and Cavett). Of the five, only Channel 10’s Jack White isn’t employed by KFMB. Two hard-charging personalities, KSDO-AM (1130) talk show host Roger Hedgecock and Channel 10’s Michael Tuck, must be in mourning, having missed being included on such a prestigious list. . . .

Channel 10 is bringing new levels of cheesiness to local television news with its annual “Swimsuit Edition,” which aired Tuesday night. Such sledgehammer ratings-month techniques are commonplace in Los Angeles, where stations attempt to out-bikini each other. Channel 10 apparently wants to bring Bikini Wars to San Diego. . . . Ex-presidential son Michael Reagan is off the KSDO-AM morning news, but he’ll soon start a talk show, 10 a.m. to noon Saturdays and Sundays.

KSDO General Manager Mike Shields said Operations Manager Jack Merker is expected back June 12. . . . The scene: the UCSD campus, where a group of students was due to protest events in China. A Channel 8 cameraman was on hand, but only a few demonstrators had gathered, and they were just standing around. So the cameraman asked them to do something for the cameras. They shouted slogans for a few minutes, asked if the cameraman had enough footage, and then stopped. It happens all the time, especially with live broadcasts. The line between covering news and staging news is very thin, indeed. . . . As part of his continuing attack on Roger Hedgecock, XTRA-FM morning host Mark Williams sent a very cordial letter to KSDO inviting Hedgecock to appear on his show. He didn’t get a reply. Williams called Hedgecock’s show on the air last week to let a guest know that Hedgecock had been convicted of felonies.