KFTO

KFTO-TV, virtual and UHF digital channel 24, is an heritage Independent/Graham News station serving the Liberty City/Alderney City Broadcast Area. WFTO is a proud flagship hotline of the  Berfield/Willis Broadcast Corporation for many many years, operating as part of a triopoly between DuMont affiliated station KRBL (channel 4) and YesNet-owned station KDFA(channel 24). Due to that, KFTO is now a locally owned station. KFTO-TV's studios are located in Star Junction, Algonquin and it currently shares it's Broker-based transmitter facilities with sister station DuMont-affiliated KRBL (channel 4).

Station History
KFTO-TV was founded on December 17th, 194 by media mogul Victor Willis III, but signed on nearly two years later on July 1st, 194 at 8pm central. When the station originally signed on, it signed on as an independent. KFTO’s inaugural program was Dirty Harry starring Clint Eastwood after airing a countdown clock since midnight followed by archived footage of Apollo 8’s launch; this was inspired by MTV’s launch. Programming that aired initially aired on WFTO were reruns of older sitcoms (such as Dobie Gillis, I Love Lucy, The Three Stooges and The Andy Griffith Show, the latter of which still airs today as of September 2015), classic movies, children’s and religious programs. KFTO’s owner and GM Victor Willis originally opted not to form a news department for the station, fearing competition from then FOX affiliate WLFO as well as WB affiliate WLCT, but eventually KFTO premiered a 10 o'clock newscast on Thursday, May 21st, 198 titled 24 NewsPulse @ Ten. In 200, KFTO, formed a 2 hour morning news show titled 24 NewsPulse Morning Edition from 7 am to 9 am. On September 11th, 2001, KFTO aired nonstop coverage of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center by extending their morning news program to 11 am that morning and airing nonstop CNN Headline News coverage. KFTO also extended their 10 pm newscast to one hour that day. This practice was done for one whole week before the schedule was reverted back to its regular format. Due to low ratings on their newscasts, KFTO made expansion to their news department starting in 2004. These expansion would continue until 2010. KFTO started by expanding their morning newscast to 3 hours, from 6 am to 9 am. WFTO also added in a 6 pm newscast that aired from Monday to Friday. This newscast was now directly competing with WEHK (NBC), WLIX (ABN), WLFO (FOX), WLIB (CBS), and WELC (ABC) In 2005, KFTO expanded their newscasts to weekends: starting with 24 NewsPulse Morning Edition which aired Saturday and Sunday Mornings from 7 am to 10 am and adding a 10pm Newscast on both Saturday and Sunday Evenings. Beginning in 2006, KFTO made more expansions with their news department by adding a one hour, 4:00 pm newscast, a half hour 5:00 pm newscast, a half hour noon newscast and pushing their morning newscast back one hour earlier, now airing in a 4 hour time span from 5-9 am. In 2007, the 5 pm and the 6 pm newscasts were now shown on weekends. Also in 2007, as a way to expand its news coverage, WFTO bought and used a Bell LongRanger 206L newsgathering helicopter called Chopper 24. In 2008, 2 new locally produced shows were put on the air. One of which was a one hour public affairs talk show called Your Voice, Your City airing on Sunday Mornings and a 30 minute sports program which airs on Sunday Nights titled Sports Blitz Sunday. In 2010, KFTO upgraded news programming and programming to HD and unveiled a new set, logo, graphics and music package. KFTO made even more expansions starting with the morning news cast; expanding it to 5 hours, beginning at 4 am and ending at 9 am. Expansions were also made to other news casts on KFTO: The noon newscast was extended to one hour, the 5 and 6 pm newscasts were extended to one hour, the 10 pm newscast was extended from 30 minutes to one hour and adding a new 11:00 pm newscast. In 2013, KFTO extended their morning newscast to 6 hours from 4-10 am, directly competing with WLFO. The 6th hour of the morning newscast was a lifestyle program titled On Location with Lillian Sharma. This program, as the title states, was not filmed in a news set, rather so “on location” such as at Middle Park. This program was cancelled in September 2014 due to Lillian’s departure from WFTO and to make way for the premiere of The Meredith Vieira Show. Beginning on June 1st, 2015, KFTO re branded as "The 'FTO 24" and unveiled a new logo. Despite these changes, programming and news operation as it is will not change. The last program to use the old logo was Leverage airing at 2 am on Monday Morning, June 1st, followed by the usual five hour block of morning news. The first program that used the new logo was Rachael Ray airing at 9 am on Monday Morning, June 1st. Along with the branding changes, KFTO added a new network: Escape, which airs programming directed to women aged 25-54 years old airing on digital subchannel 24.4. KFTO signed an agreement with HTN Communications to air all of their syndicated football, basketball and hockey games during their respective seasons. Along with the agreement, KFTO will air the annual CHL Playoffs and Finals (also supplied by HTN Communications) through at least 2021. In the event that these programs will air, KFTO will transfer regularly scheduled programming over to KFTO-DT3. On December 28th, 2015, KFTO made an agreement with Sabana American Broadcast Holdings and ABN Domestic Television Corporation to allow KFTO to air UBC programming on the station's digital subchannel, 24.5. For a brief period of time in 2016, KFTO's 24.6 subchannel carried an audio simulcast of radio sister station, WJSM-FM. As of June 2016, that subchannel is currently airing color bars. It was announced on June 3, 2016 that 24.6 will become an affiliate of the newly formed Country Music Network channel. It is set to affiliate with the new network on July 1st. On June 24, 2016, KFTO announced that they would carry 3 affiliates on their xx.7 subchannel: GetTV, Z Channel, and MyTV. GetTV specializes in classic television programs and feature films from the Sony Pictures library. Z Channel specializes in the art of cinema and showcases feature films. MyTV is a general entertainment format network specializing in Americanized versions of television series from the UK and from Australia owned as a joint venture between Adelphia Communications Corporation and Disney-ABC Domestic Television. MyTV is expected to have a morning newscast and a nightly newscast. On August 3, 2016, KFTO added the newly formed Couch Potato Television network to it's xx.8 subchannel. Couch Potato specializes in classic sitcoms and dramas from the 1950s-'90s, much like competing network, Antenna TV, which KFTO also airs programs from. As of 2017, KFTO is now change as KFTO 24 and since 203 AD, now offers to all US area as KFTO entertaining america.

Current On-Air Staff
Jeff Inglewood - News Director
 * Gurdeep Ahluwalia - anchor; weekday mornings "News 24 First Edition" and "News 24 DayBreak"; also reporter
 * Steve Anthony - anchor; weekday mornings "News 24 In The Morning"
 * Pooja Handa - anchor; weekday mornings "News 24 In The Morning"
 * Stephen LeDrew - anchor; weekdays "News 24 Live at Noon"; also host of "Your Voice. Your City"
 * Stephanie Smyth - anchor; weeknights "News 24 First at Four" and "News 24 Live at Five"; also Managing Editor and Breaking News Anchor
 * Nathan Downer - anchor; weeknights "News 24 First at Four" and "News 24 Live at Five"; also reporter
 * Deborah Allen - anchor; weeknights "News 24 More News at Seven" (on KRBL) (formerly of WXTR)
 * George Lagogianes - anchor; weeknights "News 24 Prime Time News at Nine"
 * Kyle Christie - anchor; weeknights "News 24 Live at Six", "News 24 Live at Ten" and "The Night Team"
 * Jee-Yun Lee - anchor; weeknights "News 24 Live at Six", "News 24 Live at Ten" and "The Night Team"
 * Jamie Gutfreund - anchor; weekend mornings "News 24 First Edition Weekend", "News 24 DayBreak Weekend" and "News 24 In The Morning Weekend"
 * Travis Dhanaraj - anchor; weekend mornings "News 24 First Edition Weekend", "News 24 DayBreak Weekend", "News 24 In The Morning Weekend" and "News 24 Live at Noon Weekend"
 * Nick Dixon - anchor; weekend evenings "News 24 Live at Six", "News 24 Live at Ten" and "The Night Team"

24/7 StormLab Weather Meteorologists

 * Kyler Watts - meteorologist; weekday mornings "News 24 First Edition", "News 24 DayBreak" and "News 24 In The Morning"
 * Kelsey Jackson - meteorologist; weekdays "News 24 Live at Noon", "News 24 First at Four" and "News 24 Live at Five"
 * Chris Jordan - chief meteorologist (AMS Seal of Approval); weeknights "News 24 Live at Six", "News 24 Live at Ten" and "News 24 Live at Eleven"
 * Jill Colton - meteorologist; weekend mornings "News 24 First Edition Weekend", "News 24 DayBreak Weekend", "News 24 In The Morning Weekend" and "News 24 Live at Noon Weekend"
 * Patricia Jaggernauth - meteorologist; weekend evenings "News 24 Live at Six Weekend", "News 24 Live at Ten Weekend" and "News 24 Live at Eleven Weekend"

Sports Blitz

 * Ken Reid - sports director; weeknights "News 24 Live at Ten" and "News 24 Live at Eleven"
 * Devon Soltendieck - sports reporter; weekend evenings "News 24 Live at Ten Weekend" and "News 24 Live at Eleven Weekend"; also weeknight reporter (see below)

Current On-Air Reporters/Staff

 * Andrea Hartling - general assignment reporter
 * Karman Wong - general assignment reporter
 * Jackie Crandles - general assignment reporter
 * Diana Petrucci - general assignment reporter; also assignment editor
 * Arda Zakarian - general assignment reporter
 * Omar Sachedina - general assignment reporter
 * Amber MacArthur - general assignment reporter
 * Courtney Heels - general assignment reporter
 * Cristina Tenaglia - general assignment reporter; also host of "Hot Property"
 * Cam Woolley - on-site morning traffic reporter; also host of "Know Your Rights"
 * Sue Sgambati - host of "Liberty City Crime Stoppers" segment
 * Caryn Lieberman - host of "Does It Work?" segment; also breaking news producer
 * Bryce Wylde - health reporter
 * Dr. Karl Kabasele - medical reporter
 * Lorne Honickman - legal specialist; also co-host of "Know Your Rights"
 * Jamey Tucker - tech reporter; host of "What The Tech?" segment

TimeSaver Traffic

 * Bob Summers - traffic reporter; weekday mornings "News 24 First Edition", "News 24 DayBreak" and "News 24 In The Morning"
 * Amber Payie - traffic reporter; weekday afternoons "News 24 First at Four", "News 24 Live at Five" and "News 24 Live at Six"