Kulbida out at WNYT December 9, 2008 at 4:35 pm by Chris Churchill, Business writer
Lydia Kulbida, one of most popular television personalities in the Capital Region, will not have her contract renewed by WNYT Ch. 13.
Since Thursday, the NBC affiliate in Menands has been cutting jobs to cut costs in the face of declining advertising revenue.
Kulbida and other station employees learned this afternoon that her contract would not be renewed, according to two sources with knowledge of the situation.
It is unclear if Kulbida, who co-anchors the 6 and 11 p.m. news, will immediately leave the station.
Kulbida was voted the region’s most popular television anchor in the most recent Times Union readers’ poll, one of many accolades she has received.
Low man on totem pole is all this is. She is/was the anchor with the least time with the station. Though I'd rather have seen what's her name, Wortman (sp?) go instead.
That's too bad. I thought she did a great job. If there are any openings at any other tv station that is looking for someone, she'd be a shoe in.
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
TV anchor Kulbida among those let go WNYT dealing with ad losses BY JEFF WILKIN Gazette Reporter
Longtime WNYT anchor Lydia Kulbida has lost her job on the Menands television station’s toprated newscasts. Kulbida, who has been with “NewsChannel 13” for nearly nine years, was told Tuesday her contract will not be renewed. She was among the last of 18 station employees released in a flurry of layoffs that began last week. “This is a tough decision here, it’s just in a cost-cutting mode, but we have opted to not renew Lydia’s contract,” said Stephen P. Baboulis, WNYT’s vice president and general manager. “She’s done a great job for us. This kind of thing has been happening around the country in markets everywhere, and basically we just have to get our workforce and the cost of gathering the news in line with the revenues that are available, and sometimes the choices that you have to make in those situations are very difficult to make.” Kulbida, a native of the Bronx, said in an e-mail sent Tuesday night she would not have any immediate comment. She landed her first on-air job in Glens Falls in 1990 — anchoring and reporting at the city’s TV-8 station — and joined WNYT in January 2000 after working broadcast jobs in Buffalo, Hartford, Conn., and Springfield, Mass. She replaced Kari Lake and first worked with longtime WNYT anchor Ed Dague. She had been working weeknights at 6 and 11 p.m. with co-anchor Jim Kambrich. “It’s obviously very distressing,” said Bill Lambdin, a station reporter and president of Local 51021 of the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians. “She’s one of the public faces, but there’s a total of 18 people who have been dropped or are being dropped at Channel 13. The general manger held a meeting this afternoon and he used the number 18. Not everyone is in the bargaining unit; some of them work in departments that aren’t represented by the union.” Two other on-air personalities, John Allen and Kelly Lynch, also have been affected. Allen, a station employee since 1996, has accepted a severance package. Lynch had been working part-time as WNYT’s midday news anchor and will leave the station rather than accept another part-time assignment. “She’s got a few days more to work in the month of December,” Baboulis said. “She’ll wrap up her time here shortly.” Lambdin, who termed the Kulbida layoff “shocking and disappointing,” said the broadcaster talked to some co-workers on her way out of the office. “It was not an organized speech,” Lambdin said. “It was just talking to people in the parking lot. I would point out to you her contract does not expire until the middle of January, and she may very well appear on the air some more.” “We’re talking about that,” Baboulis said. “Right now, I’ve given her a few days off so we get removed from the situation today.” Lambdin noted Kulbida has won popularity surveys conducted by other media organizations. “From that standpoint, it’s quite puzzling she would be the person chosen to be dropped,” Lambdin said. “Anybody of the air staff who were dropped would be extremely unfortunate; we believe all our coworkers are doing their jobs well. Some of the people here are wondering. The thought process is elusive.” “She’s well regarded by all of us,” Baboulis said of Kulbida. “It’s just a result of the times. It’s just something where we have to make some tough decisions that you don’t really want to make. She’s done fine work for us, I think everyone affected by this situation has done good work for us. We basically just have to re-size and rethink what we’re doing here to make sure we can still be viable to serve the community with news and information and public services and there are casualties here that no one feels good about.” Baboulis could not say whether Kambrich, Kulbida’s co-anchor on the evening newscasts, will work solo. “We haven’t gotten past the point of making the decision and talking about it,” he said. “We’ll be talking .............................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar01101
“This is a tough decision here, it’s just in a cost-cutting mode, but we have opted to not renew Lydia’s contract,” said Stephen P. Baboulis, WNYT’s vice president and general manager. “She’s done a great job for us. This kind of thing has been happening around the country in markets everywhere, and basically we just have to get our workforce and the cost of gathering the news in line with the revenues that are available, and sometimes the choices that you have to make in those situations are very difficult to make.”
This is so basic and so well stated that I wanted to see it again. This is exactly how government should operate.
The ads during the morning news are from all over NY and little mom and pop stores....even during the daytime/primetime the ads are pretty much nothing......no cleaning products, no diapers, no female stuff......all the ads are for prescription drugs and lottos and the likes of Wachovia and their 'brothers and sisters'......
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
must be they don't need those little companies advertising dollars
"While Foreign Terrorists were plotting to murder and maim using homemade bombs in Boston, Democrap officials in Washington DC, Albany and here were busy watching ME and other law abiding American Citizens who are gun owners and taxpayers, in an effort to blame the nation's lack of security on US so that they could have a political scapegoat."
Speaking of advertising on TV....where are the Christmas Budwieser commercials?
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
It's a welcome relief to not be pulverized by ADs.....the carrot in front of us 'puchasing dokeys' is finally gone.....and the merry-go-round has slowed..... the nightmare is at a rest now.......take stock before you buy your next ticket to ride.......
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
Kulbida's departure a sign that industry is starving First published in print: Friday, December 12, 2008
There's a particularly devious Stephen King short story called "Survivor Type" in which a dissolute doctor is marooned on a desert island with nothing but his surgical tools and a supply of heroin. As hunger sends him closer and closer to the brink, he begins to wonder which parts of himself he could do without.
I recall this tale not merely to gross you out, but because it's a much more cinematic version of the old folk expression about "grinding your seed corn," referring to an inability to differentiate between thrifty self-sacrifice and heedless self-destruction.
On Tuesday, the Capital Region learned that WNYT Ch. 13 news anchor Lydia Kulbida would not have her contract renewed, a move that stunned even those who have become hardened to reports of layoffs, cost-cutting and, in some cases, the wholesale collapse of media outlets around the country.
The news came just a day after Tribune Company, which operates several of America's biggest newspapers, filed for bankruptcy — necessitated in part by falling ad revenue, but mainly by the crushing debt load imposed by excitable real estate mogul Sam Zell's decision to take the company private after purchasing it last year.
WNYT cut 17 people in this round of layoffs (16 of them full-time positions), ousting reporter John Allen and part-time entertainment correspondent Jay Bobbin as well as numerous technical and production staffers. Hubbard Broadcasting, the company that owns WNYT, cut roughly an equal number at its Minneapolis-St. Paul flagship station.
It's at this point that I should mention that I've worked with Kulbida on the production of the "Capitaland Quarterly" TV magazine the Times Union co-produces with WNYT and WMHT Ch. 17. She's a pro — sharp, witty, creative and what an earlier generation might have referred to as "brassy."
My only other interaction with Kulbida was to call her up to congratulate her whenever she was named the best TV anchor in the region in our annual Best of the Capital Region readers poll, which was three times in the past four years. I always looked forward to counting up the votes because of the extreme ultraviolence frequently inflicted on the spelling of her Ukranian monicker.
But even if I had never met Kulbida — even if I thought she was lousy at her job — the bottom line is that she and her co-anchor Jim Kambrich (who also finishes near the top in our annual poll) bring in the bacon, which in this case is ratings.
Of course, the true measure of success at a TV station or any other business is measured in black and red ink, and comes with a dollar sign attached. A drop in advertising is a natural consequence of any economic downtown, and traditional media have been battered for a long time now. Numerous other stations around town have instituted layoffs; this newspaper just went through a round of buyouts.
But with no disrespect to the hard-working cameramen or producers who got the ax over the past few days: A station that ditches a top-rated anchor is like King's shipwrecked doctor, staring at his foot and wondering if it will be enough to tide him over until the ...........................http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=749634
Re Dec. 10 article, “Popular TV anchor Kulbida being let go”: I’m saddened to read in the Gazette that Lydia Kulbida will be leaving WNYT. She is a class A anchorwoman and a classy lady. Why her I’ll never know.
By CHRIS CHURCHILL, Business writer Last updated: 2:27 p.m., Monday, December 15, 2008
WNYT Ch. 13 continued its dominance in the latest TV ratings period, according to Nielsen Media Research numbers released to the stations this morning.
The Desmond The NBC affiliate in Menands had the top-rated newscast at 6 and 11 p.m. -- still considered the most prestigious time slots for news -- and also won big in the mornings. WNYT also had the highest-rated news at 5 and 5:30 p.m.
WXXA Ch. 23, the Fox affiliate in Albany, again scored well with its late local news, shown at 10 p.m. The program bested other late news programs among adults ages 25 to 54, a key demographic for stations and their advertisers, and finished second to WNYT overall.
Logged
She will land on her feet, she is good.
