While I was gone celebrating my mother’s 90th birthday in Atlanta, GA, there were some unsettling events occurring back home with our television broadcast that is seen by a viewing audience covering nearly our entire state, as well as parts of Ohio and Kentucky.
After almost eight years WCHS-TV decided to sell our Sunday morning time slot without informing us and without giving us the opportunity to repurchase the time slot ourselves. The only way we knew our program was off air was when our Daily Walk staff and viewers commented that the program had not aired the previous Sunday. It was not until we initiated contact with the station that we learned the aforementioned details.
When I arrived home from my mother's birthday celebration I further learned that a Daily Walk viewer had called WCHS-TV about our program not being broadcast. It was reported to me that she was told we were off air due to a “financial situation.” Another viewer that contacted the station was reportedly told that we no longer wanted our time slot anymore.
I don’t personally know what responses representatives of WCHS-TV are telling our viewers when they call the station. However, I feel it is important to clarify some facts for our viewers as I know them for the sake of the testimony of our Lord and the Daily Walk ministry.
- We have always paid the full amount of our weekly broadcast promptly.
- We have always made adjustments to our technology to accommodate things requested of us by the station.
- When the FCC began requiring TV broadcasts to be closed captioned, we paid to have one of our staff members trained (at considerable cost), as well as purchase the equipment to do this work so we would be in full compliance.
- WCHS-TV has never spoken negatively to us about our programing, whether referring to its overall quality or its content (some of their staff have previously been complimentary of the program).
- There was NEVER any indication from the station that our program could potentially be replaced by other programing. No notice, no phone call, no letter, no email, no visit from any WCHS-TV representative...nothing at all!
- We were NEVER contacted by WCHS-TV and given the opportunity to repurchase the time slot prior to them selling it to infomercials.
- Not until Daily Walk staff/viewers told us the program was not aired the previous Sunday and we contacted the station did we learn that our time slot had been sold to other clients.
- Subsequent calls about our situation resulted in the station sending us a new contract for the same time slot (9 a.m. to 10 a.m.) at an increased price, which we promptly signed and faxed to WCHS-TV.
- When our staff contacted the station to make sure they had received the signed contract we were told the contract was a non-binding agreement and needed the approval of the parent company in Tampa (none of which was indicated to our staff during the discussion about the new contract).
- Setting aside whether the new contract is binding or not, common courtesy and honorable business practices would seem to require WCHS-TV to contact present clients about potential programing changes (at least thirty days prior to those changes) and/or allow them to repurchase their original time slot before selling it to someone else.
- If all of this was due to an internal error on the part of WCHS-TV or a matter beyond their local control, you would assume they would quickly apologize for the problem it has caused us, but that didn’t happen either.
- This decision on the part of WCHS-TV to replace our broadcast will cost us financially in other ways than the weekly cost of the broadcast. We have spent considerable money advertising our program and including it in our church publicity. All of our printed literature will eventually have to be redone and a significant advertising campaign undertaken to direct our viewers where to find the program and to attract new viewers to the program.
Our ministry has acted honorably throughout this entire negotiation process and we are working diligently to find the right outlet for our Daily Walk broadcast. Until then viewers can watch our services live online at LMBC.tv or go to our website (LMBC.org) and watch the Daily Walk TV broadcasts from the media dropdown menu. My prayer is that by the first Sunday in March we will be back on air proclaiming the truth of Scripture and readying people’s hearts for the Easter season. Unfortunately, we will likely not have the prime viewing hour of 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. that we have enjoyed for several years.
My greatest burden throughout this whole process has been for the viewers that we hear from regularly and that depend on the ministry of the Daily Walk. Some of these people are elderly, others are homebound or in nursing homes, and many are providentially hindered for other reasons from attending church services. These dear souls have relied weekly on the Daily Walk as their spiritual help. And, many of them don’t have access to our program over the Internet as a replacement for the TV broadcast. It is because of them and others that need us that this whole situation has made me personally feel like the analogy in the book of Ezekiel.
"They were scattered for lack of a shepherd; they became food for all the wild animals when they were scattered." (Ezekiel. 34:5 HCSB)
Instead of the shepherd looking for the lost sheep in this passage, it is the sheep looking for their lost shepherd. There are probably many people not in our viewer database (whom we can contact) that do not know what is going on and that may feel like we left them without telling them where we have gone.
To those we have ministered to for years through our broadcast, we did not leave you intentionally or willingly! Please know that we deeply appreciate you and will not stop praying for you. God willing, we will return soon to continue proclaiming the truth of Scripture that changes lives. God has a plan in all of this and He is bigger than the mountain we must climb to connect again with our viewers. Thank you for your patience while we work through this process of relocating to another station.
