The 2017 Boston TV affiliate realignment

The 2017 Boston TV affiliate realignment is an event which will occur in Boston, Massachusetts that will involve the switching of broadcast affilations of the NBC Television Network from WHDH-TV Channel 7 the current NBC affiliate licensed to Boston and owned by Sunbeam Television to the NBC owned and operated WNEU-TV Channel 60 licensed to Merrimack, New Hampshire currently affiliated with Spanish network Telemundo.
On January 9, 2016 NBCUniversal owner of the NBC Television Network announced that it will drop WHDH-TV as an NBC affiliate on January 1, 2017 because it has a desire to have control of an owned and operated station in the Boston market but Sunbeam Television CEO Ed Ansin says that NBC's actions constitutes a breach of contract and violates an agreement that NBC and its now parent company Comcast made with the Federal Communications Commission as part of Comcast's agreement to acquire 100 percent of NBCUniversal to make broadcast stations available without cable television, Ansin said that if Comcast goes through with the switch using WNEU it will alienate a majority of the NBC viewers in Boston as that station is inferior because its transmitter which is located in Goffstown, New Hampshire does not reach the majority of the Boston over-the-air broadcast market which includes most of the City of Boston, parts of upper Connecticut which cannot receive WVIT the NBC affiliate in Hartford and parts of Rhode Island which cannot receive WJAR in Providence. Following the announcement by NBC Ed Ansin spoke to WHDH staffers assuring them that if NBC does drop the affiliation that WHDH will begin to produce more news programming to make up for the programming loss. Ansin also was reported to have spoken privately with U.S. Senator Edward Markey who later said that he plans to "Closely scrutinize” any move by NBC to pull its programming from Channel 7.
WHDH, its parent company Sunbeam Television, Sunbeam CEO Ed Ansin and NBC have had a very rocky and contentious relationship over the years which began in 1988 when NBC without warning pulled the affiliation of WSVN-TV a Sunbeam station in Miami, Florida and moved it to WTVJ an owned and operated station that NBC had recently acquired from Wometco Enterprises. Ansin fought NBC but lost his bid to keep WSVN's NBC affiliation. WSVN is now affiliated with the FOX Network. WHDH's relationship with NBC worsened starting in 2009 when NBC announced that Tonight Show host Jay Leno was retiring after 17 years of hosting the stored late-night talk show and would instead host a prime-time talk show called The Jay Leno Show at 10pm, Sunbeam CEO Ed Ansin announced that WHDH would not carry the talk show electing to replace it with a simulcast of the 10 p.m. newscast that WHDH began producing for WLVI in order to better compete with Fox-owned WFXT. The network quickly dismissed any move of Leno to any timeslot other than 10 p.m., stating that WHDH's plan was a "flagrant" violation of the station's contract with the network and that it would consider moving the NBC affiliation to another Boston area station, either by creating an owned-and-operated station through an "existing broadcast license" in the market owned by NBC or by seeking inquiries from other stations in the market to acquire the affiliation. WHDH began removing all references to the proposed 10 p.m. newscast from its website the next day, and on April 13 the station announced that it had decided to comply and air The Jay Leno Show instead.
NBC has not said what will happen with Telemundo programming if NBC moves to WNEU but there is speculation by the media and viewers that it will be relegated to a sub-digital channel such as 60.2 while NBC will occupy Telemundo's old position on 60.1.
This will be the second time that NBC has pulled an affiliate for its own station interests. WMGM-TV licensed to Wildwood/Atlantic City, New Jersey which was originally founded by Howard Green's Jersey Cape Broadcasting and had been affiliated with the NBC network for 48 years (1966-2014) was dropped to allow WCAU-TV an NBC O&O station to have a monopoly in the Philadelphia market of which the Atlantic City is part of.
Other television network affiliates in Boston market are not expected to be affected or make affiliate switches as a result of this event.

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