Contract spat means Dish Network customers won’t see KAKE

If you have Dish, you can’t have KAKE.

Wichita’s ABC affiliate went dark on Dish Network on Tuesday as negotiations on a new contract dragged on.

“It’s very disappointing,” KAKE general manager Neal Davis said early Tuesday evening. “At this moment, we’re officially in a dispute with Dish Network.”

“We’ll fight through it. Hopefully, we’ll come to an agreement.”

Lockwood Broadcasting, KAKE’s owner, is essentially seeking the same rate Dish is paying the other stations in Wichita, Davis said.

“Our problem is we are a small, family owned company,” he said. “We don’t have the leverage the large corporations have.”

Tuesday’s blackout affected six stations in four markets spanning seven states.

“With Dish willing to grant an extension and a retroactive true-up on rates, Lockwood had nothing to lose and consumers had everything to gain by leaving the channels up,” Andy LeCuyer, Dish senior vice president of programming, said in a prepared statement. “Instead, Lockwood chose to turn its back on its public interest obligations and use innocent consumers as bargaining chips.”

A spokeswoman for Dish would not say how many customers in the Wichita area would be affected by the blackout.

“We’re certainly hoping to end it as quickly as possible,” Davis said. “The losers here are our viewers...and us. We’re losing our viewers. Dish doesn’t lose anything with us.”

The blackout includes three stations serving Sherman, Texas, and Ada, Okla.; one station serving Greensboro, High Point and Winston-Salem in North Carolina; and one station serving Huntsville, Decatur and Florence in Alabama.

This story was originally published January 23, 2018 at 4:51 PM with the headline "Contract spat means Dish Network customers won’t see KAKE."