If 2002 turns out to be an especially good year for WGAL-TV, the station can give some credit to George Gekas and Tim Holden.

The wild 17th Congressional District race, which cost around $7 million, contributed to Lancaster's WGAL airing more political ads than any other TV station in Pennsylvania - and taking in more than $4.6 million in the process.

In fact, campaign commercials brought more than $59 million to the state's TV industry, according to figures compiled by the Free Air Time Campaign, which argues that broadcast stations ought to provide free political advertising in exchange for using the public airwaves.

"The cost of those 30-second political spots is the biggest reason campaigns have become so expensive," the organization, part of the Alliance for Better Campaigns, argued in a statement.

Charges like that make television officials a little defensive. They say TV is private enterprise that shouldn't be singled out to bear the burden of helping candidates reach voters. And they point out that political ads drive away more lucrative business - not to mention drive away viewers.

"It is not all gold that glitters," said WGAL general manager Paul Quinn.

And on the accusation that TV ad rates are driving up the cost of campaigns, Quinn is dismissive.

"If they reduce rates to politicians," he said, "all it's going to mean is more political ads on television."

What no one disputes is that the 2002 campaign has been an amazing one for local television, at least in a non-presidential year.

The Free Air Time Campaign (http://bettercampaigns.org) reports that stations serving Pennsylvania markets collected $59.538 million from political ads. The top money makers were in the pricey Philadelphia market, where one station, WPVI-TV, took in $9.7 million from 3,901 commercials.

In the Harrisburg-Lancaster market, which WGAL dominates, the NBC affiliate ran 6,995 spots costing $4.649 million.

WHTM-TV, the ABC affiliate in Harrisburg, aired 6,223 commercials, at $2.1 million. WHP-TV, the CBS station in Harrisburg, had 3,051 ads for $1.3 million; WPMT-TV, the Fox station in York, had 1,503 for $448,000; and UPN station WLYH-TV in Lebanon had 531 1/2 ads for $88,000.

Statewide, the station closest to WGAL in numbers of ads was WNEP-TV, a Scranton-based ABC affiliate, with 6,783 ads earning $3 million.

Quinn, the WGAL general manager, hadn't seen the report.

"That had to have been Gekas," Quinn said. "It was the largest congressional race, as far as the advertising, in the history of this market."

Gekas, the Republican incumbent, lost to Holden, a Democratic congressman redistricted into the 17th, in one of the most-watched campaigns nationwide. Party organizations and special-interest groups poured around $7 million into the race, analysts said.

"It was phenomenal," Quinn said. "It was far and away beyond our wildest expectations that we would get that kind of money."

Contributing to the ad totals was another hot race - for governor - that drove candidates and special-interest groups onto the airwaves.

In that contest, the busiest ad season was the spring primary pitting Democrats Ed Rendell and Bob Casey Jr. Rendell, the eventual victor in both the primary and general elections, spent heavily on TV, as did Casey.

The general election campaign wasn't quite as TV-focused, mainly because Republican Mike Fisher didn't have enough money to stay on the air.

Joe Lewin, general manager of WHTM, thinks the governor candidates had as much effect on his station's advertising as the 17th Congressional did.

"Both races spent a lot of advertising dollars," he said.

By contrast, Lancaster Newspapers Inc. carried few political ads during the campaign. Retail advertising director John Derr said he can't think of any from candidates, and only a few from interest groups, including one from a gun-rights organization.

"It is minimal," he said, at least in this market.

Quinn said he doesn't expect a repeat.

"Political spending in this market keeps going up," he said. "But I don't believe we're going to see anything like that again."

If the Free Air Time Campaign has its way, no one will.

The organization, a coalition of union, civic and mainline church groups, publicized TV ad revenues to bolster its argument that stations should provide free campaign commercials and help to reduce the cost of elections.

Its parent organization, the Alliance for Better Campaigns, is funded by major foundations, including the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Ford Foundation, and lists its honorary co-chairmen as former presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford and retired anchorman Walter Cronkite.

"Broadcasters are public trustees as well as private businesses," the Free Air Time Campaign contends. "Most people don't realize it, but ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox don't own the airwaves they use. We do. ... Yet the broadcasters have never paid a penny for their exclusive rights to use the airwaves."

Not only do costly commercials drive up the price of elections, the air campaign said, but they limit competition: "If you're a challenger who can't write a big check to the local television station for a nightly bombardment of ads, you'll still have your freedom of speech. But you won't have much chance to be heard - or elected."

Quinn and Lewin replied that TV stations must, under a 1970s federal law, give candidates the same preferred rates granted to their best advertisers.

But the Free Air Time Campaign - and sources familiar with local television - said the loophole is that the cheaper rates are "pre-emptible" spots, meaning another advertiser willing to pay more for that time can push out the political commercial.

In a campaign with an election-day deadline, that's not a feasible strategy, so candidates pay higher rates to guarantee their commercials will run at the times they want.

Plus, parties and interest groups aren't covered by the law.

An effort to close that loophole via the campaign finance reform bill passed by Congress this spring failed when a provision guaranteeing lower rates was stripped from the bill. The Free Air Time Campaign blames the broadcast lobby for pressuring Congress into dropping the language.

Quinn said it's unfair to expect broadcasters, as private businesses, to bear the responsibility of lowering campaign costs and making elections more competitive.

For the stations, he said, an influx of political ads means an outflow of other business, and not only because the campaign commercials eat up spots that otherwise would be used by stores and car dealers.

"We have advertisers who won't run ads through election season," he said, because of the clutter of political ads.

Lewin said when advertisers are "squeezed out" by campaigns, the local economy suffers.

TV watchers suffer, too.

"It just drives viewers away from television," Lewin said.

If candidates succeed in getting even lower rates - and U.S. Sen. John McCain introduced a free-air-time bill in October - Quinn and Lewin agreed it will only lead to politicians raising the same kind of money to buy more commercials.

"I think we have enough political advertising," Lewin said. blog comments powered by Disqus