A week before the torch was lit, Steve Baboulis lamented the softer-than-expected Olym-pic sales at WNYT, Albany's NBC affiliate. Nonetheless, he was eager to run a slew of promotional spots during the Games, hoping to extend WNYT's longtime dominance of the news market. "We're going to be one of our biggest customers," says Baboulis, VP and general manager of the Hubbard Broadcasting outlet. WNYT has led the ratings at both 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. since 1999-and claims it was the first station in the country to use the "Live. Local. Latebreaking" tagline. It's now debuting a "Coverage You Can Trust" moniker. Albany-Schenectady-Troy is the 56th-ranked DMA, and WNYT's news success (despite NBC's weak primetime) has paid off. The station accounted for $21.9 million of the market's total of $77.4 million last year, according to BIA Financial Network. That was second only to Freedom Communications' $24.5 million, derived from a CBS-CW (WRGB-WCWN) duopoly. Young Broadcasting's ABC affiliate, WTEN, was third with $ 17.2 million, while New-port Television's Fox outlet, WXXA, fin-ished fourth at $ 12.6 million. But 2008 has been less than a gold-medal year in New York's capital city. GMs say the economy has been a lin-gering trouble spot, substantially hurting revenues. Layoffs have hit WTEN and WXXA. Others are replacing departing employees with part-timers. June unemployment in the area was at its highest level since 1992, and con-sumer confidence plummeted. The state's new governor, David Paterson, hasn't ruled out reducing the traditionally stable state government work force-a major economic driver. Even attendance at the Saratoga horse-racing track is down dramatically this summer, in part due to gas prices.
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