cw las vegas my lvtv dt2 slogan dare to defy channels digital 29 uhf virtual 33 psip subchannels 33.1 the cw 33.2 mynetworktv 33.3 this tv affiliations the cw 2006 present owner sinclair broadcast group kupn licensee llc first air date july 30 1989 1989 07 30 call letters meaning vegas cw sister station s ksnv former callsigns kfbt 1989 2006 former channel number s analog 33 uhf 1989 2009 former affiliations independent 1989 1995 and 1998 2006 the wb 1995 1998 and september 5 17 2006 transmitter power 1 000 kw height 382.9 m facility id 10195 transmitter coordinates 36 0 28 n 115 0 24 w 36.00778 n 115.00667 w 36.00778 ; 115.00667 website cwlasvegas.com kvcw virtual channel 33 uhf digital channel 29 is a cw affiliated television station located in las vegas nevada united states . the station is owned by the sinclair broadcast group and is part of a duopoly with nbc affiliate ksnv channel 3 . the two stations share studios on south jones boulevard in spring valley although it uses a las vegas address and its transmitter is located on black mountain near henderson nevada southwest of i 515 u.s. 93 u.s. 95 . on cable it can be seen on cox communications channel 6 and in high definition on digital channel 706 and clear qam 6.1 . syndicated programming seen on kvcw includes reruns of law & order criminal intent dr. phil and judge judy . 1 contents 1 history 2 digital television 2.1 digital channels 2.2 analog to digital conversion 3 newscasts 4 references 5 external links history edit on april 22 1987 the federal communications commission fcc issued an original construction permit to 4 a communications to build a new full power television station on uhf channel 33 to serve the las vegas market . 4 a communications owned by lawrence and teri depaulis became channel 33 inc. which remained the station s licensee until 2015 in august 1987 . the station known as kfbt went on the air on july 30 1989 under a program test authority and was given a license one month later . the station s original transmitter was located in the mccullough range southwest of henderson . on july 20 1990 a family ownership group headed by daniel danny koker purchased channel 33 inc. under the kokers kfbt was an independent station with a firmly local flavor and soon garnered much acclaim with features such as the scary b movie showcase saturday fright at the movies hosted by count cool rider which aired at 10 p.m. count cool rider was actually koker one of the station s owners who has since gone on to become a respected builder of custom motorcycles 2 as well as a regular expert on the history channel series pawn stars 3 and host of its spinoff counting cars . 4 5 the station primarily broadcast older programming during this era as well as professional wrestling most notably world class championship wrestling and the national wrestling alliance . kfbt became a charter affiliate of the wb at the network s launch on january 11 1995 and remained an affiliate while owned by the koker family . on december 18 1997 the koker family sold channel 33 inc. to montecito broadcasting corporation with the sale being finalized on february 3 1998 . the same day that montecito closed on its purchase of kfbt it immediately entered into an agreement to be acquired by the sinclair broadcast group which montecito entered into a local marketing agreement to operate kfbt until the transaction was completed . 6 on march 1 1998 sinclair moved the wb affiliation to kupn channel 21 which later changed calls to kvwb now ksnv and kfbt was to affiliate upn but did not signed a contract and instead became an independent station . the station was rebranded as gold 33 and began showing mainly newer syndicated programming . sinclair completed its purchase of montecito and channel 33 inc. in february 2000 resulting in the creation of the market s first duopoly between kfbt and kvwb . on january 24 2006 cbs corporation the parent company of upn and the warner bros. unit of time warner announced that the wb and upn would be shut down that september and have some of their higher rated programs migrated onto a new jointly owned network called the cw . 7 8 on february 22 news corporation announced that it would start up another new network called mynetworktv . 9 this new service which would be a sister network to fox would be operated by fox television stations and its syndication division twentieth television . mynetworktv was created in order to give stations affiliated with upn and the wb that were not mentioned as becoming cw affiliates another option besides becoming independent stations as well as to compete against the cw . sinclair chose to affiliate kvwb with mynetworktv leaving the cw to join with either low power upn affiliate ktud ca channel 25 or kfbt . sinclair began negotiations with the cw to affiliate kfbt and in april when ktud decided to go independent instead of pursuing a cw affiliation 10 kfbt was virtually assured the cw affiliation . an affiliation agreement was announced on may 2 and kfbt changed its call letters to the current kvcw on june 19 reflecting its pending affiliation with the new network . kvmy now khsv affiliated with mynetworktv when the network launched on september 5 two weeks before the wb was scheduled to shut down and the cw made its debut ; as a result kvcw rejoined the wb for the network s last two weeks of programming before switching its affiliation to the cw on september 18 . on may 15 2012 sinclair and fox agreed to a five year affiliation agreement extension for the station group s 19 fox affiliated stations until 2017 . this included an option that was exercisable between july 1 2012 and march 31 2013 for fox parent news corporation to buy a combination of six sinclair owned stations two cw mynetworktv duopolies and two standalone mynetworktv affiliates in three out of four markets ; kvcw and kvmy were included in the fox purchase option along with stations in cincinnati wstr tv raleigh wlfl wrdc and norfolk wtvz tv . 11 in january 2013 fox announced that it will not exercise its option to buy any of the sinclair stations in the four markets included in the option . 12 on august 13 2013 ksnv dt announced that the nbc soap opera days of our lives would move to kvcw as of august 19 . the move of the program was necessitated after ksnv changed its schedule to accommodate a 3 p.m. newscast . 13 on september 3 2014 sinclair announced the purchase of ksnv from intermountain west communications company for 120 million . as sinclair already owns kvcw and kvmy the company will sell the license assets though not the programming of one of the three stations to comply with fcc ownership restrictions with the divested station s programming being relocated to the other stations . 14 on november 1 2014 kvmy s programming was moved to kvcw s second digital subchannel . sinclair could not buy ksnv dt outright because las vegas has only seven full power stations four too few to legally permit a duopoly . when the sale closes sinclair will control half of those stations . it will also create a situation in which a cw affiliate is the nominal senior partner in a duopoly involving an nbc affiliate and a big four station . digital television edit digital channels edit channel video aspect psip short name programming 15 33.1 1080i 16 9 thecwlv main kvcw programming the cw 33.2 720p my lvtv mynetworktv 33.3 480i this tv this tv analog to digital conversion edit when the fcc released its initial digital channel allocations on april 21 1997 it had assigned kfbt s digital companion channel to uhf channel 32 . 16 the allocations met with considerable resistance from low power broadcasters who would be displaced by the digital channel allocations and on february 17 1998 the fcc issued a revised final dtv allocation table . 17 kfbt s original allocation would have displaced low powered k31do now knbx cd so the fcc substituted uhf channel 29 allowing channel 32 to be assigned to lake havasu city arizona station kmcc dt and eliminating a displacement there . kfbt was granted a permit to construct its digital facilities on january 26 2001 . technical difficulties delayed construction of the full power facilities requiring extensions of the construction permit . 18 on november 8 2002 kfbt was granted special temporary authority sta to construct a low power facility in order to comply with the fcc deadline for commencing digital broadcasting while the full power facilities were still being built . the station now known as kvcw dt completed construction of its full power digital facilities in january 2007 and was granted a license on march 8 . back in 2006 the fcc required each station with a digital companion channel to select which one it would continue to use after the end of the transition period at that time scheduled for february 17 2009 . kvcw dt selected channel 29 as its final digital channel and returned the channel 33 license to the fcc . 19 kvcw continues to use channel 33 as its virtual channel per the atsc standards for psip . regular analog programming was dropped on february 18 2009 with the station participating in the analog nightlight program for two weeks with a broadcast explaining how to switch to digital reception . kvcw dt is available on channels 4 12 and 51 over air in mesquite nevada and on cable in saint george utah . 20 newscasts edit in 2003 former sister station kvwb established a news department and began airing an hour long primetime newscast at 10 p.m. it was part of sinclair s centralized news central operation that was based at the company s headquarters on beaver dam road in hunt valley maryland . national and international news segments weather forecasts and some sports segments originated from the company s hunt valley facility while local news and sports segments were based at kfbt kvwb s las vegas studios . the news department was shared with kfbt which aired its own local newscast at 7 p.m. it also aired the point a one minute conservative political commentary that was required to be broadcast on all sinclair owned stations with newscasts . the news department was shut down at the beginning of march 2006 as were the majority of sinclair s news operations under the news central format . kvwb later entered into a news share agreement with nbc affiliate kvbc channel 3 now ksnv dt to produce a nightly 10 p.m. newscast for channel 21 . the newscast originally titled news 3 at 10 on the wb las vegas debuted on april 4 2006 and was later renamed to news 3 at 10 on mylvtv to correspond with kvmy s affiliation switch to mynetworktv . the program was discontinued on december 15 2006 and moved to kvcw the following monday under the title news 3 at 10 on the cw las vegas . on august 11 2007 kvbc became the second station in the las vegas market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition and the kvcw broadcast was included in the upgrade . the 10 p.m. newscast originated from kvbc s studios on foremaster lane in las vegas near the border with north las vegas . kvbc also produced a 15 minute sports highlight program called sports zone that aired weeknights at 10 45 . both programs were discontinued on september 28 2009 and replaced with syndicated programming . as of august 17 2015 current sister station ksnv relaunched newscasts on