Networks tour FleetCenter

Representatives of the network news operations toured the FleetCenter yesterday and met with Democratic convention organizers to start planning how to televise Boston's big moment on the political stage this summer.

But in recent election seasons, the broadcast networks have devoted steadily smaller shares of time to political conventions, as news executives decided that the events had become tightly programmed campaign advertisements that rarely provided compelling television news. With crucial coverage decisions still months way, news executives and convention officials acknowledge that the big challenge is to reverse that pattern and create must-see TV.

"We look at the trends. The network share has been steadily declining over the last few cycles," said Rod O'Connor, CEO of the Democratic National Convention Committee. "We are looking to try and reinvigorate the process at this time. Part of the reason we've had some coverage decline is because conventions have been very controlled." Phil Alongi, the executive director of NBC News Specials who inspected the Fleet venue yesterday, put it simply: "They realize that the convention has got to be newsworthy for us to justify being here."

Officials from CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, and the Fox News Channel were in Boston to evaluate a number of logistical issues, such as where to locate reporters, booths, trucks, and cable lines. "The walkthrough acquaints everybody with what the Fleet looks like," said Rick Kaplan, senior vice president of ABC News, who was in New York yesterday. "It's really about becoming totally familiar with the physical plant."

O'Connor characterized yesterday's meeting as "good progress." He added that "we are taking a fresh look at the way we program the convention," and searching for ways to "make it more newsworthy."

In light of the realities of today's presidential politics -- with conventions functioning largely as scripted coronations -- that is an ambitious goal. Gone are the dramatic floor fights and contested nominations. The social and political divisions that erupted during the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago seem like ancient history.

Summing up the feelings of many journalists and television viewers, ABC's Ted Koppel stalked out of the Republican convention in San Diego in 1996, saying: "Nothing surprising has happened. Nothing surprising is anticipated." And in recent years, the major broadcast networks have ceded more and more convention coverage to their cable news cousins.

According to statistics from the Democratic National Convention Committee, the combined ABC, CBS, and NBC coverage for each convention dropped from about 20 hours in 1992 to only 11 hours in 2000 while ratings have plunged about 33 pecent in that period. Nielsen Media Research numbers indicated that the average nightly audience watching on all the networks was about 20 million for the 2000 Democratic convention and 19 million for the Republican convention. Yet, a CBS "Survivor" show that summer attracted almost 29 million viewers.

Marty Ryan, executive producer of political programming for the Fox News Channel, said his organization expects to air "wall-to-wall aggressive" prime-time coverage of the conventions this summer. "A lot of times we thumb our noses at these things, but what do we want them to be?" he said. "I don't think it's their job to make news for us."

But broadcast network executives say the course of the campaign will help them decide how much time and energy to devote to covering the conventions. Kaplan said that if the nomination is still in doubt by the time the Democrats arrive in Boston, "that makes the convention much more compelling . . . and we will cover the heck out of it."

"I'd love to be able to read those kind of tea leaves," he continued. "The key to today is you keep your options open and as the story becomes clearer, you start to commit."

And for one day at least, the question of whether the convention would provide political drama was superseded by concerns about whether the camera would love the Fleet Center. On that issue, the early returns seem good.

"The building is spectacular, good lines of sight from a lot of places," said Alongi. "Everything sort of works and it's easy to get around."