Public TV station in Fort Myers, Florida
WGCU (channel 30) is a PBS member television station in Fort Myers, Florida, United States. Owned by Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU), it is a sister station to NPR member WGCU-FM 90.1. The two stations share studios on the FGCU campus in Fort Myers and transmitter facilities in unincorporated southern Charlotte County.
Public television came to Southwest Florida when channel 30 began broadcasting as WSFP-TV on August 15, 1983. It was founded as a service of the University of South Florida (USF), which had a campus in Fort Myers. The station repeated USF's station in Tampa, WUSF-TV. In 1988, WSFP-TV moved into its first local studio facilities, enabling it to begin producing local programming and qualify for federal grants.
USF–Fort Myers was absorbed by Florida Gulf Coast University in stages: WSFP-TV became WGCU on July 1, 1996, when the new university took over operations of both stations—a year before it held its first classes. The Myra Janco Daniels Public Media Center, which houses the studios of WGCU radio and television, was completed on the FGCU campus in 1998. The station offers PBS national and local programming.
History
University of South Florida ownership
The University of South Florida (USF) filed on February 21, 1978, for a construction permit to build a new public television station on channel 30 in Fort Myers.[2] After obtaining an $800,000 federal grant and state funds to help finance construction,[3] the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted the permit on September 16, 1980.[2] To this project was later added a radio station, both of which would be broadcast from a tower to be built in the Cecil M. Webb Wildlife Management Area in southern Charlotte County.[4] WSFP-TV and WSFP-FM would initially serve to rebroadcast the university's stations in Tampa, WUSF-TV and WUSF-FM, though USF intended for the two to become separate, locally focused stations at a later date.[5]
After delays in construction caused by the legal description of the deed to the tower site[6] and rainy weather,[7] WSFP-TV signed on on August 15, 1983, filling a void in national public television coverage.[8] The new station had limited capability beyond rebroadcasting WUSF-TV with no local studios, though it had an agreement to use facilities of Edison Community College and USF owned a remote studio van that could be sent to Southwest Florida if needed.[9] Less than a month after the TV station, USF brought public radio to Southwest Florida with the launch of WSFP-FM 90.1.[10] WSFP's television and radio debut coincided with an increasing presence of the University of South Florida in the Fort Myers area. USF had been offering courses in the area since 1971, but in 1982, the USF–Fort Myers campus was completed adjacent to Edison Community College.[11]
In 1988, WSFP-TV moved in to WEVU's former studios in Bonita Springs when that station relocated to new facilities in town. The move made WSFP-TV eligible for grants from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the state government as a full station with its own production facilities.[12] The station began producing local programs such as Southwest Florida Business Week, a series on fishing in Sanibel,[13] and profiles of local legislators.[14]
Florida Gulf Coast University ownership
In 1991, state legislators authorized the creation of a tenth state university to be built in Southwest Florida. Three years later, they named it Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU).[15] USF–Fort Myers formed the backbone of the student body for FGCU, which would open to students for the fall 1997 semester.[16] The new university would become the licensee of the WSFP stations on July 1, 1996, as part of the transition of people and responsibilities from USF–Fort Myers.[17] and the new university began seeking architects to design a broadcast center in the first phase of campus construction. The broadcast center would unite WSFP-TV, based in Bonita Springs, with WSFP-FM, which operated on the USF–Fort Myers campus.[18][19]
When the transfer became effective on July 1, 1996, WSFP radio and television changed their call signs to WGCU. At that time, construction began on the broadcast center at the FGCU campus, which would feature a 3,000-square-foot (280 m2) television studio.[20] During this time, the station aired a weekly update show on the progress of campus construction.[21] When WSFP-TV moved into the new broadcast center in January 1998, it eliminated the 45-minute drive from the Bonita Springs studio to the master control facility at the transmitter site, necessary to play out recorded programs.[22]
In 2016, Myra Janco Daniels, an advertising executive and arts philanthropist, donated $3 million to WGCU to support arts programming on television. After the gift, the broadcast center was renamed the Myra Janco Daniels Public Media Center.[23]
Local programming
In 2003, WGCU began producing Untold Stories, a series of history documentaries on Southwest Florida.[24] The station also airs daily local news minutes produced by the WGCU radio news staff.[25]
Funding
WGCU TV had total revenue in fiscal year 2022 of $4.57 million. $1.5 million of this total came from the station's 11,392 members. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting contributed $1.1 million, mostly in the form of a Community Service Grant. Florida Gulf Coast University appropriated $444,000.[26]
