WBFF leads Emmy news nominations

Emmy nominations were announced yesterday for local television stations -- and once again, WBFF (Channel 45) was the big winner among Baltimore's daily news operations. The staff that provides news for both WBFF and WNUV (Channel 54) earned 25 nominations overall -- 22 for news and three for promotion and graphics. The contest is sponsored by the Washington Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, which includes stations in Maryland, Washington and Virginia.

The Baltimore stations with the second-greatest number of nominations were WJZ (Channel 13) and WMAR (Channel 2), which had five apiece, based on a preliminary count. WBAL (Channel 11) had one.

"Once again, we've dominated in the market, with more nominations than all the news operations [in Baltimore] combined," WBFF news director Joe DeFeo said in a memo congratulating his staff yesterday.

Among the strongest showings for WBFF was spot news photography. In that category, the station received six of the seven nominations. The seventh went to WJZ.

The winners will be announced at a dinner June 17 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington.