CHNU-DT

Trinity began creating and producing children’s programs, including “Follow Me” which aired for five years.

A new production facility was built and a new children’s program “Sonshiny Day” was created.

A total of 260 “It’s a New Day” shows had been produced, airing weekdays on five Canadian TV stations.

At CRTC hearings commencing February 21 in Vancouver, charitable not-for-profit corporation Trinity Television Inc. applied for a broadcasting licence to carry on an English-language religious television programming undertaking in the Fraser Valley region of British Columbia. 

On July 6 the CRTC approved the application.  The station’s programming was designated as primarily Christian in orientation, but with 18 hours of programming each week reflecting other perspectives and religions.  Trinity was to present approximately 7.5 hours per week of faith-specific programming produced by individual non-Christian groups, including presentations from Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh perspectives.  The station was also to produce a number of issue and event-oriented programs examining various issues from a variety of religious perspectives.   Further, the licensee was to establish a balance committee to oversee all balance programming.  This committee was to initially include five individuals from five different major faith groups

The station was approved to operate on UHF channel 66 with an average effective radiated power of 18,000 watts.  Originally, the call letters were to have been CFVT, but prior to sign-on they were changed to CHNU-TV with the slogan “NOWTV”.

On September 14 Trinity offshoot Christian Radio Manitoba Ltd., launched CHVN-FM 95.1 Winnipeg.

On July 4 the CRTC granted a request by Trinity Television for a 3-month extension of the time limit to September 29 to implement the new TV station.

On September 4, the CRTC approved a decrease in average effective radiated power from 18,000 to 16,000 watts.
  
CHNU-TV “NOWTV” officially signed on at 7 p.m. on September 15, after several days of on-air testing.   The station was licensed to serve 750,000 people in the Fraser Valley east of Vancouver.  However, because of the CRTC’s access rules, it was entitled to be carried on basic cable (channel 10) on Vancouver area cable systems.  The signal then became available to over two million people in B.C.’s lower mainland. 

On May 20, the CRTC approved the purchase of CHNU-TV by Rogers Broadcasting Limited and also approved a rebroadcast transmitter in Victoria, operating on channel 21 with an average effective radiated power of 720 watts (peak 1800 watts).  On September 5, “NOW-TV” changed its on-air identification to “OMNI.10” (for its cable 10 position in metro Vancouver) and the Victoria rebroadcast transmitter signed on. 

On January 30 the station announced its first board of multi-faith community advisors.  The new advisory board was to play an essential role in the station’s feedback mechanisms, reflecting the various faith and cultural communities served by its programming.   

On June 29 the CRTC addressed a complaint regarding the apparent non-compliance by Rogers Broadcasting with its conditions of licence relating to the broadcast of religious programming.  The Commission found that nine programs broadcast on the station were not consistent with its conditions of licence, and directed Rogers to take the measures necessary to ensure that the station’s program schedule was consistent with those conditions by no later than January 1, 2008.  The Commission further indicated its willingness to entertain applications to vary the condition of licence given its realization that the condition should reflect the programming realities of the marketplace.
 
In December the station began identifying on-air as CHNU-TV instead of “OMNI”.

On March 31, the CRTC announced approval of an application by Christian Channel Inc. (CCI) to acquire the assets of CHNU-TV from Rogers Broadcasting. The ownership change followed the Commission’s approval of its acquisition of CKVU-TV Vancouver (one of Canada’s “Citytv” stations) on September 28, 2007, which stipulated that Rogers had to divest itself of CHNU-TV within 12 months to respect the CRTC’s Common Ownership Policy. The Commission also approved CCI’s request for relief from some of the programming conditions that previously had been imposed on Rogers, which were tailored for the specific circumstances of its ownership.

On May 26 S-VOX Inc. (the parent company of Christian Channel Inc.) took over the day-to-day management of CHNU-TV with an announcement of a new flagship series The Daily with former B.C. Lions defensive back Mark Washington and Vancouver broadcast personality Laura-Lynn Tyler Thompson.

CHNU-TV and sister station CIIT-TV Winnipeg re-launched September 1 under the new brand name “Joytv”. New schedules for the first time included simulcasts of top-rated U.S. network programs such as 60 Minutes and Smallville. Bill Roberts, President and CEO of S-VOX, said the Joytv brand name reflected the “vibrant, upbeat and energetic” spirit of the stations and their programming. Announced at the same time was the senior management team of Terry Mahoney, General Manager; Ken Stewart, Production Manager; Karen Corbeil, Promotions Director and Gary Milne, General Sales Manager. 

On March 30, the CRTC approved, subject to certain conditions, the applications by ZoomerMedia Limited, on behalf of itself and on behalf of Christian Channel Inc. and ONE: The Body, Mind and Spirit Channel Inc., for authority to effect a multi-step transaction involving the specialty television service VisionTV, the Category 1 specialty television service ONE: The Body, Mind and Spirit Channel and the television stations CHNU-TV Fraser Valley and CIIT-TV Winnipeg, as well as for a new broadcasting licence to continue the operation of VisionTV. Further, the Commission approved an application by MZ Media Inc. (CFZM, CFMZ-FM, CFMZ-DR-1 Toronto and CFMX-FM Cobourg) for authority to transfer all its issued and outstanding shares from Mr. Moses Znaimer to ZoomerMedia. ZoomerMedia is a public corporation effectively controlled by Mr. Moses Znaimer, who owns directly and indirectly, through his holding corporation Olympus Management Limited, 77.89% of the voting interest in ZoomerMedia. Following the transaction, Mr. Znaimer would own, directly and indirectly, a 66.28% voting interest in ZoomerMedia and continue to exercise effective control of the corporation.

A restructuring plan at ZoomerMedia, connected to the recent acquisition of Vision TV, ONE: The Body, Mind & Spirit Channel, Joytv 10 Vancouver and Joytv 11 Winnipeg, resulted in the loss of 25 positions in Toronto and Vancouver. Division President Bill Roberts said personnel losses resulted from redundancy in marketing and sales within ZoomerMedia. The restructuring was expected to result in annual cost savings of about $1.5 million. 

Doug Elphick joined Joytv 10 as General Sales Manager as of July 12. He had been Director, National Sales, Western Region for CTVglobemedia from 1997 to 2008 and was most recently with the CTV Olympic Broadcast Consortium. 

All production staff at JoyTV 10 – seventeen people – were let go. Apparently new owner ZoomerMedia was working on a six to eight-month plan to turn the station’s fortunes around.

On January 10, the CRTC approved CHNU-DT’s application to relocate the transmitter site, change the channel from 47 to 24, increase the maximum ERP from 13,500 to 35,000 watts and the average ERP from 4,900 to 15,900 watts, and increasing the EHAAT from 346.3 to 625.6 metres. The station said  the existing transmitter site at McKee Peak was being decommissioned so CHNU had to relocate its transmission facilities.