PBS SoCal, KMEX Lead L.A. Local Emmy Wins; KVEA, KABC Land Top Newscast Prizes

PBS SoCal (KOCE and KCET) was the big winner Saturday night at the L.A. Area Emmy Awards, landing eight — including for live events-programming, entertainment, crime/social issues and arts. Univision’s KMEX was next, with seven, followed by Telemundo’s KVEA with six.

KVEA once again won the newscast Emmys for daily daytime (11 a.m. to 7 p.m.) and daily evening (7 p.m. to 12 a.m.). Last year, KVEA won all three — also picking up daily morning (4 a.m. to 11 a.m.). But this year, KABC/ABC7 won that morning newscast Emmy.

The 2026 Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards were held Saturday at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles, hosted by KABC entertainment reporter George Pennacchio. KABC’s David Ono received the 2026 Los Angeles Area Emmy Governors Award, “recognizing his more than three decades of broadcasting and his passion for in-depth storytelling.” Ono’s KABC co-anchor, Jovana Lara, presented him the honor.

Bob Bain and Bob Bain Productions produced the ceremony, while Greg Taylor and Brian DeCloux are the Los Angeles Area Governors. Categories included Live and Breaking News Coverage, Crime and Social Issues, Culture and History, the Arts, Health and Science, Human Interest, Music, Sports and the Environment.

Beyond PBS SoCal, KMEX and KVEA, other outlet winners included KABC/ABC7 (four), KNBC/NBC4 (four), Spectrum News 1 (two), Spectrum SportsNet (two), LA36 (one), Spectrum SportsNet LA (one) and USC football (one).

As for this year’s nominee totals, PBS SoCal landed 29 nominations; KABC/ABC7 received 21, Univision outlet KMEX received 20, Telemundo’s KVEA had 18, KNBC/NBC4 landed 15 and Spectrum News 1 had 10.

For the station newscast awards, every TV station that submits is eligible. This year’s eligibility period was for the 2025 calendar year, which means many of the news categories winners focused on the devastating wildfires that ripped through the region last January.

Read more, and see the list of winners here.

KABC Bomb Scare: Station Broadcasts 4 p.m. Newscast Outdoors

KABC/Channel 7 devoted its 4 p.m. newscast this afternoon to a story that literally hit home for the station. A bomb scare forced the evacuation of the station, located in Glendale, along with a few nearby buildings on Disney's Grand Central Creative Campus.

That means the station had to hustle and broadcast live from nearby Flower St., utilizing live trucks and the station's helicopter. The broadcast broke for commercials, but otherwise it was wall-to-wall coverage from the street.



"Our plan worked," Rebecca Campbell, the head of ABC's owned-and-operated stations, told anchors David Ono and Ellen Leyva. "We have a job to do, and our viewers are being served as we stand here and are a part of the story. We'll be talking about this tomorrow, for sure." Meanwhile, meteorologist Dallas Raines -- the hippest man you can have at a bomb scare -- tried to get Campbell to do the "Dallas Dip." And yes, he referenced it as the "Dallas Dip."

Campbell noted she had experienced a similar situation at ABC's Philadelphia station WPVI, when a water main break forced that station to broadcast outside.



"This is insane," anchor Mark Brown said. Meanwhile, Raines gave his weather forecast with the help of an iPad and ABC7's weather app. (Below)



By 5 p.m., the all-clear sign was given, and the station resumed regular newscasts.



A few Tweets from the KABC/ABC7 team:

Setting up for an @ABC7 newscast outside due to bomb threat pic.twitter.com/emXmh7Qn6C

— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) September 30, 2015

Not kidding. A bomb threat @ABC7 has us setting up for an outdoor newscast at 4pm pic.twitter.com/b8gqvVqG70

— Danny Romero (@ABC7Danny) September 30, 2015

We've been evacuated due to a bomb threat. Doing the 4pm on the streets of glendale! @ABC7 crazy! pic.twitter.com/wbmdAJJaLh

— David Ono (@ABC7DavidOno) September 30, 2015

Breaking news: there's a bomb threat to @ABC7. We've evacuated our building. Police have Flower St. shutdown. pic.twitter.com/RiuxGPbtpe

— Melissa MacBride (@ABC7Melissa) September 30, 2015

LA Local Emmys: KNBC Extends Its Streak at the Top

Three time's a charm at the Emmys for KNBC (Channel 4). Just like last year, KNBC won all three top newscast honors at the 64th Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards, held Saturday night in North Hollywood.

"NBC4 News at 11 p.m." -- which has struggled in the ratings in recent years -- once again won the local Emmy for regularly scheduled evening newscast; "NBC4 at 6 p.m." won the daytime newscast Emmy; and "Today in L.A. at 6 a.m." won for morning newscast. KNBC had also won the daytime and evening categories in 2010 -- making this quite the streak for the NBC-owned station.

In another surprise, KABC (Channel 7) tied with KTLA (Channel 5) and KNBC for the most overall Emmys, at 7 apiece. Why a surprise? KABC doesn't officially participate in the Emmys, and doesn't submit entries to the awards (leaving it up to individual staffers to do it on their own). That's why KABC is never up for any of the top newscast prizes, in which anyone who submits is automatically a nominee.

(If you count Fox Sports West and Prime Ticket as one entity, the two channels combined won 8 awards on Saturday.)

KABC's tally included an Emmy for investigative news reporting (for the "Eyewitness News" package "Serial Plantiffs"). KABC's David Ono also won for outstanding programming writer and outstanding hard news reporting (which he also won last year).

At KNBC, its other wins included the Emmy for live coverage of an unscheduled news event (for its report on the Seal Beach massacre) and news special (for its coverage of the death of Osama Bin Laden).

Speaking of streaks, a big one came to an end on Saturday night: After five consecutive wins in the outstanding news writer category, KNBC's Mary Harris lost out this year to KCBS/KCAL's Nicolette Medina.

And KTLA continued its wins in the outstanding news director category, as Deborah Wilkinson, who won in 2010, took home the Emmy. (KTLA's Bryan Hileman won last year.)

Meanwhile, it may be a small victory, but even without the sheen of a PBS affiliation, KCET still won three Emmys (more than stations such as KMEX and KTTV). Two of those wins were for "SoCal Connected."