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The Insider

Mar 10, 2003  •  Post A Comment

Lucie Salhany, a Cleveland Browns and Pittsburgh Steelers fan since she was a kid, is now the sole woman on the board of The Football Network, set to launch this fall.
Ms. Salhany chaired Fox Broadcasting in 1993 and ’94 when the upstart netlet sacked CBS and ran off with its NFL package of more than 30 years for a then-unheard-of $1.6 billion.
“I was very involved with that,” said Ms. Salhany, who recalls that it wasn’t just the money that convinced the NFL to get Foxy. It was the marketing skills and commitment Fox pledged to the NFL as a partner. “We took ads to them that blew them away.”
Ms. Salhany, who also headed Twentieth TV and Paramount TV and was the founding president of UPN, is now head of her own her consulting company, JHMedia, and a member of the boards of several major companies. “I think my skills fit,” she said of her new assignment.
Beuth-iful Home for Sale
Former Capital Cities and ABC executive Phil Beuth recently breezed through New York to help the Broadcasters’ Foundation honor NBC Chairman Bob Wright and to check up on the Putnam County, N.Y., home he put on the market last year.
If you’re interested, it’s a five bedroom, three bath, three fireplace place on a freshwater lake just an hour north of New York City. Serious shoppers should e-mail Mr. Beuth at witenblauw@aol.com. It’s furnished with “everything from phones to forks” and a separate in-law apartment, Mr. Beuth said. “We’re asking $699,000, which is less than we have in it. I would take something like $650,000 and run.” If The Insider had anything worth something like $650,000, she would run, too.
War on Spending
Jim Walton, the topper at CNN, which has a reported war chest of $25 million with which to cover the unpleasantness about to play out in Iraq, called his direct-reports together last week to stress the importance of spending smart now and being prepared for the prospect that more will be required if the war lasts longer than most are expecting.
The bottom line, short term: No nonessential travel, no nonessential overtime, no nonessential hires. Insiders say CNN is not going to scrimp on the war coverage, with which it hopes to improve its competitive fortunes, and that debt-ridden parent AOL Time Warner has not ordered specific cutbacks. But the original all-news network will look for ways to share some of the bricks-and-technological-mortar aspects of getting the story and getting it on the air. It won’t be alone.