Zell's Tribune starts to tinker

Note to KTLA: the TV station that Sam Zell's Tribune company owns in South Florida is moving in with the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel newspaper. Zell has said the company would start to experiment with new ways of doing things at its smaller properties before importing them to Los Angeles et al. Memo from Zell exec Ed Wilson after the jump.

Also: Zell is getting less ink for being profane as he continues to visit Tribune properties and that's not neccessarily a plus, says Chicago Tribune columnist Phil Rosenthal:

Because what's being said as he and Randy Michaels, Tribune Co.'s chief executive of Internet and broadcasting, continue their road show is still newsworthy�even if it has nothing to do with cursing, Cubs and Wrigley Field....
"Tribune was a very old company. It was very tradition bound," Zell said at WGNO-TV in New Orleans earlier this month, deriding predecessors as "sleepy."

Zell has previously sounded exasperated that Channel 5 and the L.A. Times don't do more together.

Wilson memo:

Today marks the beginning of a bold new era for Tribune Broadcasting�we�re taking the unprecedented step of joining the print and broadcast operations of WSFL in South Florida with those of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. For the first time ever, we�ll have all our media properties in this region under one roof in Ft. Lauderdale.
And that is great news for consumers and advertisers. It will give us the chance to develop new content, programming and sales opportunities in such areas as fashion, food, travel, entertainment and lifestyle. It will give advertisers a single point of contact and a way of buying media efficiently across all our properties in South Florida.

Since we didn�t think he had enough to do while running two newspapers, Sun-Sentinel publisher Howard Greenberg, who is also serving as interim publisher of the Orlando Sentinel, will assume the additional responsibilities of general manager at WSFL. Also joining the new leadership team at WSFL is Allyson Meyers, who will serve as station manager.

Howard knows the region better than anyone; Ally knows TV sales and operations. Together they�ll make a great team....

Ed