Jim Paymar goes behind camera to develop new cable-TV.

Jim Paymar goes behind camera to develop local news cable-TV

Jim Paymar is back. But, he's quick to point out, he never left.

While working on the air for Fox Broadcasting Co.'s recently cancelled news magazine "The Reporters," Paymar commuted to and from New York to remain close to his daughter, two sons and his San Anselmo home.

"I worked for three years at Fox and in my contract it said, |He shall not leave San Francisco,'" Paymar said.

But the larger measure of the three-time Emmy award winner's devotion to the Bay Area as a home and workplace is yet to come. The television reporter and former KRON-TV anchor is creating a local news and ethnic programming station largely from scratch as general manager of KCNS-Channel 38. The small San Francisco UHF television station run by West Coast United Broadcasting Co. currently airs foreign language and religious programming.

Paymar, 40, joined the station in May along with his wife, producer Diane Masciale, who is the station's assistant general manager and director of programming.

Paymar believes he can beat local stations that barely scratch the surface of news, issues and ideas.

"Very little on (local) TV is of Bay Area origination. We feel we can find a way to do this …