Today, witness a flurry of Milwaukee area media notes that have recently filled the inbox.
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IHeartMedia, aka Clear Channel Communications, has named Colleen Valkoun market president for its Madison and Milwaukee radio station cluster. She replaces Jeff Tyler, who held the position since 2012 and was named president of Clear Channel’s Minneapolis station cluster in January.
Valkoun served as interim market president since his departure. She was national sales manager for the Milwaukee and Madison stations and worked in sales at Saga Communications from 1992-2003.
Valkoun grew up in Milwaukee and is a University of Wisconsin-Madison alum. She will oversee Clear Channel stations WIBA-AM, WIBA-FM, WMAD-FM, WTSO-AM, WZEE-FM and WXXM-FM in Madison and WISN-AM, WKKV-FM, WMIL-FM, WOKY-AM, WRIT-FM, WRNW-FM in Milwaukee.
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Sweeps are over but the sensationalism continues. Under the headline “TV News loves a good catfight,” the media website Romenesko.com posted a WITI-TV Twitter item – complete with exclamation point – promoting an EXCLUSIVE “fight over a parking spot” at a Walmart in Greenfield, which aired during its 11 a.m. newscast.
Love to see it included in the station’s “This Is the Place,” theme song.
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WUWM-FM named Rachel Owens host of the local cut-ins that air during the station’s broadcast of NPR’s “Morning Edition.” She joined the station in 2014 and was producer and co-host of the public station’s nightly music program. She previously worked at Wisconsin Public Radio and television.
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The television industry website FTVLive is reporting that layoffs are occurring at TV stations 0wned by E.W. Scripps, which will be taking over – er – merging with Journal Broadcast Group stations this spring.
According to the site, downsizing has occurred at KNXV in Phoenix, KMGH in Denver, KGTV in San Diego and WEWS in Cleveland. It also reports that Scripps is hiring “digital content” people “to run at least some of their TV newsrooms.”
Stay tuned to see what, if anything, this will mean for WTMJ-TV, whose 10 p.m. newscast was fourth ranked during the February sweeps.
Update: TVSpy is reporting that a Scripps press release says some job positions “have lived within our newsrooms for years” and changes were made “to better support our multi-platform future. That means relocating more resources to content creation.”
Scripps corporate communications director told TVspy “we want to have more people involved in actual newsgathering – out in the field – especailly for investigative coverage on a daily basdis.”
According to the press release Scripps chairman president and CEO said “we are focused on digital video” and the addition of “Newsy video players” gave the company a “big boost’ in the fourth quarter.
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Public station WYSO, licensed to Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio and serving nine counties in Southwest Ohio, has posted a charming StoryCorps interview with long time Wauwatosa resident Lucille Miyazaki about her journey from Hawaii to the Midwest.
“I’d rather talk about the Packers,” she tells her son Kurt Miyazaki, an Ohio resident who is conducting the interview. Listen here.
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I’ve never understood the local news practice for main anchors to hand off reading stories to “breaking news anchors” who are “reporting live” from “the newsroom.”
Aren’t the main anchors already reading – I mean reporting – live? It just clutters the screen with personalities, rather than information.
This week, WISN-TV’s morning newscast “Breaking News anchor” Melinda Davenport was named main anchor of the station’s morning newscast, with co-anchor Patrick Paolantonio. She replaces previous anchor Marianne Lyles who joined WTTV-TV in Indianapolis.
Davenport joined WISN one year ago this month. No word from the station on who replaces her as “breaking news” anchor.
Tags: Clear Channel, E.W. Scripps, Journal Broadcast, WISN-TV, WTMJ-TV, WUWM Posted by