TV Turmoil
Revolving
door in small news markets part of the biz
In
Jennifer Taylor's broadcast journalism game plan, Erie was always
considered a steppingstone -- not a destination.
Taylor,
28, recently left her reporter/anchor job at Erie's WSEE-TV for a
new reporting job at WNWO-TV in Toledo, Ohio. In doing so, Taylor
joined a growing list of anchors and reporters who have left Erie's
local television news scene since January.
Karla
Mullenax.
Pat
Van Zandt.
Dan
Wells.
Sarah
Arbogast.
On-air
talent turnover is a frequent fact of life in Erie -- the 142nd largest
television market in the U.S. out of 210 such markets nationwide.
Since
January, several well-known faces in Erie television news have left
the airwaves, either for new reporting jobs or to leave the business
entirely.
Beyond
that, each local station has lost a number of seasoned reporters in
the last decade or so -- reporters who spent years gathering and delivering
news in Erie.
The
response from those who have left -- and those who continue to work
in local TV news, including station owners -- is that the business
remains strong, and such turnover is the nature of the beast in a
small TV market.
But
tighter budgets and new methods of delivering the news, such as the
Internet, are also having an effect on local television stations and
their respective news staffs.
Karla
Mullenax Wludyga is among those who have recently left the airwaves
for other opportunities.
The
ABC affiliate's lead anchor since 2003, Mullenax left that job in
late June to take a public relations job at Gannon University.
"I
was just looking for a new personal challenge," said Mullenax, 31,
who also wanted a job that would allow her to spend more time with
her husband, former WJET-TV sports anchor Scott Wludyga. "No one cut
my salary or anything. But I was getting stagnant. ... I'm too young
to get stagnant."
After
seven years at WSEE as a reporter and producer, Van Zandt quit to
launch a nonprofit therapy-dog organization.
"It's
not the same business that it was when I started," Van Zandt, 41,
said of television news. "We were definitely short-staffed, taking
a lot of hits and cutting back."
Many
reporters who land in Erie, like Taylor, want to hone their skills
and move to a larger city, where the pay is generally higher.
Erie
was Taylor's home for a little more than two years. She said she left
largely for two reasons -- Toledo is a bigger TV news market, and
her salary at WNWO is "considerably more" than it was at WSEE.
Taylor
said her annual salary at WSEE started at about $24,000, and she was
making roughly $26,000 a year when she left in May. She declined to
reveal her Toledo salary.
"It
was hard to leave (Erie), but I felt like I learned all I could there,"
said Taylor, who has family in northeastern Ohio. "It was always my
intention to move on.
"But
it's also hard when you come into a job and you know that a manager
in fast-food is making more than you are and you have a college degree."
Barbara
Frye, vice president of talent placement services for Frank N. Magrid
Associates of New York City, said there is an "unwritten rule that
you don't want to stay in a small market too long."
Magrid
is a media research and consulting firm that specializes in local
TV news.
"There
is a chain you want to climb to get to the top," said Frye, whose
firm has helped reporters get to and leave Erie. "And in a larger
market, you make more money. That's a big part of it."
A
2007 Radio-Television News Directors Association and Ball State University
survey shows that the median pay for television reporters in a market
the size of Erie's is $24,000 a year. For anchors, median yearly pay
is $45,900.
By
contrast, median pay for an assistant manager at a U.S. fast-food
restaurant -- the job former WSEE reporter Taylor referred to -- is
$25,775, according to PayScale.com, an Internet site that collects
data on employee compensation nationwide.
In
the nation's top 25 TV news markets -- places like New York, Boston,
Philadelphia or Los Angeles -- median reporter pay jumps to $56,000
annually, according to the RTNDA/Ball State survey. For anchors in
those markets, median pay is $98,000 a year.
In
recent years, a host of other reporters, weather forecasters and sports
anchors have come and gone -- among them Lisa Zompa, Dylan Dreyer,
Amanda Barren, Brian Neudorff, Mary Nguyen, Rob Macko, Brittney Gordon
and Scott Wludyga.
"I
think it's pretty noticeable, all this turnover," said Tony Peyronel,
coordinator of undergraduate programs in speech communication, broadcast
journalism and print journalism at Edinboro University of Pennsylvania.
"Erie
has traditionally had a lot of younger reporters on the air, but the
anchor talent has been more established," Peyronel said. "Now you're
even seeing the anchor faces change somewhat."
A
changing business Some media experts say the changing face of TV news
is also a factor.
Media
conglomerates across the country frequently own multiple stations.
As they acquire more stations, they often take on additional debt.
Some
of those companies look to keep costs down as a result, which can
mean cuts to salaries, staff, equipment and other resources -- which
has happened at Erie's stations.
Irving,
Texas-based Nexstar Broadcasting Group Inc., an 1,800-employee, publicly
traded company, owns or operates 42 television stations in the United
States, including WJET and WFXP-TV, Erie's Fox affiliate.
Lilly
Broadcasting is the family-owned company that owns WICU-TV, Erie's
NBC affiliate, and local CBS affiliate WSEE-TV.
"TV
news is still lucrative, but profit margins have eroded, and many
station buyouts have left owners with huge debts to pay off," said
Deborah Potter, executive director of NewsLab, a nonprofit resource
center based in Chevy Chase, Md., that focuses on television and radio
journalism.
Tim
Dunst, vice president and general manager for WJET-TV, declined to
reveal what WJET pays reporters.
Despite
the financial pressures, Dunst said, he's proud of WJET's news operation,
which has traditionally been top-ranked in the Nielsen ratings.
Current
Nielsen ratings for the local stations were not available.
Brian
Lilly, general manager of WICU, said business pressures haven't stopped
the station from trying to improve its news operations.
Lilly
said WSEE reporter Jacqueline Policastro will attend the Republican
National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., and the Democratic National
Convention in Denver later this summer.
Lilly
Broadcasting is also improving the Internet sites of WICU and WSEE
to include more video and breaking news, he said.
TV
stations across the country, as well as newspapers and radio stations,
are investing heavily in the Internet to bring news and other information
to more people, as well as to make money.
"There
has to be a re-thinking in all newsrooms," Lilly said. "If we keep
doing the same thing, we won't be here 10 years from now."
Veterans
and rookies NewsLab's Potter said cost-cutting has spawned another
problem that affects the quality of reports coming into viewers' living
rooms.
Many
stations have lost much of their veteran talent, Potter said -- reporters
whose years of source-building and knowledge of government, crime
and business helped them break meaty stories.
"Some
really are ready to retire -- it's a cyclical thing," Potter said.
"But others are being pushed out to save money."
Brian
Sheridan, a full-time lecturer in the Department of Communications
at Mercyhurst College who still works part-time as a reporter at WJET,
said each of Erie's TV stations have suffered from the loss of veteran
talent like Carol Pella, Hyle Richmond and Bill Knupp.
"Working
with them, you just learned every aspect of this business," said Sheridan,
42, who started his reporting career in the mid-1980s. "Now there's
not as many senior reporters for young reporters to learn the craft
from.
"You
spend so much time 'feeding the beast' -- that's the term we use for
filling a show -- that you often don't get the stories with context
and the history," Sheridan said. "The viewer loses out on understanding
all of it."
Veteran
WSEE reporter Scott Bremner, who was named news director in April,
agreed that veteran reporters like himself and WICU's Paul Wagner
are rare these days.
"But
I don't want to paint it like there's nothing but rookies on the air,"
Bremner said.
Bremner,
48, said younger reporters are often eager to learn. They also bring
other valuable skills to the table -- like a knowledge of emerging
technology and the Internet that older staffers often lack.
"I
can show them how beat reporting works, how to write a story more
tightly, but they can tell us something about YouTube or Twitter or
BlackBerrys," Bremner said. "That's important too."
Lilly
also cautioned against underestimating today's younger reporters.
"Some
(reporters) can do the work at 23 better than someone who's 53," Lilly
said.
Lisa
Weismann, 22, who started reporting at WICU in June, said she frequently
chats up veteran reporters and residents to learn more about Erie.
Weismann,
a recent Pennsylvania State University graduate, said she does not
consider Erie a short-term stop.
"Introducing
yourself to people, making yourself known, for me I think that's where
the good stories will come from," Weismann said. "I want to stay here
and let people know I'm trying to get their stories out."
By
Kevin Flowers@www.goerie.com
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