Station brings former journalists back to the newsroom
Experience matters
A Des Moines television station has embarked on an interesting program to fill some of its on-air positions. WHO-TV has brought back a group of veteran journalists and meteorologists who have been absent from central Iowa airwaves.
In recent months, WHO has hired former WOI-TV main anchor Lisa Carponelli, former WHO anchor Courtney Maxwell Greene, former WOI-TV chief political correspondent Amanda Krenz, former WHO and KCCI meteorologist Jason Parkin and former WOI and KCCI meteorologist Metinka Slater.
The different aspect of this hiring spree is that all these TV veterans have joined WHO on a part-time basis. Many of them have full-time jobs outside the business and are dipping their toes back into the newsroom on an occasional basis.
Lisa Carponelli is a multimedia communications professor at Simpson College in Indianola. Courtney Maxwell Greene works in community engagement at Unity Point. Amanda Krenz’s LinkedIn profile says she’s a mortgage sales coordinator at a credit union.
The station’s strategy is an outgrowth of the great resignation. Finding and keeping good employees is difficult in many businesses, especially in journalism these days. The pay is not great. The hours are terrible. News consumers are quick to attack journalists for doing their jobs.
People from Iowa…
Station General Manager Bobby Totsch says central Iowa is a unique place. “People from Iowa love people from Iowa. It’s as simple as that.” So instead of spending money bringing in younger journalists from outside the market, he’s hiring well-known names to fill on-air openings. Those pros bring with them a wealth of experience. They know the history of the market. They have contacts. They have roots down in the community and can find out what’s going on.
It's a concept I’ve not seen elsewhere in the country. So far, Totsch says it’s working. “If they’re able to bring content that matters, that has an association from people that they know, how can anyone lose, especially the audience?”
Lisa Carponelli, who spent seven years as main anchor at WOI-TV, had been off the air in Des Moines since May of 2008. Fifteen years later, she’s signed up to anchor Saturday evening newscasts on WHO. I watched a recent Saturday newscast and was delighted to see an experienced, calm, mature professional anchoring a newscast that in some stations is left to newbies.
Totsch says viewer feedback about Carponelli has been positive. “You wouldn’t believe the comments. Positive. My goodness, what a professional. What an unbelievable anchor. I mean, they trust her.” Totsch says the station benefits “but the biggest thing is the viewers, the people that we serve, are getting these professionals.”
Carponelli says anchoring Saturday nights fits her schedule and feels completely different than when she moved to Des Moines 20 years ago. “I think it’s a combination of my age, the time I’ve spent living and engaged in the community, and the fact that I raised my kids in Des Moines. I feel an even greater connection to the people and the stories here.”
The current newsroom experience will help her be a more relevant teacher for journalism students at Simpson College. “Part of my responsibility as a faculty member is to stay current and engaged with my discipline.” The new hands-on experience will be valuable, but the basics remain the same, she says. “There’s so much more technology that helps journalists do their jobs than when I first started, but it still comes down to a genuine curiosity and a commitment to finding impactful stories to tell.”
Conflicts of interest?
Carponelli and Totsch are both aware of potential conflicts of interest should a story about Simpson make the news. The school signed off on her anchoring gig and she has agreed not to do any reporting about her full-time employer. Station GM Totsch says the same thing goes for the other part-time journalists. “They can’t report or do anything that touches their current full-time position,” he says.
Totsch says the concept has not been a hard sell with WHO’s corporate owner, Nexstar Media Group. In fact, the owners are watching to see if it’s a program that might work in any of Nexstar’s other 115 markets where it owns stations. “It’s a business model that I’ve kind of made work,” he says. “And it’s a business model that we love. We will continue to do it and may do some more of it.”
I spent 30 years hiring TV news staffers and I really like WHO’s concept. Experience matters. Experience in the community really matters. Not only do veteran staff members find out about stories before the competition, but viewers trust anchors and reporters who’ve been around a while and know their way around a story.
Hiring folks with a little gray hair may defy the trend toward younger demographics that advertisers crave, but this is an idea that I think could benefit other stations around the country that are trying to connect with their viewers.
A follow-up to last week’s column about the Iowa House refusing to give liberal journalist Laura Belin a credential to cover the House. Five days after Belin filed a federal lawsuit claiming a violation of her First Amendment rights, the chief clerk of the House this week issued a press pass to Belin. Congratulations to Belin. This will allow her to tell more complete stories. I’m glad Republicans running the House finally came to their senses, five years after Belin began asking for a credential. It shouldn’t have taken that long to do the right thing.
The Belin case is indicative of one of the problems with one party controlling all levers of state government - the tendency to think they can get away with anything they want, regardless of what the majority of Iowans want and regardless of the law. The list of Iowans who are forced to file lawsuits to protect their rights grows longer every day. From teachers and authors battling book bans, to women fighting for reproductive rights, to parents protecting their LGBTQ kids, to journalists demanding their First Amendment rights.
Republicans in the Iowa legislature would be better served listening to the minority party and addressing their concerns rather than ignoring Democrats’ input and voting down their proposed amendments. It might result in fairer, more reasonable laws and it might mean less money spent defending unreasonable bills in court.
Dave, a nice warm fuzzy feel good column! Thanks- I was needing one on this gray day. Also great news on Belin press pass. Disgusting that it takes a lawsuit (and a good column by you) to get the right thing to happen......
Lucky us to have such an expert veteran as Dave, always on point, to the point, and well written. As to the Republican trifecta, someone should make a list of all of the terrible things they've done to Iowans, all because they can. The list would be a long one. Time to wake up, Iowa, they've taken our State backwards, and cost taxpayers money in the process. Arrogant willful ignorance. Just one example is the harms they've caused to nursing home residents by failing in oversight. And, they've even refused to consider changes through bipartisan discussions in Oversight Committee hearings. Shameful!