Julie Eisenman, who has spent the majority of her broadcast career in Erie, PA, has landed in Savannah, where she’s been named news director of WJCL-WTGS.

After spending three years leading the newsroom at Erie’s WICU-WSEE, Eisenman is replacing Michael Sullivan as news director of the New Vision-owned duopoly.

“Julie’s passion for local news and her willingness to guide our staff made her the obvious choice,” WJCL-WTGS president and general manger Scott McBride said in a press release, which mentioned that the stations conducted “an exhaustive search that included several candidates from across the country.”

A Pennsylvania native, Eisenman began her career as a weekend assignment editor at Pittsburgh’s WPXI before joining WICU as a beat reporter. At WICU, she worked her way up through the newsroom, becoming an anchor and then assistant news director before eventually being named ND.

“I’m absolutely thrilled,” Eisenman said of her new job. “I know it’s going to be a big challenge, but it’s one I’m greatly looking forward to. We have a great team of eager journalists. It will be a pleasure working with them.”

Learn why media companies should be interested in the Semantic Web with Michael Dunn (Hearst Interactive Media) at our Semantic Web Media Summit on September 14 in New York City. Other speakers include Evan Sandhaus (The New York Times), Mike Petit (OpenAmplify), and Alan Meckler (WebMediaBrands). Learn more.

Independent cable operators in Topeka sent a letter to Kansas governor Sam Brownback today, asking for his help in persuading the FCC to block or condition the pending sale of the market’s ABC affiliate, KTKA.

Cable operators are fearful that the sale of KTKA to PBC Broadcasting will lead to a partnership with New Vision Television — which currently owns two stations in Topeka — to form a virtual triopoly. New Vision Television and PBC Broadcasting have shared service agreements in two other markets — Youngstown, OH and Savannah, GA — which has led cable operators to believe that the two companies will strike a similar deal in Topeka.

The letter, signed by representatives of five cable companies in Topeka, asks Brownback — who sat on the Commerce Committee during his time as a US senator — to urge the FCC to block the sale of KTKA:

We know the FCC’s failure to act will lead to significant harm to our customers. On behalf of pay-TV viewers in Topeka, the FCC must be a cop against collusion and a bulwark against balckouts. We encourage you to take action immediately to either disapprove the Topeka Triopoly or approve it with meaningful consumer safeguards.

Read the full letter after the jump.

Read more

“Dick, we are surprised and impressed and… confused,” WNYW morning anchor Greg Kelly told Dick Brennan, the Fox O&O’s chief political correspondent and early morning anchor, on Tuesday.

Reporting live for “Good Day New York,” Brennan described how New Yorkers have been trying to stay cool during a recent heat wave. At the end of his report, Brennan decided to cool off himself and jumped into the path of an industrial sprinkler, drenching his clothes yet, remarkably, managing to keep his wireless mic working (video above).

“It must be really hot out there because this is so unlike Dick to do something like that,” said a shocked Rosanna Scotto. [h/t Mediaite]

What is it with reporters getting soaked during live shots lately?

Like many local stations, WSAZ — the NBC affiliate in Charleston, WV — has completed the switch to high definition across their news broadcasts.

“This represents the end of a multi-year, multi-million dollar project and the beginning of a new way for all television viewers in the Charleston-Huntington market to see their world,” vice president and general manager Don Ray said. “We’ll all be looking at the drama and excitement that happens every day in breathtaking color and clarity.”

Part of making the switch included new equipment upgrades for WSAZ. The station donated the old equipment — including field cameras, editors, video switchers, television audio consoles and studio cameras — to the communications department  West Virginia State University.

WSAZ is the first station in the Charleston market to make the switch. The station will show their local broadcasts, as well as nationally syndicated NBC programming, in HD.

Trying to beat the summer heat? Just get a little closer to the nearest wildfire.

Suzi Theodory was reporting on a Southern California wildfire for Time Warner Cable News when she got a little too close to the flames — and one of the firefighting helicopters dropped water on her live shot, drenching Theodory and her crew.

Theodory can be heard laughing hysterically as the camera pans away from her to show water rushing down the road where she’s standing. To her credit, she pushed a giggling producer out of the way and regained her composure.

“As you can see, the helicopter just dropped water on us,” she said. “That’s how close we are to the flames. Now, it’s not a funny thing. But we definitely did not expect for water to get dropped on us.”

The absence of a traditional beat reporting system in newsrooms is hurting local stations–at least that’s the assertion of a new piece from TVNewsCheck, which points out that just one in 10 local TV newsrooms currently operate with beat systems.

“Those formal beats under which TV newsrooms used to operate are fast disappearing at the majority of stations,” writes TVNewsCheck’s Diana Marszalek. “And the dismantling of the system may be taking broadcast journalism down with it.”

Over the past decade, stations around the country, faced with fewer resources and a changing media landscape, have changed the way their newsrooms are organized–focusing more on breaking news stories like severe weather and less on discovering a story through dedicated research and reporting Read more

In a move that appears to be part of a growing national trend, Baltimore’s WBFF is scaling back sports coverage during its late newscasts.

The Sinclair-owned Fox-affiliate is going to experiment with dropping its 15-minute “Sports Unlimited” segment and offer a shortened sports report instead, according to The Baltimore Sun.

“Our research indicates that local viewers watch local sports programming less than they did 15 or 20 years ago,” WBFF general manager Bill Fanshawe told the Sun‘s David Zurawik.

WBFF has regularly run “Sports Unlimited” at the end of its weeknight newscasts, from 10:45 to 11 p.m. Now the station will try offering a relatively short sports report within the body of its 10 p.m. newscast–similar to what many stations currently do.

While WBFF is far from cutting sports coverage altogether, the station’s current experiment is yet another sign of a national reevaluation of the value of local sports to a newscast. Read more

A year after having her second child, Michele McClintick has announced she will leave Buffalo’s WIVB at the end of this month to spend more time with her family.

“With the second one, it became almost impossible to balance everything,” she told Buffalo media reporter Alan Pergament.

McClintick, who has been at the CBS affiliate for nine years, has been working on the evening newscasts in order to spend the day with her 3-year-old daughter and her 15-month-old son. “The night hours were just a little too difficult for the two little ones, and worse on me and everyone else in the household,” she said.

McClintick’s last day will be July 27. She follows in the footsteps of WIVB colleague Lisa Flynn, who left the station last year to spend more time with her family. “I’ve talked to Lisa a lot in the past year,” McClintick said. “She’s kind of known I’ve been thinking about it. She told me, ‘you will not regret it in the least.’”

WCCB morning anchor Derek James is calling out Anderson Cooper for seemingly ripping off a regular segment that James did back in January (video above–begins around 1-minute mark).

Both James and Cooper share an apparent respect for the collected works of author Nicole Polizzi (aka Snooki). James expressed his admiration for Snooki at the beginning of this year in a series of segments that look a lot like one that Cooper did recently.

Meredith Local Media Group and WorldNow have completed the launch of ten redesigned local stations’ websites. All of the stations are owned by Meredith and published on a WorldNow platform.

The sites were launched in a span of three weeks beginning last month. The redesign gave each site improvements across multiple platforms, including video and mobile capabilities, advertising sales tools and production of original editorial content.

“The launch of the sites is our first step toward cementing Meredith’s leadership position among local media in their markets,” WorldNow senior vice president Melissa Hatter said. “We look forward to a number of advancements over the coming months that are focused on providing the best user experience on multiple platforms for continuous growth.”

The stations with relaunched websites are: WHNS, WGCL, WNEM, WSMV, WFSB, KPHO, WSHM, KVVU, KPTV and KCTV.