Kareem Johnson | A Reporter's Notes

ST. LOUIS — Get ready for more newscasts coming to KMOV in July. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Deb Peterson posted on May 30 that the CBS Affiliate will add newscasts from 7am to 8am and 10:30-11:00am on Sundays. The newscast will be named “Awake Sunday.”

The station already airs 1 hour of news on Saturday and Sunday at 10pm.

John Knicely and Dianna Zoga will anchor with Kristen Cornett providing weather.

My Take:

More newscasts are good; although the news content hasn’t increased with the additions of newscasts at KSDK, KMOV, KPLR, or KDNL the past few years. We’ve seen largely the same content recycled throughout the day, with a few new readers and a developing story.

With newscast additions, traditionally new talent is brought in, but also in recent years, existing talent is given second or even third duties on top of their existing jobs; while great for the bottom line, it’s not great for an industry in need of new talent coming out of schools, but that’s a separate argument. The real problem is can existing talent and staff be expected to do quality work while they are being overworked? Only time can tell.

Chicago–Lewis Lazarre of the Chicago Sun Times is reporting that meteorologist Megan Glaros, who was most recently seen on New York’s WCBS is coming to Chicago to join fellow WCBS alums Steve Bartelstein and Kate Sullivan.

This comes as WBBM shuffles it anchoring lineup and replaces the low-rated “Monsters and Money in the Morning,” CBS2′s attempt to strike a different chord in morning news programs. Lazarre says that Glaros was interested in making the move back to Chicago, where she graduated from Indiana University. She will most likely end up on new, and probably traditional CBS2 morning news progam.

WBBM has been making a lot of changes with the announcement of local news legends Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson returning to Chicago airwaves to anchor the 6pm news, with Kate Sullivan joining Rob Johnson for the 5 and 10 pm newscasts.

Read more here:

St. Louis–Mike Garrity, one of the assignment reporters at KSDK is leaving for the East Coast to New England to work for WMUR the powerhouse Hearst ABC affiliate in Manchester New Hampshire, reports the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Deb Peterson.

Peterson reports that “Garrity, who has been with KSDK-TV (Channel 5) since 2007, said he believes his last day here will be Sept. 11 and that he is scheduled to start work in New Hampshire on Sept. 20.” Garrity told Peterson that he wanted to live closer to his family.

Congrats to Mike.

Send your messages to his twitter account @MSGarrity

Chicago–Steve Bartelstein, who has seen his share of controversies at WABC and WCBS in New York is transitioning from the Big Apple to the city of broad shoulders, Chicago, reports Robert Feder. Feder reports Bartelstein was

“was once fired from WABC-TV for sleeping through a news update, and later quit WCBS-TV, saying he felt “tired of this place not appreciating me for what I do for them.”’

Bartelstein joins Kate Sullivan, also of WCBS.  The reason for so much talent from New York?  Dave Friend is the former News Director at WCBS, and current VP of news operations at WBBM.

Feder thinks that Bartelstein might be headed for “Monsters and Money in the Morning,” WBBM’s response to a traditional 5 to 7 am newscast.

Read more here.

Here are the May 2010 Sweep Results for St. Louis; Where available I’m  providing the numbers from May 2009 for comparison.  Status Quo for the most part, but  KDNL is doing better in overall ratings, KMOV is down everywhere, and KSDK retains the overall news lead, with KTVI nearly tying them in weekly averages.  We could be seeing KTVI become the overall leader in the market. The last time KTVI led in sweep ratings was when they were an ABC affiliate.  It proves that consistency works.  KMOV and KSDK need to take notice. Keep your news team consistent, focus on the fundamentals of journalism, and the viewers will watch.

KDNL has a unique opportunity to reintroduce it’s news image if it wants to.  ABC’s schedule is doing respectable in the ratings locally, and could provide a solid lead-in for a newscast.  It’s time for a news presence on KDNL. Onward to the numbers.

Daytime:

Evening/Prime/Late after the Bump:

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE May 11, 2010

ANCHOR / REPORTER KELLY JACKSON RETURNS TO NEWSCHANNEL 5

KSDK, NewsChannel 5 announced today that Kelly Jackson will return to the station this coming Saturday as a weekend anchor and reporter. Jackson left NewsChannel 5 three years ago to take a job at Gannett sister station KXTV, the ABC affiliate in Sacramento. For the past three years she was co-anchor on KXTV’s weekday morning newscasts. Jackson’s career with NewsChannel 5 began back in 1998 as a co-anchor with meteorologist Scott Connell on Today in St. Louis at 5 a.m. Additionally, she was a host and reporter for Show Me St. Louis as well as an anchor on NewsChannel 5 at 5:00 p.m. prior to her leaving for California.
“We’re very pleased to welcome Kelly back to NewsChannel 5,” said Lynn Beall, President and General Manager of KSDK. “Of course she’s never really left our family, working for the past few years at our station in Sacramento. We are excited that she’s returning to St. Louis and bringing with her the energy and enthusiasm NewsChannel 5 viewers remember. Kelly has a long list of accomplishments, experience and skills as a journalist, but the thing I’ve always enjoyed about Kelly is her service to our St. Louis community.”

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Jasmine Huda

St. Louis–KSDK alum Jasmine Huda will back on the airwaves at KMOV-TV, the CBS affiliate in St. Louis. Huda left KSDK at the end of her contract back in January after an agreement could not be reached.  Huda will offiically join the News4 St. Louis team in a couple of weeks, but will not be on the air until August 1, when her no-compete ends. Until then, she’ll be off-air as a producer.

From the Post Dispatch’s Deb Peterson:

Channel 4 insiders say Huda, 31, will become a reporter, probably in the 10 p.m. time slot, and will also be a fill-in anchor.Allan Cohen, general manager of KMOV, said he was pleased the station was able to negotiate a deal with Huda. He noted that she is not replacing anyone at the station and is an addition to the staff.

“We’re absolutely delighted that she’s decided to join our station,” Cohen said. “But she really made me feel old when I found out that she had been in the same high school class (Ladue High) as my daughter, Stacie.”

My take: KSDK keeps allowing good talent to leave; Huda will be an immense asset to KMOV. She proved repeatedly while at KSDK she’s a solid reporter.  Glad she stayed in town, and she’ll round out the reporting and anchor team at KMOV nicely.

November 2009 Sweep Ratings for the sweep days from October 29 to November 25, 2009. Commentary follows the prime time numbers.

Daytime:

Evening/Late after the Bump:

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The Live newscast from before Thanksgiving Break. We’re taking a break, and will be back in January.  The first block didn’t get captured, but It went out live over Channel 22.

Via Gail Pennnington @ stltoday:

Ratings from the recently ended November sweeps show KMOV (Channel 4) in first place at 10 p.m. by 2.3 ratings points and 4 share points over KSDK (Channel 5). KMOV also won last November’s sweeps, but by a smaller margin.

This year, KSDK was dragged down by Jay Leno at 9 p.m. Leno averaged a 4.6 rating and 7 percent audience share during the month. From that meager lead-in, KSDK still managed an 8.3 rating and 15 share. Last November, NBC’s 9 p.m. shows gave KSDK an 11 rating and 16 share as a lead-in to the 10 p.m. news.

KMOV, with an average 11.4 rating and 18 share as a lead-in from CBS, finished the month with a 10.6 rating and 19 share.

(”Rating” represents 1 percent of the St. Louis population, or just over 12,000. “Share” refers to the percentage of television sets in use that are tuned to a particular program.)

Sign-on to sign-off, KTVI (Channel 2) is the No. 1 station with both adults 18-49 and adults 25-54.

No numbers for KPLR; I’ll dig that up, and post a nice chart (if possible).