Asking tough questions is part of the job

Reporter Amy Hawley caught up with KU AD Lew Perkins today and asked a very pertinent question about his job security.  Mr. Perkins didn't appreciate the interuption of his golf game, apparently: 
Lew Perkins gets upset in interview after questioned about recent KU scandal - NBCActionNews.com

Incredibly, a reporter from WDAF, Al Wallace, was also there, recorded the whole thing and presented it as a "confrontation."  We were all amused when during the 6pm news, anchor Phil Witt appeared to congratulate our reporter for her tenacity.

Amy did her job.  Can't say the same thing for Al.

Katie, Bar the Door!

I love this video.  I love the Rizzo kid.  I love the speech.  When the youngster talks about the Russian hockey team, I mentally replace that country with the call letters of my opponents--KMBC, WDAF and KCTV.

The February book has only a few more days left.  We put our focus on the evening newscasts and I'm pleased with how it's played out, so far.  I'll miss Vancouver but I think that in almost every instance, our news team put its best effort out there and it will be interesting to see how our local news ratings play out when programming goes back to normal.

The Olympics are over and soon we'll find out what is real and what is a halo from the winter games. 

No matter what happens, we can never, ever give up.

KMBC, WDAF, KCTV Roeder "Coverage?"

From: Phillip, Peggy
Sent: Fri Jan 29 19:37:18 2010
Subject: Great job!
I just want to take a moment to commend the hard-working Wichita crew of Tim, Dale, Lindsay and Matt.
Covering news far from the home base is never easy. Whatever can go wrong, will. Stuff breaks. Things change. Or they don't.
Here's one thing that's a given: The brainiac managers back at the station (well, me) always have crazy ideas for just how much can and should be done (I did and I was wrong).
Our team got up early every day, gave up a big chunk of their weekends and worked very long hours ... (Live every weekday at 6am and every night at 6pm with more sprinkled in between).
They tweeted, they posted, they edited, they fed. They never missed a live hit, they were up and in front of the camera in time with mic checks and roll cues submitted.
Our Wichita coverage was simply stellar from start to finish. I can't think of a thing I'd change.

That's a piece of a memo I sent to our team Friday evening.
 
There were only two local news departments that chose to cover the Scott Roeder trial completely.  The one at the newspaper and KSHB.  The other stations generally took a live feed from the courtroom and relied on others to do the work.
 
And now that the verdict is two days old, I'm still trying to figure out why our competitors didn't cover it gavel-to-gavel with a crew in Wichita.

Was it because the crime happened three-and-a-half hours away?  A perception that Scott Roeder wasn't really a local?  Abortion isn't a hot topic anymore?  There was too much going on here in KC?  Preparing for the February sweeps?  Too costly?

My guess is a combination of the last two. 

I think we made the right decision.  Yes, we spent some money on hotel rooms, satellite time and overtime. 

The story is too big to ignore or do a half-assed job of coverage.

Just sayin' is all...