Jones exits KDKA
Pittsburgh:Keith Jones, co-anchor of the KDKA-TV (2) morning news, will be leaving the station April 3. He has accepted a new job at WTSP-TV in Tampa, Florida. Jones tells the Post-Gazette, "My family and I adore Pittsburgh and are sad to leave, but the economic environment we're in indicated it was time to move on. I'm incredibly blessed to have had a couple of job offers."
Jones has been at KDKA since 2005, but previously worked at WPXI as a weekend anchor and reporter. In between he spent two years at WOWK-TV in Charleston, West Virginia.
Readers’ Forum
For information purposes only: Is he the same Keith Jones who used to serve as news anchor on the old WDSY morning show in the 1980s?
Rick - March 26, 2009 at 2:19 pm
Speaking of leavings… anyone catch Ashley DeParlo’s exit this morning? Apparently today was her last day – she’s getting married and moving out of the area, if I gathered the info correctly this morning. Any “official” word on that, or did I miss a post previously (if I did, I apologize)?
Rick (a different one) - March 27, 2009 at 09:20 am
Good luck to Keith and his family. I think he is a bit young to have been the same Keith who did the radio news in the 80’s. Not sure, though.
The local cupboard keeps getting barer and barer.
Channel Four has gone with two ladies at the anchor desk from time to time (Wendy and Kelley in the am), why does’t KDKA try this by putting, say, Stephanie Watson or Allison Morris alongside Sunni? They might be able to offset Bowman’s blandness, as well as whatever it is Lokay allegedly brings to the broadcast.
I read in the paper that Stacy Smith is getting the “Bill Burns Award”. Can anyone tell me what the award is for? Longevity? It can’t be for superior news reading. I’m sure he’s a great guy, but let’s face it, he can’t go through a story without stumbling over the words.
PWN - March 27, 2009 at 1:20 pm
PWN —
Point of reference. KD had Kelli Olexia and Sonni Abatta together in early 2005.
Jim Lokay - March 31, 2009 at 11:50 am
If you put Allison and Sonni together, you’ll have a Carnegie Mellon grad with a Yale graduate. That’s pretty impressive. Maybe Allison prefers to be on the move reporting.
In his “Musings” of 4/3, Eric mentioned the notion of the newscasts being cut back. I’m 43, and barely remember a time without at least the 5pm news. I think Channel 11 was the first with this; some combination of Hank Baughman, Roxanne Stein, Jim Scott, and Jane Crawford, I believe. With The internet, is it possible that TV news could fall by the wayside like some of the newspapers? When watching any of the newscasts, the anchors are often telling us to go to their website for more info anyway. Why not just go there to begin with, and forget the news. Channel 2 is great for talking about an upcoming story, and you actually see it at 6:40pm or so. When they first mention that story at around 4:10, I can just go online and see it without having to sit through 12 weather forecasts and a “Does it really do that?” segment.
WPXI, WTAE, or KDKA: Be the first station on your block to have news at 6a, noon, 6p, and 11p only. One hour at 6a and 6p; 1/2 hour for the other two. I don’t require three hours of news in the morning, watching the same weather and traffic “updates” umpteen times.
The only question then would be what to put on the schedule in place of the news? Dr. Phil? 30 year old episodes of All In the Family or Laverne and Shirley? Another two hours of The Today Show?
PWN - April 03, 2009 at 1:08 pm