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Cleveland TV Revolving Door

skiwest said:
WJW has lost several weather people recently - Beth, Melissa, AJ and I think someone else. Maybe Andre will be next.
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Andre is now in the Goddard position - does the 5 and 6p news, is the resident "Yoda" of the weather department, and will go when he wants to go.

People like Beth, Melissa, and AJ come and go all the time. Andre's been there since 1988 (34 years)...if/when he goes, THAT will get people's attention.

WJW has an established formula of letting their longtime soldiers ease their way out the door when they're about ready to hang 'em up (Tim Taylor, Wilma Smith, Dick Goddard, Bill Martin)

It may be looking like they're doing that with Bernier by giving the 10p slot to Dontae Jones, making him the evening workhorse (4, 7, 10p) with Andre at 5 and 6p.

Don't know anything, just observing and keeping in mind past history.
 
I guess Andre is a nice guy. I just have a hard time watching/listening to him do the weather. He is too verbose.

As for AJ, he had been at Fox 8 for quite a while. Not sure I would put him in the same category as Beth and Melissa. There must be more to the story.
 
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skiwest said:
I guess Andre is a nice guy. I just have a hard time watching/listening to him do the weather. He is too verbose.

As for AJ, he had been at Fox 8 for quite a while. Not sure I would put him in the same category as Beth and Melissa. There must be more to the story.
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AJ has kind of bounced around - he also had stints at 3 and 5, so he wasn't a TV 8 lifer.

AJ was doing the 10p news when he was cut. Could be he wanted more shifts and couldn't get them, or that he wasn't given the big chair.

You look at all the stations, and the big weather chairs are pretty well ensconced.

*Betsy Kling has been at WKYC since 2000, and in the big chair since 2007 (15th anniversary)
*Mark Johnson has been at WEWS since 1993, and in the big chair since 2002 (20th anniversary)
*Jason Nicholas has had the big chair at WOIO/WUAB since 2016, after being a Swiss Army knife at WEWS for over a decade (and before that Jeff Tanchak had the big chair from 2003-2016 during the "19 Action News" era).
*Andre Bernier has been at WJW since 1988, was the evening workhorse from 2007-2016, got the big chair in 2016, and in the past year or so has eased off from doing the 10p news.
 
Betsy has actually been at WKYC since 2003. She was there when Mark Nolan was the chief. After Nolan moved to the morning news as an anchor, Betsy took over his weeknight gig.
 
vjm said:
WUAB used to have news from 7-8a during the bulk of its "My 43/CLE 43" era. That news hour was briefly jettisoned to 43.2 in summer 2018 when the main channel picked up the CW and had to do some shuffling to accommodate it, and was then just quietly abandoned shortly thereafter.

Fox 8 News in the Morning ain't gonna change - why fix what ain't broke?

This town stays loyal to radio/TV institutions, so any other morning newscast is fighting for 2nd, as nothing's knocked F8NitM off it's perch for over 20 years, and it's not gonna start now.
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It's nice to have another option for local news in the morning after 7am. Not everyone wants to wake up with WJW.
 
MediaLover said:
Betsy has actually been at WKYC since 2003. She was there when Mark Nolan was the chief. After Nolan moved to the morning news as an anchor, Betsy took over his weeknight gig.
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Doh! - I thought I said '03, as that is correct, but I had a case of fat fingers on the "0"...my bad.

But in '07 was when Nolan went to mornings and Betsy took over the big weather chair.
 
A couple of new editions to WOIO CBS 19 and WUAB CW 43 as they expand their morning show

Katie Wilson - an NEO native brought in from sister station WSAZ NBC 3 in Huntington/Charleston WV - is now the 11a anchor on WUAB, with Jamie Sullivan focusing now more on the expanded morning show (traffic early, anchoring after rush hour). She'll also be a reporter for WOIO's afternoon newscasts.

Erika Paige - brought in from KSNW NBC 3 in Wichita - is the new weekend evening weather lady, as Kelly Dobeck is now part of the expanded morning show (basically as a Swiss Army knife - a little weather with Jeff Tanchak, helping out with traffic reports, and some anchoring at 8a with Jamie Sullivan)
 
WJW Fox 8 added yet another meteorologist, this time being Mackenzie Bart.

She's coming in from WBNS CBS 10 in Columbus.

Interesting resume:

*Graduate of THE Ohio State University
*2014 Miss Ohio
*Winner of the reality show "America's Next Weatherman" in 2015.

She's not the first Miss Ohio winner to work for WJW.

1979 winner Tana Carli was the evening news co-anchor with Tim Taylor in the early 80s.

And for what it's worth, in the talent competition of the 2015 Miss America pageant, Bart showed her ventriloquism skills, singing the Mary Poppins tune "Supercalafragolistic-Expialadocious"

Here it is in living color
 
She's a native of Bellevue (smack dab in the middle of Vacationland), so she's local-ish.

She was with CNN/HLN for nearly 20 years (2003-2022) and said she wanted to basically move back home, so she quit the national rat race.

She'll be doing the 5p news with Jay Crawford, who ironically had a similar path to channel 3 - Vacationland native (Sandusky), who spent many years at a big national network (ESPN) and found his way back (for all intents and purposes) home.
 


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