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Covering The Murder
Of A President
Shocked reporters dealt with their own grief, mass confusion, and the silence of official sources to inform the nation that John F. Kennedy had been shot to death in Dallas.

Help people survive in hard times
Viewers were urged to help tackle hunger in a campaign created by WFMJ-TV, Youngstown. The details were explained by News Director Mona Alexander and General Manager John Grdic.

Warning System Calls People In Path of Hurricanes, Tornados
Television stations in Tornado Alley have found success with an automated weather alert system that notifies people by telephone or e-mail. WeatherCall is a pre-recorded weather warning for flash floods, severe thunderstorms, tornado and hurricane warnings. It's worked well for Randy Dixon, News Director of KATV-TV, Little Rock and Carlton Houston, News Director of KTUL-TV, Tulsa.

Use topical investigations to increase sampling
Veteran consultant Tom Dolan advises taking key stories that viewers already know something about and then developing more information, better angling and more enterprise on those stories.

Newscast expanded
at 10 p.m.
KOAT-TV, Albuquerque, expanded the 10 p.m. weekday newscasts to an hour, and quickly saw audience growth. The plan was explained by Mary Lynn Roper, President and General Manager.

Officers raiding meth labs: Many are ill from exposure
Former Utah narcotics officers, who put their lives on the line when they raided illegal meth labs a decade or two earlier, have died or are battling unusual illnesses.
The chemicals used to make the meth are deadly.
The story was investigated by the team at KSL-TV, Salt Lake City. Reporter Debbie Dujanovic found 58 police officers who had investigated meth labs in the previous two decades.
News Director Con Psarras explained how they put the project together, and told us, "We only found a few officers who didn't have a serious health problem. When compared to the average rates of illness and cancer among that age group, the statistics were indicative of a pretty big problem."
Of the 58 officers, 40 were sick or dead.

High on meth, speeding, killing --- and still driving
A log truck driver kept on rolling, in spite of overloading his truck and causing a fatal accident. The driver was off the road for only about one week after the accident. KING-TV's Chris Ingalls found there was no penalty, no suspension of his license, nothing ---he just went right back to driving. There should have been three strikes against him. He was speeding. His truck was overloaded. He tested positive for meth.

Changing the culture: A 24-Hour web channel
Web sales more than doubled in one year at WIBW-TV, Topeka. General Manager Jim Ogle shared with us the strategy that is working for his team.

Web Video Journalist Hired
A photographer has become talent and is producing stories for the Web site of WPRI-TV, Providence. He shoots, writes, and narrates the pieces. News Director Joe Abouzeid and his team explain how it works.

When Help Doesn't Arrive In Time  
Have a serious heart attack on the streets of Cleveland and the chances of being successfully recuscitate are slim.  WJW-TV's Tom Merriman broke this.   Meanwhile, they don't have enough ambulances in Cincinnati.  WCPO-TV's Hagit Limor reported that story.

Financial Fitness
Boot Camp   
A major project combining financial information and advice aired on WCNC-TV, Charlotte.   News Director Mary Alvarez and reporter Anna Crowley explained how it was executed.

Broken School Buses
Kept Rolling
Safety violations in the Indianapolis school bus fleet were so severe that the state police began an immediate investigation after they were contacted by WTHR-TV. News Director Carolyn Williams and investigative reporter Bob Segall explained how they executed their project.

Rare Interviews, SWAT Team Tapes Give Depth to School Shooting Anniversary Special
A deranged, armed drifter entered a Colorado high school. He took seven students hostage. A special on the hostage drama was produced by KMGH-TV, Denver.
It featured interviews with people who had never talked about it publicly.
"If we were going to do something, we wanted to do something significant and impactful, and that meant we needed to get a lot of players involved," said News Director Byron Grandy.

Columbine: Viewer Sensitivities Were Key
The live images were monitored carefully when two young men killed 12 other students, a teacher and themselves at Columbine.
Patti Dennis, KUSA-TV's News Director, told us, "We had pictures coming in from hospitals that I told them absolutely, positively, I did not want to see on our air. I forbid it!"

Pick debate winners instantaneously
If you can learn something about which candidate viewers feel did the best in a debate you will be offering information beyond a simple summarization of their carefully rehearsed statements.  An innovative project was explained by Jim Boyer, News Director of KOMO-TV, Seattle.

Strengthen your politics online: Website gives stations depth
Your station's website can be an effective vehicle for providing extensive political information that can be accessed by viewers/users when they have an interest in the campaigns. The NextGenPolitics website was developed initially by Hertz Research.

Child molesters walk free on probation
One-third of those who sexually abused a child won probation and were released to roam the community in Houston. An analysis of court records found the lenient treatment these predators were receiving. KHOU-TV, Houston.

Some violent criminals
get a break because of loopholes
Because of plea bargains and bureaucratic mistakes, sex offenders are not being classified in the most serious categories and notification is not required --- even for some of the most dangerous offenders. And in Maryland, judges have the power to modify an offender's sentence at any time. WEWS-TV, Cleveland. WBFF-TV, Baltimore.

Protecting Crews and Gear From Unruly Crowds 
Jubilant fans of the Los Angeles Lakers set fire to two police cars and damaged news vans during an unruly celebration after the team's championship victory.   It didn't particularly appear there was going to be vandalism and violence.  But it grew.
At one point, a photographer told his reporter, "Run for your life!"

Devil's Night Arson: What Do You Report When You Are Anticipating Trouble?
Detroit had been plagued with extensive fires in previous years.  Now the year has passed.  It is time for the troubles again. You can't ignore it, but you don't want to stimulate anything with your early news coverage.

TV, Papers Lose Fight For Prison Interviews
The California legislature voted to overturn a Corrections Department policy virtually banning inmate interviews with reporters. However, the governor vetoed the proposed access, claiming it allowed criminals to become celebrities.   Access advocates said it would allow the public to learn more about prison conditions.

Covering Hurricane Ike:
On Air, Online, On PDAs, On Cells

Here's how station executives and staffs used their on air and online resources to help people prepare for and recover from a powerful storm, Ike.

Maximizing all platforms

		The Houston television stations became information powerhouses as Hurricane Ike neared, delivering news and information on all platforms.
		"Hurricanes occur every summer, and we have a sophisticated hurricane plan that is constantly revised and improved," says Susan McEldoon, President and General Manager of KHOU-TV. Fully integrating the web into the hurricane plan was an important update to reflect the company's news philosophy.

The Houston television stations became information powerhouses as Hurricane Ike neared, delivering news and information on all platforms.

"Hurricanes occur every summer, and we have a sophisticated hurricane plan that is constantly revised and improved," says Susan McEldoon, President and General Manager of KHOU-TV.
Fully integrating the web into the hurricane plan was an important update to reflect the company's news philosophy.

The web was vital to keeping people informed. It was heavily used by local residents, as well as people around the world.
"The web might have been as important as the on air product, and at times it probably reached more people, because 90 percent of the city didn't have power," says McEldoon.

The mobile platform went from relatively little usage to nearly one-half million page views. People who didn't have power used their cells and PDAs to access the Internet.

KHOU.com   Web Statistics
Monday (No Danger)		Saturday (Ike Nears)
Page Views
1,008,739		9,229,229
Unique Visitors
111,758		451,686
Average Time On Site
15.06 min		26.35 min
Photo slideshow
50,254		3,499,143
Mobile
12,044		473,748

Viewers expect an "information utility"

"Our overall strategy is that any time there is a hurricane that is threatening our area we need to be a public utility," says Keith Connors, Executive News Director.
Just as you expect the lights to come on when you throw the power switch, viewers tune in looking for vital information right now.
"Our message to our staff is that we need to be there with consistent, constant, credible information that people can use to make informed decisions," he says.

The KHOU newsroom went into round the clock coverage mode on Thursday before the Sunday morning landfall, and stayed on until midnight Sunday evening.

Access to key emergency officials was a prime concern.  In choosing live locations, a major factor was having direct access to emergency information sources.

Connors was less concerned about finding a spot where they could stand in the surf, and was more interested in finding a spot where they could be in constant communication with emergency officials, so they could turn information quickly.

"Our strategy was to make sure we had 'a picket fence' set up along the Gulf Coast, so wherever the storm would hit, we would have the beaches covered," says Connors.
"At that point, our responsibility was to pass along the latest on the storm and the storm track, and what emergency officials were saying people needed to do to remain safe," he says.

Establish media partnerships and inform viewers in advance where they can find your coverage.
"A big part of that strategy was making sure people knew ahead of the storm where they would be able to receive our signal," he says.
"We put our information out on every possible platform, so people who were evacuating could still keep track of what was going on in their home town," says Connors.

KHOU struck deals with XM Radio and DirecTV, which was used by tens of thousands residents of Galveston and Houston who had evacuated to San Antonio, Austin, Dallas and other communities.

The station also teamed up with a radio group, so the signal was broadcast on radio, too.
"We were able to provide people with constant information throughout the storm. People listened on small hand-held radios. We heard from a number of people, who rode out the storm in their attic or their homes, and listened to our coverage on radio as the storm moved through," he says.
"That was a key part of our strategy which paid great dividends. We wanted to make sure that whatever a person's situation was --- whether they lost power, lost cable, had evacuated or were riding out the storm --- that we were there for them," he adds.

Everyone produces for the web

"Every day each of our reporters gets an on air assignment and an online assignment, with a deadline and an expectation of what they will be providing. It has become second nature for our newsroom," says Connors.

During Ike, the reporters reported live on camera and via cell phone, and blogged on their laptops about what was going on at their locations as the storm moved in.

A dedicated e-mail address was created to focus and simplify public input.
Ike@khou.com was very successful. Viewers e-mailed and shared their pictures using whatever communications mode that was still functioning --- their cell phones, PDAs, and computers with wireless service.

Non-news staffers processed the e-mail generated by ike@khou.com.
They received information and video, and answered questions. This reduced pressure on the desk and freed the busy web team members for their web duties.
"This is when our Sales Department and other department heads get involved, because everyone can answer an e-mail," says McEldoon.

The public contributed valuable information and video.
"We received hundreds of reports where people can get gas, which we have posted on the website and read on the air. The ability to make your coverage truly large, yet truly personal, through consumer-generated content was one of the big changes for us during this storm," says Connors.

Web continuously updated, no gaps

The web was covered 24 hours a day with overlapping 12-hour shifts. A total of nine dedicated web producers kept khou.com going:

5 producers - Hurricane Ike editorial content. 1 producer - School and business closings, slideshows, high school football cancellations. 1 producer - Live video stream and video segments. 1 producer - Updating the lead. Additional stories. Volunteers from Sales Department - responded to e-mails.

During the height of the storm, web producers slept at the station between shifts.

Web site layout was kept fresh

"We redesigned the format of the home page several times to draw attention to important information," explains Christine DiStadio, the Director of Digital Media.
"We made sure the most important links were in the hotspot of the page, which is the center middle column. We created blogs, forums, video sections, neighborhood reports, satellite images and lots of photo slideshow galleries," she says.

Community forums were organized county by county.
Users could report damage from their area or check in to see reports from other residents.
"It was a way for people to connect with neighbors or friends," DiStadio explains.
"These community forums were one of the biggest hits on our site. On one day the community forums alone had over one million page views," she says.

More than 10,000 people sent e-mails to ike@khou.com over the weekend.
"A huge part of our web coverage consisted of photos and videos sent in by web users," says DiStadio.

Even though 90 percent of the area was without power, much of the Internet usage was by people who had remained in the area.
"We did a city-by-city report, and 60 percent of the web traffic was still coming from the city of Houston. A lot of it was on PDAs and wireless," she explains.
Having a place viewers could send questions also helped take pressure off the assignment desk.
"Because of the web, people had another way to get in touch with us, and it helped cut the phone calls to the newsroom by as much as 50 percent," DiStadio adds.
People were somewhat surprised and very grateful to receive personal and timely responses to their e-mails, instead of getting an automated response, she adds.

Video was a big draw

The most heavily viewed items online included:

--- Live video stream.
--- The storm tracker.
--- Evacuation maps/information.
--- Photo slideshows.
"Before the hurricane, the slideshows were a popular part of our website, but now even more so. We had days where we had over 3 million page views just to the slide-shows by people who wanted to see video of the storm. On our peak day, we had 9 million page views to the site!" says McEldoon.

A Google breaking news keyword search campaign was purchased.
"We had about 100 keywords related to the storm, such as "hurricane," "Ike," "Ike coverage," "Galveston," and "KHOU." When someone went to the Google window for a keyword search, we wanted to make sure we came up first," DiStadio explains.

WeatherCall was recently launched by the station, which also helped support their efforts online and reinforced their weather brand. DeStadio says more than 5,000 people signed up for it over the weekend alone!
"The WeatherCall people had to staff their customer service bank with eight additional people just to handle our station," she adds.

Internet extended stations' reach,
increased their impact

The websites were lifelines helping millions of worried residents with the information they could use to survive.

At KPRC-TV, Click2Houston.com is an Internet Broadcasting site. They live streamed the station's continuous coverage and offered the specifics of emergency services.

"The main thing we wanted to do was to provide as much information as possible," says Lyn Stewart, Managing Editor of Click2Houston.com.
She says the web has developed to the point where station management now considers the website "as important as any show on their air."
"It's not an afterthought anymore. In this storm, they were even more committed. At some points, the web was reaching more people than the TV station," she adds.

The web site performed the dual role of providing the latest emergency updates and being a resource of recovery information.
"Normally, you are concentrating on news stories. But when you have a catastrophe of this magnitude, you switch to becoming an information source and focus on giving out the most important information at each point in time," says Stewart.
Closings, sources of gas, power outage updates, and emergency resources could be accessed in great detail.
"Many people went to the web. They knew that when the storm hit, if they had a laptop and a cellular card, they could watch it online when they did not have power. Then they could go charge it in their car, which is what many people did," she says.

There were many people outside of Houston who needed information.
"When people started evacuating, our live stream became more popular than ever," she says.

An Ohio mother watched intently

People got information however they could. Some of their adjustments were unique.

One woman e-mailed to say thank you after the hurricane. She was in Ohio. Her daughter was riding out the storm in Houston.
"Her daughter did not have power, and did not have phone service. But she could still text on her cell phone," says Stewart.
The mother sitting in Ohio accessed Click2Houston.com. She then texted her isolated, worried daughter, telling her what was going on in Houston and what to expect.
"The storm lasted for about 12 hours, and it just pounded the area. People thought their homes were going to collapse, because the winds were so strong. After this woman got her daughter through the storm, the woman texted her that 90 percent of the city was without power. The young woman thought she was in the hardest hit area. But in reality, she was not," says Stewart.

The mother was also able to tell her where she could get food and gas.
"The mom said she had never been so thankful to be able to help her daughter. She was in Ohio and felt useless," says Stewart.
It was a testament to the power of the web.

Hurricane!
The news executives and staffers who were there explained how they served their viewers, and survived.

Terrorism Threat: Manhole Covers Left Unlocked
Underground cables carrying electricity and computer data --- the lifelines for America's cities --- are exposed. WABC-TV's Jim Hoffer discovered that Con Ed has not locked its manhole covers --- despite Homeland Security recommendations.

Attack On America
At first it appeared to be a terrible aviation accident at the World Trade Center.  It turned out to be much more.  Here is how it was covered by the news teams on the scene.

Security gaps are many
Long before, and then after, the terrorist attacks of September, 2001, several television stations conducted investigations into lax security at airports and other major public facilities. Most of these reports were prepared after the 2001 attacks. In some cases, the broadcasters were credited with helping to make positive changes.

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The Rundown has reported weekly on local television news, programming, and community service projects since 1981. This material now fills a massive hard copy archive of 7,000 pages --- easily the largest record of hometown television's activities.  Key articles are available in our online archives.

A Young Kennedy Dies
When John Kennedy, Jr. and his wife vanished off Massachusetts, hometown TV stations provided long hours of coverage, serving viewers anxious for any news of the president's son.

The Crash of Flight 191:
Tragedy at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport
The news crews had close access to the scene.  They were searching for accurate information, but had to be very careful about what they showed.

Winter Weather Hampers Rescue at Denver Crash
A Continental jet flipped and broke apart on a snowy runway at Stapleton Airport. The blizzard-like conditions which may have contributed to the accident made coverage particularly difficult.

Media In Montoursville: 
Trying To Be Very Sensitive  
When TWA Flight 800 exploded in 1996, more than 20 victims were from one small town in Pennsylvania.  Newspeople tried to be sensitive to the grieving relatives, friends and townspeople.  At the same time, the reporters and photographers were dealing with their own feelings of sadness and shock.

The White Bronco Chase
Accused of murder, O.J. Simpson travelled  along the highways of Los Angeles, and one of the largest television audiences ever watched it live.

Murders at School:
San Diego Shootings
Accurate information was difficult to obtain.  Students were interviewed with care.  

Oklahoma City Explosion: Covering the Terror
That this could happen in America's heartland was unthinkable.  Even more astounding was the news that Americans had unleashed this violence on fellow Americans, murdering more than 150 innocent men, women and children.

Two reporters, four stories, one big award
The judges awarded a Peabody to the investigative unit of WFAA-TV, Dallas, for the overall quality of its work. The station won for four separate stories submitted by investigative reporters Brett Shipp and Byron Harris.
The Peabodys do not recognize categories, nor are there a set number of awards given each year. Although the entries were submitted separately, Executive News Director Michael Valentine said it was the caliber of the work by the unit as a whole that made it a winner.

Students drinking contaminated water
Youngsters are being exposed to lead every day in Los Angeles. The surprising source --- the drinking fountains at their schools -- - was revealed by KNBC-TV's Joel Grover.

 Schoolhouse Outrage:
Filthy Bathrooms
Schools in Southern California were checked to see how sanitary --- or unsanitary --- the bathrooms were.  KCBS-TV   investigators  spent three months and visited more than 50 buildings, some of them more than once.  Many bathrooms were locked or unavailable to students.   Many were missing essential supplies.

Roughed Up At Recess: Violence On The Playground
Teachers stood by doing nothing while bullies beat up other children on the school playgrounds.  News team members at WITI-TV, Milwaukee were surprised that it was so blatant and out of control. They followed up with a project that offered solutions for parents and educators.

Room 104:
The Overcrowding Crisis
By focusing on students and teachers, an initially boring subject was brought to life. Viewers could see how children are shortchanged when the instructor is simply lucky to keep control, never mind teaching and helping individuals having problems. This was a duPont winner for WABC-TV, New York.

Juvenile sexual offenders attending schools
Not only are juvenile sexual offenders attending schools, often the school officials don't know it.   The offender changes schools, but his record may not follow him. In St. Louis, KSDK-TV investigated.  

Public Safety Workers Face On The Job Hazards
Many people who keep the public safe have been injured or sickened because of workplace accidents or exposure to harmful substances.

Prisoners: Escaping and Not Pursued, Inmates Housed at Secret Locations
Two investigations showed how important it is keep track of how corrections officials are --- or are not --- doing their jobs.

Intelligence Report Breaks News Every Day
WLS-TV, Chicago showcases investigative stories on a daily basis. Many news executives have been working to get their investigative units on air more frequently.

Into Child Porn? No Problem, Have A Nice Day
Most men who are arrested in Wisconsin for Internet sex crimes do not go to prison. Three years of cases were analyzed by WITI-TV, Milwaukee.

Airport Restaurants:
What's on the Plate?
For your airport meal: Spoiled food and big rats. There was a lot to reveal when restaurants were visited by investigators from WAGA-TV, Atlanta.

It's Hard To File A Complaint Against Police In South Florida
Only 3 of 38 departments had complaint forms available when undercover checks were run by investigators at WFOR-TV, Miami.

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Hostage Crises:
Do You Let Gunmen Control Your Air?

When an upset, armed individual is threatening to kill someone, the police commanders supervising the emergency response and the news executives in charge of covering the confrontation have many sensitive decisions.  
Here's how broadcast executives have dealt with these dangerous emergencies.