Florida News Center

(portions from News-Press.com) – WBBH NBC2 has welcomed a new reporter in its Charlotte County bureau. Charlie Keegan is now covering Punta Gorda, Port Charlotte and the environs. He arrived here from Great Falls, Mont., where he reported for KFBB-TV, the ABC station.

Meanwhile, NBC2 investigative reporter Andy Pierrotti has announced he’s leaving Southwest Florida and headed to Austin, Texas. He’s going to be an investigative reporter at KVUE-TV, the ABC station there. Pierrotti started at NBC2 in early 2010..

Sources tell Florida News Center that WINK reporter Anjuli Lohn will be leaving the Fort Myers station. She will be headed up the coast to WTVT Fox 13 in Tampa. She starts in August.

(from TampaBay.com) – Thanks to some rising competitors, the local TV news race may be close at it has been in some time, with area powerhouses WFLA-Ch. 8 and WTVT-Ch. 13 challenged by WFTS-Ch. 28 in several key time periods.

These observations come from looking at ratings for May’s “sweeps” period among viewers aged 25 to 54, the key consumer group most local TV stations sell to advertisers. It may look nice to talk about your household ratings — at WTSP did in a press release about its sweeps performance– but the number which earns the station money is connected to the 25 to 54 viewers.

Among those numbers, WFTS edged ahead of WTSP at 11 p.m., despite a 20 percent drop from the year before. Indeed, every 11 p.m. newscast was down a bit from the year before, excepting fifth-place Bay News 9….Cont….

(from BroadcastingCable.com) – Fox Television Stations (FTS) and AccuWeather are partnering in 11 Fox markets starting this summer, with AccuWeather’s content running on air and online at the Fox-owned stations in Dallas, Atlanta, Washington, Detroit, Phoenix, Tampa, Minneapolis, Orlando, Memphis, Austin and Gainesville (Fla.).

Fox said its stations “will offer their local viewers a 24/7 live streaming video weather channel provided by AccuWeather,” while jointly produced and branded content will extend across “virtually all of the stations’ media platforms,” including mobile.

“Weather is one of the most important services our stations provide to their communities and has long been a major focus for FTS,” said Ron Stitt, the group’s vice president of digital media and internet operations. “This exclusive partnership with AccuWeather, a company who has been extremely effective in pursuing digital platform distribution, notably Connected TVs, will help us take our digital weather products to the next level.”….Cont….

(from CrainsDetroit.com) - Former high-profile local investigative reporter Steve Wilson will return to television news after a two-year absence — but not in Detroit.

Wilson, whose contract wasn’t renewed at ABC affiliate WXYZ-Channel 7 in February 2010, has taken a job as an investigative reporter with First Coast News in Jacksonville, Fla.

First Coast News is the joint TV news operation of an ABC-NBC duopoly owned by McLean, Va.-based Gannett Co. Inc. The Jacksonville stations are WJXX-Channel 25 and WTLV-Channel 12.

Wilson’s new gig was announced by WXYZ reporter Ross Jones on Twitter on Wednesday, and Wilson himself confirmed it the same day on mibuzzboard.com, a forum for Michigan radio and TV industry news….Cont….

//hattip to NewsBlues.com

(from TampaBay.com) – Tampa NBC affiliate WFLA-Ch. 8 got some good news in February, scoring top ratings among key viewers at 6 a.m., 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. in a serious challenge to rival, Fox station WTVT-Ch. 13.

The turnaround is particularly important because owner Media General has moved so decisively in recent months to separate resources and staff between WFLA and sister outlet The Tampa Tribune newspaper. Officials promised TV staffers — who had long complained that the extensive convergence with the newspaper was hurting their performance — the broadcast arm would get its “swagger” back….Cont….

(from TVNewsCheck.com) – Lindsay Milbourne is joining Fox O&O WTVT Tampa, Fla. (DMA 14). She will contribute to Good Day Tampa Bay Weekends, as well as various weekday newscasts.

Most recently, Milbourne was weekend meteorologist and reporter for WBTW Myrtle Beach, S.C. Prior to that, she worked as weekend meteorologist and reporter at WCJB Gainesville, Fla….Cont….

//hattip to NewsBlues.com

You can also notice Miami’s WCIX (now WTVJ) in that video as well. Enjoy…

//hattip TampaBayTimes.com

(from TampBay.com) – Readers often wonder about the elusive art of understanding TV ratings.

Watch the ads aired by local stations, and you may see several claiming to be the highest rated or most watched, leading to a natural question: Can they all be right?

Look at the results for Tampa Bay area stations from November’s “sweeps” ratings period, though, and its easy to see how everyone can find something to crow about.

Local stations sell advertising mostly on the numbers of viewers aged 25 to 54 who watch their programming, so I usually only report on those figures, focusing on the big broadcast network affiliates and their news programming. At 6 a.m. among those viewers, for example, Tampa NBC affiliate WFLA-Ch. 8 scored 1/100th of a ratings point higher than rival Fox station WTVT-Ch. 13….Cont….

(from TampaBay.com) - Tampa Fox affiliate WTVT-Ch. 13 apologized to viewers Sunday after inadvertently airing images of a nude Tampa Bay Buccaneers player from the team’s locker room during a live interview.

The moment came during the station’s post-game show, as tackle Donald Penn was commenting on the team’s disappointing loss to the Tennessee Titans. Over his right shoulder in the background, a naked player donning shorts inadvertently exposed himself to viewers for a few seconds, seen only from the waist down….Cont….

SEE THE WANG HERE       —WARNING, WANG NUDITY— (am I the only one that finds the “measurement” discussion just absolutely hilarious?)

(edited from TampaBay.com) – Sheena Parveen, a St. Petersburg native who has worked as a weather forecaster at Tampa Fox affiliate WTVT-Ch. 13 on weekend mornings for the past two years, will leave the station Sunday headed for job at WCAU-TV NBC 10 in Philadelphia.

Parveen, 25, known as Sheena Parveen Samanipour while growing up locally, declined to confirm which station she will work for in Philadelphia, saying she expects to reveal more details later this week.

A spokeswoman for WTVT confirmed that Parveen’s last day on air at WTVT will be Sunday….Cont….

//hattip to FTVLive and NewsBlues