WXIA Atlanta

The station groups were cited for their “strong, clear, vocal leadership.” Other winners of the political journalism award, which is bestowed by the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism,include include KUSA Denver (two awards); KXAN Austin, Texas; WXIA Atlanta; WOI Des Moines, Iowa; KMGH Denver; and KCET Los Angeles.

Tegna Media President Dave Lougee challenged his stations to come up with new ideas for first-run shows that it could take group-wide — and possibly nationally. That yielded five pilots and, of those, two from WXIA Atlanta and WWL New Orleans were deemed worthy to produce locally. 

Four 2017 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards go to local television news investigations: KXAN in Austin, Texas, for documenting racial profiling, WVIT in West Hartford, Conn., for uncovering widespread faulty home construction, Indianapolis’ WTHRfor exposing a corrupt charity, and Atlanta’s WXIA for spotlighting problems with the 911 emergency system.

RTDNA today announced the winners of the 2016 National Edward R. Murrow Awards, which honors outstanding work produced by radio, television and online news organizations. In large-market television, WXIA-WATL Atlanta scored a triple win for Continuing Coverage, Investigative Reporting and Writing. In small-market television, WVUE New Orleans had a double win for Series and Use of Video and WISC Madison, Wis., got a triple win for Overall Excellence, Newscast and Feature Reporting.

WTAE Pittsburgh, WXIA Atlanta and WMAQ Chicago are the station winners included in the first batch of 10 winners from its inaugural Peabody 30 winners for 2016.

Tegna’s effort to overhaul local news is manifest in Inside the Triangle, a six-week investigation into heroin usage by the group’s Atlanta NBC affiliate. So far it’s been available only online, generating close to four million page views. “Everybody has talked for years about trying to change the formulaic product that we produce,” says Tegna’s Ellen Crooke, “and Tegna is devoted in 2016 that we’re going to do something about it.”

Gannett’s Atlanta NBC affiliate is dropping Dr. Phil at 5 p.m. starting March 2 and bringing back a local newscast at that hour. But Dr. Phil fans shouldn’t despair. The station was already showing repeats of the show at 3 p.m. Now, the first-run editions of his show that had been on at 5 will air at 3. The station is also ending its noon and 7 p.m. news programs.

Former Weather Channel executive Jennifer Rigby has been named the new news director at Gannett’s Atlanta NBC affiliate, replacing Ellen Crooke, who was promoted by Gannett to help run news operations for 46 stations nationwide.