Tonya Francisco And Amy Rutledge To Host WGN’s ‘Daytime Chicago’ This Fall

This September, Nexstar’s WGN Chicago will debut an hour-long lifestyle show, Daytime Chicago at 10 a.m., with Rachel Ray moving to the afternoon. Co-hosts Tonya Francisco and Amy Rutledge will be the new show’s hosts as it covers topics specific to Chicagoans, with features on health, décor, cooking, travel and more.

Paul Rennie, WGN VP-GM, said: “We are very excited to launch more local programming for our viewers. With Daytime Chicago five-days-a-week, WGN-TV will soon be airing 81 hours of weekly live local programming. Tonya and Amy are Chicago’s Very Own seasoned veterans who know our market inside and out; they will be a fantastic duo.”

Tonya Francisco joined WGN News in 2012 and currently anchors WGN Weekend Morning News. Prior to that, she was a general assignment reporter and fill-in anchor for WGN.  She joined the former cable news channel CLTV in 2002 and was soon after named morning anchor.

Francisco is a graduate of the University of Illinois Chicago and is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists.

Amy Rutledge spent many years as a reporter at WGN, starting in 2005. She took a brief break from Chicago and moved to Shanghai, China, where she helped launch Shanghai’s first English-language newscast. In April 2010, she came back to WGN. Most recently, she was a co-host of The Jam, a morning entertainment show on WCIU Chicago.

Rutledge is a graduate of Southern Illinois University, Carbondale with a B.A. in mass communications/media arts. She also studied meteorology at Mississippi State University.