Febuary 5, 2006

Do you trust your station to deliver a newscast that is fair in equal rights where it is a male and a female delivering the news in a fair and honest manner? If you do, you may have second thoughts based on an INNCD Investigation.

Over a five-week period, INNCD News Anchor Ava Nieves visited 94 television sites that offer newscasts in 27 markets as far west as San Antonio and as far east as New York and Florida. Actually, she visited the station personalities pages. Some were good and follwed today's newscast standards. But most had two female anchor pairs, which is now not very uncommon in markets large and smal according to a July 2006 Washington Post article. We found out that 17 stations (six from our area) we visited had slightly more men than women delivering newscasts--and only one station had an anchor position open.

We ended up finding out that stations in Miami, Dayton, Pensacola,Tallahassee, Fort Meyers, Panama City, Peoria, Philadelphia, Dallas, Tampa, Orlando, Peoria, Cincinnati, Louisville, Houston, and Dallas had more men wither anchoring and/or reporting newscaasts. What we found was far more shocking than a newscast of equality (when it comes to gender roles.) We found out that more women are anchoring newscasts in New York, Philadelphia, and in all ten markets in Florida.

We learned that only three markets in Floirda (Orlando, Fort Meyers, and Miami), four markets serving Indiana (Chicago, Cincinnati, Louisville, and South Bend), New York City, and Philadelphia are actually following a new trend. And along with those markets, six of those newscasts with that new trend are ranked number one in the Nielesen Ratings. You won't hear from those news directors, but viewers and news officials are speaking out .

Shane Elmore says, "I think I will stop watching WXIN's newscasts and watch another station. They broke the rules."

Tribune Broadcasting, Belo, LIN Television, Nexstar Broadcasting, Hearst-Argyle, and Raycom Media some of the largest media giants that owns stations in the INNCD area, say that they are proud of their news operations. Officials from those media giants do not want to talk on camera, but they should be sending us statements.

How We Did This Test

For this investigation, INNCD did research on all broadcast stations with local news in all merkets that serve Indiana and Florida, as well as San Antonio, Austin, Houston, Dallas, Peoria, New York, and Philadelphia. We did not test WFFT Fort Wayne, WBND South Bend, and WEVV Evansville since they have no news operation, nor did we access job openings, even for anchor/reporter. We looked at their biographies very closely and a number of stations failed to create back-up plans for anchors and fill-in anchors.