(Fowser photo above)
Some good news at news and talk station WDEL
Veteran Delaware broadcast journalist Mark Fowser rejoined the station’s news side Mark is a former News Director at WXDE/Delaware 105.9 in Lewes and WILM in Wilmington. He also does traffic reports out of Philadelphia on weekends.
The Claymont native is a past president of the Delaware Press Association and Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association.
Also joining WDEL is Rachel Suga is a recent journalism graduate of Penn State’s Bellisario College of Communications, where she reported for The Daily Collegian and PSN TV, including international reporting from Penn State-Scotland and hosting coverage of PSU’s THON fundraiser.
Fowser and Suga join WDEL after the departures this year of Assistant News Director Amy Cherry, who took a position at the University of Delaware and Digital Editor DJ McAneny who is now Delaware Press Secretary for U.S. Sen. Chris Coons.
The Forever Media station has made news staff cuts, and the fear was that WDEL was moving toward a skeleton staff we often see in many mid-sized markets. Even with a smaller newsroom, WDEL has piled up industry reporting awards over the years.
“Our commitment to our listeners and Delaware news has never wavered,” said Chris Carl, WDEL’s director of news & programming, “and adding Mark and Rachel to the staff will only bolster our efforts to cover the news and issues that affect Delaware.”
WDEL continues to provide nine hours of news coverage each weekday, including “Delaware’s Morning News with Peter MacArthur” – Delaware’s highest-rated news program – and WDEL’s one-hour weekday newsmagazine show “Del-AWARE.”
Earlier this year, WDEL celebrated the 100th anniversary of its first broadcast.
The recent spring rating book showed a strong performance by WDEL and sister FM hit music station WSTW. WDEL’s performance has been aided by the addition of an FM signal. A similar change was made at Philadelphia news station KYW.
No big cuts at Gannett properties
I also did not hear any word of editorial job cuts at Gannett papers and websites in Delaware.
The company did some belt-tightening after a disappointing quarter.
Gannett, the product of a merger with Gannett and Gatehouse, is dealing with a heavy debt load that makes it tough to add resources.
Gannett had done a lot of cutting in the past few years and, after the merger staffs from the Gatehouse weeklies were folded into the dailies in Salisbury (Daily Times/Delmarva Now) and northern Delaware (News Journal/Delaware Online).
In response to the changes, the staff of the News Journal voted to unionize.
