TV Talk: WQED hires new CEO

WQED Multimedia named Jason Jedlinski, most recently general manager of The Hill, a digital political news operation in Washington, D.C., as its new CEO.

In an interview Thursday morning, Jedlinski said he has been tasked by the WQED board to “usher in a new era of enhanced service that meets the changing needs of the broader Pittsburgh community.”

Jedlinski sees that as going beyond WQED television and radio broadcasts to help “people learn about each others’ history and truths, challenges and perspectives and help diverse groups of people better understand each other.”

A 1999 broadcast journalism graduate of the S.I. Newhouse School of Communications at Syracuse University with a dual major in policy studies and a minor in marketing, Jedlinski sees the future of WQED as “local, local, local” but with an opportunity to take the work of WQED’s education department and distribute it nationally.

Where WQED once had aspirations to be a national player in public TV program production, for the past two decades, the station has focused more on local programming. Jedlinski said he also will take a community-first approach.

“That is a clear direction and mandate from the board and one with roots in local media that speaks to my heart,” he said. “Just as WQED began as an experiment before there was a PBS, we have the opportunity to build on the experiment. As we define the future of community-supported media, our North Star is to become more relevant — even essential — to more people in our communities. So to me, that looks like staying true to our roots, playing to our strengths, creating compelling programs and convening substantive dialogues that drive community engagement and stimulate big ideas.”

Jedlinski foresees expanding upon and forging partnerships with community organizations and local businesses. He mentioned the possibility of expanding WQED-curated experiences, perhaps a walking tour to go along with Bach, Beethoven and Brunch.

“What was just so compelling is the mission and the history and the purity of being able to say, our goal is to educate, entertain and inspire without a lot of the junk from private equity that’s gotten in the way and decimated local media across America,” Jedlinski said. “My first objective is to listen and learn what’s needed. What are people hungry for? What’s not already being done?”

The demographics of PBS TV station viewership skew old, Jedlinski acknowledged, so he’ll seek ways to “reach others as well, and that’s probably not going to be on TV.”

In January, during the Television Critics Association winter 2023 press tour in Pasadena, Calif., PBS CEO Paula Kerger said WQED board of directors co-chair Mildred S. Myers reached out to her as the local station undertook its search for a new CEO.

“Ultimately, the decision of who runs the stations is made within the community, within their board, but I’ve talked to the board chair and they’re going for a big search,” Kerger said at the time, noting how the role of public media CEO has changed in the past decade. “You’re no longer just running a broadcast organization, you’re really thinking about a multi-platform digital company that’s supporting the community.”

While the path from a digital news organization covering politics on Capitol Hill to a public media company in Pittsburgh may not immediately seem obvious, a deeper dive into Jedlinski’s background shows commonalities with his predecessor, Deb Acklin.

Like Acklin, who was a producer at KDKA-TV before her WQED tenure, Jedlinski began his media career as a local TV news producer. He worked for local TV news outlets in his hometown of Chicago for seven years before moving into digital product development for Gannett and later the Wall Street Journal. He then moved into management with The Hill when it was acquired by Nexstar, integrating The Hill with existing Nexstar broadcast and digital properties.

“That was intentional on my part saying, I’ve balanced needs — basically refereeing between sales and news and marketing and other teams and coming up with roadmaps that everyone could get behind – and rather than being the orchestrator that negotiates the compromise, I was looking to lead a business directly,” Jedlinski said.

Jedlinski takes over for Acklin, who stepped down as WQED CEO after 12 years in September 2022 following a diagnosis of nonsmoker’s lung cancer.

“She very effectively led the organization through historic financial constraints and a pandemic,” Jedlinski said. “My job would be a lot harder without the solid foundation her hard work has provided.”