TV Talk: WTAE news director Jim Parsons to retire

Channel 4 news director Jim Parsons will retire from WTAE at the end of February, a few weeks after he turns 65.

“I first went to my bosses a year ago and told them I was thinking about this, probably around March of 2023, so it’s been a 10-month secret I’ve had to keep,” Parsons said, noting it was his decision to retire. “They asked me to stay.”

Parsons said the timing was right both professionally and personally.

“I’ve never felt better about where we are as a television station than where we are at the start of 2024,” Parsons said, pointing to the station’s ratings success in recent years. “From a personal standpoint, I’ve been doing this for 43 years. I don’t know how to do something halfway, which is not the greatest thing for my health to be as all-in as I am. I want time with grandkids. I want time with family I haven’t really been able to dedicate as much time to in the past. I’m looking forward to that.”

Although he doesn’t rule out future “career activities,” his immediate focus will be on grandkids, travel and projects around the house.

A New Jersey native, Parsons got to know the Pittsburgh TV market early in his career through his wife, who is from Butler.

“I knew I didn’t want to end up in New York,” Parsons said. He grew up in New Jersey, “the most densely populated state in the nation,” and he said it felt claustrophobic.

He developed an affinity for Western Pennsylvania. Parsons interned at KDKA-AM and cites the day he was hired as a WTAE investigative reporter in 1998 as the best day of his time at the station. He moved into the assistant news director role in 2013 and took over as news director in 2016.

For the record, he said his worst day at WTAE was covering the Tree of Life massacre in Squirrel Hill “just from a human aspect — but I was very proud of our coverage that day.”

“Ever since I was in college at the University of Dayton, my desire was to work in television news in Pittsburgh and especially at WTAE,” Parsons said. “I spent a lot of years trying to get a job here. I was constantly pestering [former WTAE] news director Joe Rovitto in the ‘80s as I watched him hire someone else every time there was a vacancy. When I was in town, Joe would let me hang out in the newsroom for a day. I always liked the culture of this newsroom.”

Parsons said he got the call inquiring about his interest in joining Channel 4 from former news director (and a Rovitto successor) Tom Petner, who didn’t know of Parsons’ interest in the station.

“So of course I played hard-to-get,” Parsons said, chuckling. “KDKA was the legacy station and I was always attracted more to the ‘we-try-harder,’ secondary-type station, which WTAE was back then. Now I’m proud to say we’re No. 1, not every book or every show, but we’ve got the best product in town. It’s been an honor to grow this great team with a minimum of newsroom drama in this place.”

Of course there has been some drama during Parson’s tenure: The 2016 Wendy Bell debacle, the bridge-burning 2021 exit of Brittany Hoke and the abrupt 2021 mid-covid departure of morning anchor Kelly Frey.

“But there isn’t [drama] now,” Parsons noted. “I’m not gonna comment on any other things that may or may not have happened in the past. Now it’s a very well-oiled machine with a lot of really good people who do their jobs well. I’ve tried to put good human beings in who are great at their jobs in the spots where they belong and then tried to give them minimal guidance and not be a micromanager. That’s been my goal.”

Parsons said he doesn’t know if he’ll be involved in the search for his replacement or if current WTAE assistant news director Mike Solakian, who has been at the station for the past three years, will be in the running for the news director position (“That’s gonna be up to [WTAE general manager] Chuck [Wolfertz III],” Parsons said).

“For 43 years, I’ve made my career come first,” Parsons said. “I’ve got to retire to focus on, as Chuck Noll said, ‘Getting on with my life’s work.’ I’ve got to leave this behind to explore what else is out there for me now.”

WTAE is TribLive’s news partner.