WTAE news director and investigative reporter Jim Parsons will be retiring from the Pittsburgh ABC affiliate on February 29.
Parsons has been the station’s news director since 2016 and a WTAE investigative reporter for 15 years.
“Jim is a leader that holds everyone accountable, especially himself,” Charles W. Wolfertz III, WTAE’s president and general manager, told the Post-Gazette in a statement. “His achievements, in front of and behind the camera, were accomplished with the highest ethical standards and competitive spirit,” he added. “Our newsroom is stronger today than it was when he became news director.”
Parsons started his TV career at WROC in Rochester, N.Y. He’s also worked at WGRZ in Buffalo, and WRTV in Indianapolis before joining WTAE in 1998.
“I always wanted to be like him in the way he wrote and thought,” said Sally Wiggin, a WTAE anchor and reporter between 1980 and 2018. “I was so jealous of how he was able to take really complicated subjects and distill it and boil it down so that anyone could understand it.”
The Gazette said “his departure marks the first news director shakeup at one of Pittsburgh’s big three stations since Shawn Hoder replaced Kathy Hostetter as KDKA-TV’s news director in July 2022. Scott Trabandt has been WPXI-TV’s news director for the last 4½ years.”