After Cleveland’s WKYC announced the hire of Russ Mitchell yesterday, the CBS News anchor talked with the Cleveland Plain-Dealer and shed some light on the decision to return to the local landscape. Mitchell, who will be managing editor in addition to anchoring the 6 and 11 p.m. newscasts, said he misses “the pulse of a local newsroom”:
“The pace of local news is relentless,” Mitchell said. “You’re putting on four to six newscasts a day, and at a network, we have the luxury, if you will, of not having that kind of relentless pace. I was in local television for 10 years before joining CBS. The business, of course, has changed dramatically in that time — major, major changes. But I do think that the power of local news still is very strong. It’s not what it was 30 years ago, but it does provide an incredible service to a community.”