Viewers Voice: disagreement on what we're covering

One viewer disagreed with what we led with last Friday night, writing, “I was very disappointed to turn on the 6pm news to see that the first headline of the evening is about Friday football and the weather. There are so many more important topics (such as the missing Virginia Tech student) to talk about rather than if it might rain during high school football games. Come on!!! This should not be the first topic of the news!!!" It was signed “a disappointed viewer.”

WSLS responds: trying to determine what the lead story should be is one of the most difficult parts of a producer’s day. At times it is obvious. Other times it is not. But, we always try to lead with the story that is the freshest and has the biggest impact on our viewing area. When you cover 23 counties, that can be tricky. But the weather is something that has a broad impact, particularly when it involves Friday night football. Granted this might not interest you, but it certainly interests many, many people in the viewing audience.

Finally, not one night has gone by since Morgan Harrington went missing that we haven’t updated people on the case. It’s not always the lead, but it is certainly one of the biggest stories we’re covering.

Tiffany Bohon called in with a loud complaint about a story she says we missed.

She said, “You had absolutely no coverage of the Thriller World Dance last night for Thrill the Roanoke. And I'm calling on behalf of everybody that participated in that. There was a lot people that worked really hard to pull that off over the past couple of weeks. Downtown Roanoke was blocked off last night. Market Square was blocked off so that these dancers could perform and you guys could not have any coverage of that none. None? I am outraged!”

WSLS responds. Tiffany, I appreciate that this was an important event for you and the others involved in it and congrats on having a successful dance contest. Our crew on that day was covering the gubernatorial contest, another story that has a broad impact on the entire viewing audience. In the future, if we're not at your event but you'd like some coverage, please feel free to forward the newsroom pictures at news@wsls.com or post them on our website.

And one more thought on this. We are the sponsors of this weekend's Thriller Dance Performance and we've arranged for coverage and pictures of it from people attending the event.

Finally, we received a compliment for the format of our new 7pm newscast.

Regina Ferris wrote, “What a great idea! Love the information ticker at the bottom.”