News operation
As of, WTOL presently broadcasts 45 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with seven hours each weekday, three hours on Saturdays and two hours on Sundays). In addition, WTOL produces 18 1/2 hours of locally produced newscasts each week for Fox-affiliated sister station WUPW (with 3 1/2 hours each weekday and a half-hour each on Saturdays and Sundays). Through the shared services agreement with WUPW, WTOL may also simulcast long-form severe weather coverage on channel 36 in the event that a tornado warning is issued for any county in its northwest Ohio viewing area.
In October 2011, WTOL was certified by WeatheRate as having the most accurate forecasts for Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan.[16]
On January 2, 2014, it was officially announced that longtime evening news anchor Chrys Peterson would be leaving WTOL after nearly twenty years at the station. Peterson decided to leave the station in order to spend more time with her family. Chrys Peterson's final news broadcast was on February 28, 2014, and an hour-long special aired at 8 p.m. in celebration of Peterson's twenty years at WTOL.[17] On April 24, 2014, it was officially announced that Emilie Voss would succeed Chrys Peterson and join Jerry Anderson as the evening anchor on WTOL.[18]
In January 2017, Emilie Voss announced she would leave WTOL after five years.[19] In February, Kristi Leigh (formerly of WNWO, WUPW and WTVG) was named co-anchor of the 5, 5:30, 6 and 11 p.m. broadcasts.[20] In June 2018, Jerry Anderson announced his retirement, with June 15 being his final day on the air.[21] Morning anchor Andrew Kinsey was promoted to the evening shift[22] while longtime reporter and fill-in anchor Tim Miller assumed morning anchor duties as of June 18, 2018. Longtime sports director Dan Cummins, a fixture at WTOL since 1980, also moved to the news desk and is co-anchor of the noon news. Jordan Strack was named the new sports director.
In March 2019, WTOL attracted viral attention for video it posted on Facebook to motivate local high school students heading into their exams, which featured its anchors excessively using slang. The segment received mixed attention, with some observers considering it to be an exaggerated attempt to appeal to the demographic, but others applauding the anchors' willingness to participate in the video. It was quickly removed by the station, but mirrored copies on sites such as Twitter reached as high as 3 million views.[23]
- Evan Rosen – author of The Culture of Collaboration and The Bounty Effect: 7 Steps to the Culture of Collaboration
- Steve Hartman
