Profiles: WDIV's Rhonda Walker!

Greetings TV Garth readers! This past Summer I was picking up Detroit, MI's WDIV (RF45) in early August and taped their relatively new 4:30am newscast. What stood out to me during the news was the talent of anchor Rhonda Walker. She's been with WDIV for 11 years, and has quite an impressive list of accomplishments in addition to her anchor duties. One of her achievements is the Rhonda Walker Foundation which aims to "empower inner-city teen girls towards becoming strong, confident, successful and moral future leaders."



I saw her a couple of times on WDIV last year, but this time I really noticed her energy and thought she had great pacing with the stories. Walker's lively delivery was quite engaging and she came across as one of the better news anchors out there. I decided to write her an e-mail saying so, and also mentioned that I was watching all the way from Markham, Ontario, Canada! To my surprise, she actually wrote back! Here's what she said:

"That is such a high compliment, thank you so much Garth for tuning us in and taking the time to write! I'm truly flattered!

The closest I've been to your neck of the woods is Toronto. I love that place! I'm amazed that you were able to get our newscast that far away, amazing!"



I replied to that e-mail, and admitted that the first time I saw WDIV's news (in July 2009) I was a bit intimidated, and probably overstated how scary I thought the stories were. Rhonda then replied to my second e-mail!

"Please try and let your readers know we're not that scary here in Detroit. We're a big urban city with crime like they all are, but we also have beautiful neighborhoods and it's a great small town feel type of metro area that's perfect to raise a family. I've been here most of my life and have never had any run-ins with crime personally."

So there you have it - the scoop on Detroit directly from Rhonda Walker herself! (To be fair, I've seen some hair raising stories this past Summer from many news markets big and small, so maybe I was being a bit quick to judge Detroit.)

Overall, I was quite impressed that Rhonda took the time to e-mail because it shows that she cares about connecting with viewers. (Even the TV geeks from Canada watching via antenna!) I find that pretty amazing and it proves that Rhonda is defnitely Worth Waking Up 4! (Plus it more than makes up for the time my pals and I got asked to leave WDIV!)



Check out the Rhonda Walker Foundation as well as her Click On Detroit bio! As a bonus, I went into the "TV Garth Archives" for some pics of my WDIV reception from last year! Enjoy! (The first pic is WDIV as seen on July 29, 2009. The second pic is the station seen on September 25, 2009.)




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