NBC News ups commitment to investigative journalism

By Paul J. Gough

NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) – NBC News will dramatically
expand its investigative unit in the latest of a wave of
changes since Steve Capus ascended to the presidency of the
news division.

NBC News said Wednesday that the news division will double
the number of producers working in the Investigative Reporting
Unit. The unit’s senior investigative correspondent is Lisa
Myers, but other NBC News correspondents will work with the
unit, too.

The number of producers in the unit will go from the four
working with Myers to about 10 in the initial ramp-up. The
unit’s new producers will come from elsewhere at the network,
though it isn’t been ruled out that more will be hired later.

The award-winning unit contributes to “NBC Nightly News,”
“Today,” “Dateline NBC” and MSNBC and CNBC. It started in 2002
under Myers and senior producer Jim Popkin.

“It’s a big commitment. It’s a commitment to the kind of
news that I would like to see the news division doing,” said
Capus, who became acting president of the news division in
September 2005 and was made permanent in November.

Capus — former executive producer of the “NBC Nightly
News,” who came up through the ranks at MSNBC and “Today”
before being named senior vice president in 2005 — has made
his mark on the news division since his promotion. In addition
to the boosting of the network’s investigative unit, NBC News
has opened bureaus in Beijing and Beirut and renewed its
commitment to a Gulf Coast bureau that it opened following the
near-destruction of New Orleans in Hurricane Katrina.

Capus said in an interview Wednesday afternoon that NBC was
“bucking the trend” of reduced international coverage and that
it was important that NBC continue to make moves
internationally.

“It’s the right thing to do at this time,” Capus said.

While Capus didn’t discuss specifics, he said NBC’s
commitment wasn’t being done on the cheap.

“I readily acknowledge it creates a lot of pressure from
the business side of it, but in my view this is what a news
division has to do,” Capus said. Other changes might occur at
NBC News’ bureaus throughout the world, although nothing will
be closed.

“We may reassess some of the other operations, but I don’t
really expect to close bureaus,” Capus said. “We may move some
resources around.”

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter