Doug Culver, who has been the news director at WFTS since 2008, is set to leave the Tampa ABC-affiliate.

In an email to staff this week, Culver announced that he would be departing in two weeks.

“Sometimes opportunity knocks at the most unexpected time,” Culver told his staff.  “That’s what has just happened to me.  As a result I will be leaving Action News.”

Before joining WFTS, Culver spent nine years at Seattle’s KIRO, serving as the station’s assistant news director and managing editor.  KIRO is currently looking for someone to replace Todd Mokhtari, who left his ND post last week to join KNBC. Read more

After five years as news director at KIRO in Seattle, Todd Mokhtari will take over next week as vice president of news at KNBC in Los Angeles, the NBC O&O announced today.

The move is a return to KNBC for Mokhtari, who was managing editor there from 2006-07. Prior to that, he spent four years as assistant news director at another NBC O&O, KNTV in San Francisco-San Jose. From 1997-2002, he was news director at KCPQ, the Fox-affiliate in Seattle.

“I am thrilled to welcome back Todd to the NBC4 team,” Steve Carlston, president and GM of KNBC, said in a statement. “Todd’s knowledge of the Southern California market, combined with his experience in producing high-quality content for broad audiences, will greatly contribute to our newscasts.”

KNBC has been without a news director since Vickie Burns resigned in March. Read more

The U.S. Secret Service may have another scandal on their hands. KIRO investigative reporter Chris Halsne is reporting that last year in El Salvador, an advance team of agents prepping for President Obama’s trip picked up a group of women at a strip club and brought them back to their hotel.

Halsne, who is just back from El Salvador, discussed the KIRO report today on “CBS This Morning” (video above). Read more

After five years at KIRO in Seattle, Chris Egert is leaving to join KSTP in Minneapolis.

Egert, a morning anchor at KIRO, is moving to Minneapolis to be closer to his father, who is in poor health. He will join KSTP as a reporter and anchor at the end of this month.

KIRO news director Todd Mokhtari said Egert brought “an energy and fresh approach” to the station.

“We will miss Chris on the air and continue to make him proud with our dedicated, straightforward Seattle News Coverage,” Mokhtari said in a statement.

Seattle’s KIRO will air primetime special tomorrow night to educate viewers to the benefits of social media.

KIRO traffic anchor Jenni Hogan, who has more than 40,000 followers on Twitter, will host a live show called “Connect with Jenni Hogan” at 10:30 p.m. tomorrow. The show will focus on “inspiring and educating viewers about the benefits of connecting online,” according to a KIRO statement.

The show will begin as a livestream on the station’s website at 10 p.m. and will be live on KIRO at 10:30 p.m. Viewers will be encouraged to use the #KIROConnect hashtag to interact with Hogan throughout the broadcast. Read more

Remaking its anchor lineup, KOMO has hired Brad Goode, who left crosstown rival KING back in June, to co-anchor its morning newscast alongside Peggy Bunker.

Goode spent six years anchoring KING’s a.m. newscast but left the NBC-affiliate this summer after he was reportedly unable to agree on the terms of a new contract with station management.  Since leaving KING, Goode has been reporting for CNBC, where he worked earlier in his career.

In addition to introducing a new morning anchor team, KOMO promoted Molly Shen, who currently anchors the morning show, to the 5 p.m. newscast, where she’ll join Eric Johnson. Read more

Four more local stations are headed to the White House for a Presidential interview today: Seattle’s KIRO, Norfolk’s WVEC, Pensacola’s WEAR and Colorado Springs’ KOAA.

The primary focus of the interviews will be the close of the Iraq War, and the stations were chosen because they have large military communities in their markets, according to President Obama’s official schedule. The payroll tax cut extension — which was the subject of a round of local press last week — will also be discussed.

The anchors — KIRO’s Angela Russell, WVEC’s David Alan, WEAR’s Bob Solarski and KOAA’s Rob Quirk — will sit down with the President at 10:30 a.m. Interviews will be embargoed until 5:00 p.m.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is debuting a new weather satellite today over the west coast.

GOES-15, which was launched into the sky back in May, is replacing the old warhorse GOES-11 in a fixed orbit over the Pacific ocean. Originally slated for a five-year mission, GOES-11 has been serving meteorologists since 2000.

“With its steady eye on dangerous weather conditions, GOES-11 served America well,” said Mary Kicza, assistant administrator for NOAA’s Satellite and Information Service. Read more

Seattle CBS-affiliate KIRO is expanding the 11 p.m. newscast on Sunday evenings to a full hour starting this week, the station announced today.

Monique Ming Laven (pictured) will remain the anchor of the 60-minute newscast. She will be joined by meteorologist Morgan Palmer and sports anchor Chris Francis.

“As our viewers prepare for the upcoming week we will be able to provide them with essential news and information that will impact their daily lives,” news director Todd Mokhtari said in a statement. Read more

Three local stations in Seattle have pulled their news crews out of Amanda Knox‘s West Seattle neighborhood, citing a desire to give the family privacy after their return to the U.S. last night.

“We want to respect Amanda’s request to use this time to be with her family,” KING executive news director Mark Ginther said in a statement. “The last four years have been overwhelming to Amanda and her family. It is time for them to be together and when she is ready to talk with us they have told us they will let us know.”

ABC-affiliate KOMO and CBS-affiliate KIRO joined KING, the NBC-affiliate, in agreeing to leave Knox’s neighborhood. The three stations pooled their resources to cover her arrival, sharing footage from the KIRO news helicopter to minimize the disruption.