What's your fate?
Send it to Melanie M. Clarke, editorial assistant, Broadcasting & Cable (e-mail: meclarke@reedbusiness; fax: 646-746-7028; mail: 360 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10010).
Broadcast TV
LaFawn Vannest, group VP, Charter Communications, Reno, Nev., appointed VP, affiliate distribution, Pappas Telecasting Companies, Reno.
Patricia (Patty) Hamilton, VP/GM, WFFT-TV Fort Wayne, Ind., named VP/GM, WXMI-TV Grand Rapids, Mich.
Manuel Rojas, account manager, KSTS(TV) San Jose, Calif., to account executive, business development team, KPIX-TV/KBHK-TV San Francisco.
Tom Fraticelli, local sales manager, WDBJ (TV) Roanoke, Va., named national sales manager.
Cable TV
Jeff Alexander, director, public relations, Eastern division, Comcast, Oaks, Pa., promoted to VP.
Bonnie Cleaver, senior director, new product development, corporate marketing department, Comcast, Philadelphia, joins Comcast Media Center, as senior director, business solutions, Denver.
Maria Escobar, assistant VP, human resources, Merrill Lynch, Hopewell, N.J., appointed area director, human resources, Comcast Cable, Eatontown, N.J.
At Comcast, Midwest Division, Southfield, Mich.: David Weiss, manager, financial planning & analysis, named director, project analysis; Sean M. Looney, director, government affairs, Verizon, Annapolis, joins Comcast, White Marsh, Md., in the same capacity.
Programming
At Oxygen Media: Mary Jeanne Cavanagh, VP, Eastern region sales, to senior VP, advertising sales, New York; Sydney McQuoid, Dallas, and Gretchen Beidl, New York, promoted from VP, affiliate sales, to senior VP, affiliate sales.
At The WB 100+ Station Group: Don Davis, regional sales manager, promoted to VP, national spot sales, Dallas; Kim Wilcox, regional sales manager, promoted to director, national spot sales, Knoxville, Tenn.
Jim Goldman, bureau chief, TechTV, Silicon Valley, Calif., named bureau chief, CNBC, Palo Alto, Calif.
Freddy James, producer, Scripps Productions, New York, joins Do It Yourself Network, Knoxville, Tenn., as director, programming.
Teri Weiss, executive in charge of production, Nickelodeon, New York, promoted to VP, Nick Jr., New York.
Radio
Returning to Katz Radio Group, New York, effective 12/26/03: Steve Shaw, president, Katz Radio Group; Tucker Flood, president, Christal Radio; Mark Gray, president, Katz Radio.
Technology
Kellie McKeown, owner, McKeown Consulting, Belmont, Calif., joins Sportvision, Mountain View, Calif., as VP, product management.
Advertising/Marketing/PR
At Medialink Worldwide Inc., London: Bill Jones, chairman, Lexis public relations, London, named vice chairman; Lucy Hadfield, director, business development, Crown Business Communications, London, appointed managing director, international operations.
Warren Zeller, national account executive, TARGUSinfo, Vienna, Va., appointed senior director, account services, cable and telecommunications division, Cohorts, Denver.
Danixa Diaz, director, business development, FreestyleCollective, New York, joins 3 Ring Circus, Los Angeles, as executive producer.
Marc R. Goodman, VP, account executive, PIC-TV, New York, elevated to senior VP, East Coast sales director.
Associations
Chris Berry, president and general manager of WMAL(AM), Washington, elected chairperson of the Washington Area Broadcasters Association.
James A. Wiatt, president and chief executive officer, William Morris Agency, elected to the board of trustees for the Museum of Television & Radio.
Elected to the Women in Cable & Telecommunications board of directors, Washington/Baltimore Chapter: Helen Dimsdale, assistant director, communications and public affairs, National Cable & Telecommunications Association, president; Marcie Anderson,
vice president of business development, Cox Communications, northern Virginia, VP; Christine Kuppens, vice president, programming, National Geographic Channel, treasurer; Jane Quilter, senior director, operations, corporate marketing & communications, Black Entertainment Television, secretary.
Allied Fields
Ann Cook, managing director, international division, Frank N. Magid Associates, London, joins AP International as director, international client relations, Camden, London.
Obituaries
Award-winning journalist Hal Walker, the first African-American correspondent for CBS News, died of prostate cancer Nov. 25 at his home in Reston, Va. He was 70.
One of the first black journalists on national television news in the 1960s, Walker was at CBS News for 12 years. He covered foreign and domestic stories from Washington, including the inaugurations of Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.
Previously, at then-WTOP(TV), the CBS Washington affiliate, Walker covered Capitol Hill and race relations, earning a local Emmy and the Capitol Press Club's "Journalist of the Year" award. His awards attracted the network executives, who hired him as a reporter for CBS News, for which he covered the funeral of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, the Republican National Convention and the White House with Dan Rather and Bob Pierpoint. He was later assigned to the CBS News bureau in Bonn, West Germany, and subsequently left to become the Bonn bureau chief for ABC News, retiring from its London bureau in 1995.
Born in Darlington, S.C., Walker graduated from Denison University in Ohio with a BA in English and theater, tried acting in New York City, enlisted in the Army, then worked as a writer and editor for the New York State Departments of Mental Hygiene and Education.
He is survived by his wife, Diane; daughters Alison and Sarah and son Stephen, all from a previous marriage; and four grandchildren.
Bill Skiba, a senior videographer for KEYT-TV Santa Barbara, Calif., collapsed and died Nov. 20 while covering Michael Jackson's trip to the county jail. Skiba, 43, suffered from diabetes and was believed to have died of a heart attack. He is survived by his parents, Vivian and Paul; brothers Bob, John, Paul and Michael; sister Paula; and 11 nieces and nephews.
