NAACP WANTS BLACK ANCHOR AT KCBS-TV

The NAACP asked KCBS-TV Channel 2 Wednesday to replace departing anchors Jess Marlow and Colleen Williams with at least one black anchor.

The organization sent a letter to that effect to KCBS General Manager Frank Gardner less than 24 hours after Marlow and Williams acknowledged that they would be leaving the station due to contractual disagreements.

“This is a position we’ve had for years--to get a black anchor on an O-and-O (network owned-and-operated) station out here in Los Angeles,” said Willis Edwards, president of the Beverly Hills-Hollywood chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. KCBS “has an excellent opportunity to make history here,” Edwards said.

As of press time, KCBS had not received the letter, according to spokeswoman Andi Sporkin. She restated the station’s frequently made claim that “we have the best minority representation on the air in the market and we’ll continue to do so.”

Station management is finalizing anchor assignments for a new format to be announced next week, Sporkin added. Dan Miller, an anchor at a Nashville, Tenn., station for the past 15 years, has been hired as a new anchor, but the station said that he was not hired to replace Marlow.