Maine TV news anchors resign on air

The news anchors on Bangor, Maine, ABC affiliate WVII dropped a bombshell on viewers and staff at the end of their broadcast Tuesday by resigning on air.

Anchors Cindy Michaels (who was also the station’s news director) and Tony Consiglio took the last minute of the 6 p.m. broadcast to give a classy goodbye to their viewers.

“Some recent developments have come to our attention, though, and departing together is the best alternative we can take,” Consiglio said.

According to an interview with the Bangor Daily News, Michaels revealed that the surprise resignation was the culmination of steadily mounting tensions between the anchors and the station’s upper management. It was a situation that Michaels said impaired her ability to deliver the news in a way she was comfortable with.

“It’s a culmination of ongoing occurrences that took place the last several years and basically involved upper management practices that we both strongly disagreed with,” Michaels told the paper. “It’s a little complicated, but we were expected to do somewhat unbalanced news, politically, in general.”

Michaels didn’t elaborate on the situation and the station’s upper management says the search is already on for people to fill the anchor chair. WVII vice president and general manager Mike Palmer did tell the paper the resignations were not surprising.

Neither Michaels nor Consiglio has career plans lined up following their departure from the station. Michaels said she would pursue her freelance writing and some painting, while Consiglio said he’d be trying to find another job in TV news.

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