Team 3 Rundown Rationale

by Gino Zarrillo (NCC News)

Cuomo Elected Governor

In most cases, the race that garners the largest amount of coverage during a midterm election is the governor's race. Without the incumbent running, this story had more than enough reason to warrant its position in the lead slot, especially when one considers the fact that Andrew Cuomo's father Mario was also the governor of New York from 1983-1994. Carl Paladino's various controversial remarks that he made throughout his campaign further solidified the story's position in the lead. Given the flow of the rest of the rundown, I made this into a reader in order to avoid a monotonous start to the newscast.

120th District

Next, I went with the 120th Assembly District race, which served as a great follow-up. Bill Magnarelli gave Kevin a great sound bite about Andrew Cuomo, tying this story into the lead. Magnarelli bases his headquarters in Liverpool, so the story also had a bit of local relevance. This made the 12oth district story the perfect bridge between the gubernatorial race and the local congressional district race.

25th District

This story was both the most locally relevant and the most timely. The race between Dan Maffei and Ann Marie Buerkle was deemed too close to call by all news outlets in the morning hours, and has still yet to be decided. This meant that representatives from both camps were unavailable, so Rochelle needed to be resourceful. She certainly showed that in speaking to a resident expert on the subject, Dr. Robert McClure, an Associate Professor in Political Science at Syracuse University.

24th District

The 24th congressional district race was an obvious choice to follow the Maffei-Buerkle race. It concerned the same political position, and represented an area that still encompasses our audience. Thankfully, Michael Arcuri conceded to Richard Hanna, allowing us to do the story as a reader. We needed to keep this one short after preceding it with a wrap and an actuality, and following it with another wrap.

Pasta Dinner

Next, Kim did a wrap on an annual pasta dinner held in North Syracuse yesterday that brings together Onondaga County politicians from all parties. This allowed us to keep with the political theme while taking a softer angle. It also served as a neat way to tie all the election stories together.

Schumer, Gillibrand Re-Elected

We then shifted our focus to a national level with the next two stories before the break. Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand both retained their positions in the United States Senate without much opposition. Still, any results with statewide ramifications such as these that needed to be reported.

Republicans Take The House

Our last story before the break is an actuality that Rochelle was able to do with a sound bite from ABC Newscall. It covers the shift of power from the Democrats to the Republicans in the House of Representatives, which marked the GOP's largest congressional win in over a century. This story contrasts perfectly with the previous story where Democrats held their seats in the Senate.

Kicker

As a kicker should, we picked a story that finished the newscast on a lighthearted note. We covered the first scrimmage of the season for the Syracuse Orange men's basketball team, which always gets the dedicated local fanbase excited for the upcoming season.

Weather

Rochelle needed to trim a little bit off the weather report in order for us to get out on time, which we did.

Given the circumstances (ENPS down, printer jammed), it was a great all-around performance by our team. I am very proud of everybody.