Passed over once, Laurie Passman perseveres and gets the prize as CBS11's news director

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
It’s been an up and down ride for Laurie Passman, who on Thursday was named D-FW-based CBS11’s vice president and news director after being bypassed for that position in January 2017.

President and general manager Gary Schneider praised Passman as “a seasoned professional who has demonstrated excellent news judgment and management skills.”

Passman had been acting news director for five months after CBS11 parted ways with Mike Garber in August 2016. But the station eventually went outside to hire Andrea Parquet-Taylor as news director. She arrived in February of last year from WNCN-TV in Raleigh-Durham, NC, where she’d been news director since 2011.

Passman returned to her assistant news director post at CBS11. But in July of this year, Parquet-Taylor was promoted to vice president and station manager of CBS11 and its sister station, TXA21. Passman again became interim news director, and now finally has the job on a permanent basis.

In a statement Thursday, Passman thanked Schneider and Parquet-Taylor for “believing in me and allowing me the opportunity to lead this talented team of news professionals. This newsroom has done an amazing job of putting our community first, and I look forward to continuing that mission.”

Before joining CBS11, Passman had been assistant news director at KTVK-TV in Phoenix.

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