Incoming at The 33? Former host of WFAA8's La Vida looks like next newcomer to station's newsroom

Amanda Salinas in WPBF-TV photo and as former host of La Vida.
By ED BARK
Nothing's official yet because station news directors invariably want to announce new hires on their own timetables.

That said, reliable industry sources say that "The 33" intends to add Amanda Salinas, former host of WFAA8's La Vida, as an anchor/reporter at the Tribune-owned CW network affiliate.

"It's not a new hire I'm making today," The 33 news director David Duitch said Monday. "But I like her."

Salinas' picture and bio recently were removed from the West Palm Beach-based WPBF-TV Web site, where she had been part of the ABC affiliate's news team since May 2006. The Laredo native and University of Texas-Austin grad worked at KCEN-TV in Waco before joining WFAA8 in fall 2001. She left the station in mid-summer 2004.

The 33 recently added Pelpina Trip as a part-time staffer hired to work on the station's slowly evolving Web site. But Trip's "Pelpina's Picks" lately have been featured on the station's 9 p.m. local newscasts.

"She has a lot of ideas, and I thought that putting her on the air might be a good way to get more traffic to the Web site," Duitch said.

Trip is fresh out of the University of North Texas, where she graduated in December with a BA in electronic news, according to her station biography.