Signing Off in the Big Apple

WABC Anchor/Reporter Rob Nelson says that having a baby has changed his life and he is ready to try something else.

After 6 years at WABC, the Weekend Morning Anchor is leaving the Anchor desk immediately and his reporting role on April 10th.

He sent this email to his co-workers at the ABC O&O:

Dear colleagues,

For months leading up to Gabe’s birth, Jenny and I heard two bits of advice most often from parents. Sleep now, they said, and just know your life is about to change forever. Almost four months into this incredible journey, we now understand how profoundly insightful that advice was. Life has indeed changed. After much discussion and reflection, I’ve decided to leave Eyewitness News. Becoming a father has shifted my perspective and priorities, and now feels like the right time to move on after six years with the station and nearly a decade with ABC. I simply want something different now, and I’m excited to pursue multiple opportunities that have emerged in recent months.

I look forward to returning to work March 18 for a few more weeks of reporting before officially leaving April 10. I have also agreed to step down from the weekend morning anchor desk effective immediately to give the show the space it needs to launch its next chapter. To all of the weekend morning warriors I’ve had the pleasure of working with, thank you for everything. I am enormously proud of what we accomplished together as well as the chemistry and camaraderie we built that made weekend mornings unarguably special. I wish you and the show continued success. And, here’s one more for the road: “Roll it!”

My final few weeks will be a chance to tie up loose ends, clean out my landfill of a desk and file a few more reports for a legacy station of which I will always be proud to have been a part.

Most importantly, those weeks will be a chance to say goodbye in person. So many of you have become friends, not just colleagues, and I am forever grateful for the memories made, the cocktails raised, and the laughs shared along the way. Good people always make the trip worthwhile. I have no doubt that these friendships, the authentic ones, will endure far beyond April.

I especially want to thank you for the incredible generosity and kindness you have shown for Gabe. It has been one of the most moving experiences of my life to bring my son into the world surrounded by such thoughtfulness, compassion and heartfelt humanity. I also want to thank the deeply loyal viewers of Channel 7. New York is a tough city and a tough market, but I have always felt respected and embraced by our faithful and diverse audience. That means more to me than anything and is a source of pride and motivation for the road ahead. I have always believed, and still do, that the connection and resonance we have with viewers are the purest, most telling, most enduring and most meaningful measures of success in this business. On a particularly tough day wrestling with this choice, a woman, clearly a huge fan of the station, stopped me on the subway platform and said, “You give me the news, but you also make me smile.” It was a fleeting conversation, but one I’ll keep in my pocket for the long haul.

You can only hope for a few things during a decision like this: that you depart with good memories, good friends and good work. I feel blessed to be leaving with all three. And now, onward and upward.

With respect, love and gratitude,

Rob