In my interview with him this week, Hearst-Argyle's Fred Young underscored an earlier story we had suggesting that the day of the high-priced local anchor may be coming to an end.

"The great anchor people of the past are just sort of leaving the business. ... As news becomes more ubiquitous, I think that the team concept will be more important than the individual player."

Young said the big money that has been going to the stars behind the anchor desks will be diverted to a new breed of TV newsperson who will be expected to multitask — that is, report, photograph, edit and present stories. (I suspect some of the money will also be diverted to maintaining operating margins, at least as long as revenues continue to erode.)

What intrigues me about all this is that it may also herald a change in the way TV stations stage their newscasts. If stations are to attract wider and younger audiences, they are going to have break away from the idea of two well-groomed people of just the right gender/ethnic mix sitting behind a desk.

I have problems with TMZ, Warner Bros.' celebrity news entry. It's laden with a meanspiritness that is even tougher to take than the unctuousness of its competitors. Do all celebrities deserved to be harassed and ridiculed?

But I do like the TMZ format. Executive Producer Harvey Levin presides over a room full of producers who pop up from their cubicles to tell Levin and viewers what's going on and set up the video segments. It works. Levin doesn't have to do much. The casually dressed young producers take the place of anchors, providing the glue that holds the show together.

The show is heavily edited so I'm not sure how it would work in the live environment of local TV news. But there is something there.

It would be great to see some enterprising stations — perhaps a nothing-to-lose station mired in third place — apply the TMZ format or a variation of it. Different kinds of stars will surely emerge from inside those cubicles.

The TMZ format may be too much for the broadcast networks, but they too should be looking for a different way of doing things. Perhaps they should be thinking about moving past the star-driven newscast, too.

I keep thinking of the $15 million salary that CBS is playing Katie Couric. The way I figure, CBS could take that same money, hire 100 of the best investigative reporters in the country, pay them a $120,000 plus benes, and set them loose to ferret out corruption and malfeasance throughout the world.

There are a lot of great reporters at newspapers working for far less and many are in fear of losing their jobs.

Maybe, then, at 6:30 p.m. each evening, CBS News would have some stories to tell, exclusive and important. You've got to believe that ratings would follow.

Of course, CBS News is really not interested in journalism that can improve the planet.

Two years ago, when CBS News President Sean McManus, introduced to Katie Couric to the TV press just before her debut on the evening news, he said that "first and foremost" he wanted to produce a newscast that was a "really intelligent, journalistically sound summary."

If a "summary of the news" really is your goal, Sean, congratulations. You've made it.

But if you have higher aspirations, you ought to think about diverting money from the anchor desk to where it matters, to the people who find and produce news, just as your affiliates are beginning to do.

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ABC Affiliate Board Chairman Ray Cole is upset that ABC was shut out of moderating duties for the three presidential and one vice presidential debate this fall — and with good reason, I think.

The Commissioner on Presidential Debates this week tapped Jim Lehrer and Gwen Ifill, of PBS's The NewsHour, to preside at the first presidential debate (Sept. 26 in Oxford, Miss.) and the lone vice presidential debate (Oct 2 in St. Louis), respectively.

Tom Brokaw, of NBC News, the commission said, will handle the second presidential debate (Oct. 7 in Nashville), and Bob Schieffer, of CBS News, got the call for the final one (Oct. 15 in Hempstead, N.Y.).

There's been some Internet buzz that ABC was being punished for the way Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos handled a Democratic debate between Obama and Clinton last April.

Some agree with Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales, who said the duo turned in "shoddy, despicable performances" with its gotcha questioning.

Regardless, Cole feels ABC has earned the right to have one of its people lead a debate.

A year ago, Cole says his station, WOI Des Moines, Iowa, teamed with ABC News to produce debates with eight Republican and eight Democratic candidates as special editions of This Week with George Stephanopoulos.

"Debates from New Hampshire and Pennsylvania followed, along with special town hall meetings on Good Morning America and other regular and special election programming and coverage," Cole says.

"No broadcast network news organization has stepped up during the '08 election cycle to the extent that ABC News has," he says. "For anyone to suggest otherwise is simply nonsense.

"As the old saying goes, ‘no good deed — or in this case, many good deeds—goes unpunished.' "

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The Broadcasters Foundation of America has sets up a memorial tribute fund in honor of Ragan Henry, the pioneering African American broadcast station owner.

"This is an opportunity to remember Ragan with a contribution to the organization that he blessed for many years as a member of the board and as a very generous supporter," says Westchester, N.Y., radio broadcaster Bill O'Shaughnessy, who heads the foundation's endowment fund.

Henry passed away on July 26 and, in keeping with his wishes, the family did not issue an obituary or hold a memorial. It simply sent out a card announcing his death to friends and colleages. It took the Philadelphia Inquirer until today to catch up with the news, even though Henry was one of the city's most prominent and wealthy citizens.

A Harvard-trained attorney, Henry began buying and selling broadcast stations in the 1970s and by 1990 had amassed a portfolio of more than 60 radio stations.

The foundation has organized such funds in the past, most notably for Tony Malara, a one-time CBS executive, and Dick Beesemyer, a one-time ABC executive.

Letters announcing the Henry fund will go out early next week. But those who can't wait may send a check to Jim Thompson, president, Broadcasters Foundation of America, 7 Lincoln Ave., Greenwich, CT, 06830.

Make checks payable to the Broadcasters Foundation of America Endowment Fund with a memo indicating that it is for the Henry fund.

Harry A. Jessell is editor of TVNewsday. You may contact him at hajessell@tvnewsday.com.