mikemcguff.com: KHOU 11's new news director is Philip Bruce

UPDATE DECEMBER 09, 2015
Philip Bruce is leaving KHOU 11

As the new KHOU news director position was announced Thursday, I was heading back on I-45 from conducting interviews with Texas City PD on this story. So forgive me to posting this important news late:

Philip Bruce, a television news veteran with more than three decades in broadcasting, is rejoining KHOU-TV where he was an award-winning reporter and Washington Bureau Chief from 1985-1995. Bruce is assuming the role of Executive News Director.

“Philip knows the television news business from all angles – behind the desk and in the trenches,” said Susan McEldoon, KHOU President and General Manager. “His experience in top ten markets is extensive and we are looking forward to his return to Houston and his KHOU family.”

Bruce covered hurricanes, politics and everything in between during his first stint at KHOU. He won awards for a series of reports on Texans returning to Vietnam and took us to war refugee camps in Croatia to see how Houstonians were rescuing orphan babies. Here at home, Bruce gave Houston its first in-depth look at a deadly Mexican drug cult whose victims included a Texas college student.

Besides his years at KHOU, Bruce has an unbroken string of broadcasting experience in such major television markets as Dallas, Washington, DC and Los Angeles. He ran the Washington Bureau for KDFW-TV/Dallas and led an EMMY award winning news team as News Director at KCET-TV/Los Angeles. He also reported for LA’s top rated KTLA-TV “News at Ten.”

Most recently, Bruce has been a deputy national editor and a senior network news manager for NPR (National Public Radio). He also served as Managing Director in charge of NPR West in Culver City, California, which is NPR’s largest broadcast center outside of its home base in Washington, DC. Bruce has been the network’s senior manager in charge of the West, giving him oversight of daily news coverage and personnel in 14 western states, from Texas to Alaska and Hawaii.

Of his impending return to KHOU, Bruce and his wife say they can’t wait.

“We weren’t born here, but we have always considered Houston home,” said Bruce about his move back to the Bayou City with his wife Lorel Kane, a television producer. “Houston has a warm, can-do spirit and professionally this is an incredible news market that’s at the center of most major events. So many stories that break across the country or around the world have a Houston or Texas connection.”

Bruce is a native of northwest Arkansas and earned a BA in Journalism from the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville.

He will begin his new role in mid-March.