Imagine Hope Woodside on Fox 13's news desk without Bob Evans or KSL's Bruce Lindsay without Nadine Wimmer and you get a picture of what local television news could evolve into one day.

The spiraling economy and a fractured audience are not only hammering the newspaper industry with layoffs, cost cutting and shrinking news space, these economic factors are also chipping away at struggling local television news programs.

As a result, television stations across the country are laying off employees and making severe cuts to meet the economy head on. Some markets, such as in Peoria, Ill., and Syracuse, N.Y., are even dropping local news broadcasts in favor of combining and sharing operations.

"Last year, we saw the first decrease in staffing at local television stations that we've seen in more than a decade," said Barbara Cochran, president of the Radio-Television News Directors Association.

Overall ratings for the evening and late-night local news have declined across the country, thanks to viewers turning more to cable programming, the Internet, video games and home video. Viewership has dropped in nearly all the important "sweeps" months of February, May, July and November from 2006 to 2008, according to the latest figures from Project for Excellence in Journalism, released by PEW, a nonpartisan issues-oriented research center.

To fight back, stations in large markets like Phoenix, Denver, Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia are making radical shifts in their local news shows that are becoming apparent to viewers -- changing broadcast times, cutting some half-hour newscasts altogether, sharing equipment, or shutting down news departments entirely.

In Utah, the four local newscasts -- KSL Channel 5, KTVX Channel 4, KUTV Channel 2 and KSTU Channel 13 -- also have experienced some viewer erosion. "I've heard of cases where some organizations are doing 10- to 15-percent reductions [in viewers]," said KSL's news director Con Psarras. "Ours was 3 percent."

In the last year alone, layoffs have been reported at KUTV and KSL, as well as at KTVX, which has undergone the most severe personnel cuts, of about two dozen people.

The resulting financial squeeze across the entire local television industry is forcing less people to do more in a world that is now demanding news more quickly. At some point, according to Al Tompkins at the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank based in St. Petersburg, Fla., something has to give. "I do worry about the constant erosion . . . of personnel and time and the loss of institutional knowledge," he said. "But it is, in the end, a business."

It might be several years before the Salt Lake City metro stations -- the country's 33rd largest TV market -- see some of the more radical changes that have dominated affiliates in larger markets.

As the industry changes and stations work to creatively deliver the news to more viewers at lower costs, what could be in store for Utah's newscasts?

» Sharing one news helicopter

Last month, Denver stations KMGH-DT and KUSA-DT, as well as affiliates in Philadelphia and Phoenix, have begun sharing one helicopter for traffic reports and breaking stories, which can save costs on fuel, helicopter leasing, hangar rental and insurance. "The economy has been indicating for a while that things were not going to continue at the same rate," said KUSA's general manager, Mark Cornetta, who noted that helicopter sharing has resulted in significant savings.

» One pool reporter for news conferences

Stations in Minneapolis, Phoenix and Dallas are combing to send just one camera operator and/or reporter to news conferences and ribbon-cutting-style of events.

"If we have five crews out there covering a press conference, those are five reporters who are now tied up there, as opposed to one pool photographer who can get the video for all of us, and those are four reporters who can do other things," said Cornetta, who is doing that now at his Denver station for events such as Denver Broncos announcements.

But both Tompkins and KSL's Psarras fear such pool reporting will make for lazy news gathering and eliminate the "checks-and-balances" system between independent news organizations. "There's always the danger that you're not going to enterprise the story behind the announcement, not much analysis behind the announcement," Tompkins said.

» One anchor instead of two

Some stations already have gone to one anchor for the morning and weekend news. But could it happen on the 6 and 10 p.m. news?

"The networks are doing it," said KTVX General Manager Matt Jaquint, who still has two anchors on ABC4's 10 p.m. newscast with Ross Becker and recently-hired Karen Carlson. "So would it matter if ABC just has Charlie Gibson or if CBS had just Katie Couric? Does it really change what you see? If you save an anchor's salary . . . you're [talking about] over a hundred thousand dollars."

But for viewer Don Garramore, 50, of West Valley City, a two-anchor desk is part of what makes his nightly ritual of watching Evans and Woodside on KSTU more comfortable.

"To have two keeps it a little interesting," he said. "It puts a more interesting perspective on it."

» More emphasize on local news

This is a direction that local television newscasts, as well as local newspapers, are already taking.

With more news outlets than ever before, from cable to the Internet, TV newscasts have to be more "essential" than ever, Tompkins said. And that means providing more of the local news you can't get anywhere else.

"As long as the news sticks to that, and provides local news to their communities in a timely fashion, the competition from cable networks is not going to be as much of an issue," RTNDA's Cochran said.

» Shift newscasts around or drop some in the mornings or afternoons to draw more viewers with syndicated entertainment programming

For viewer Liz Dalby of Sandy, a move like that would change her morning routine of watching KSTU's morning with her breakfast. "I think it's fun. it's nice and fast and you get it in the morning," she said.

In Utah, for now viewers appear more loyal to their nightly newscasts, as up to 25 percent of TV households may be tuned in to one station's news -- that's compared with only 4 percent of households who are watching a Los Angeles evening newscast.

Perhaps Salt Lake City viewer loyalty can be attributed to living in a place where people have more devotion and commitment to their community, and a more inherent interest in what happens around them. There's a tradition here of a high level of loyalty to the community, as well as a long history "of watching the news as your normal routine," Psarras said.

Whether that loyalty to local TV news can continue in today's ever-changing media landscape is what will keep Utah television news producers worried for years to come.