Dennis Owens, Alive After Five by Lisa Hummel “I love my job. I wake up everyday saying I can’t wait to go to work.” So says Dennis Owens co-anchor of WHTM ABC-27’s “Live at Five.” And it is that enthusiasm that makes Owens one of the most familiar faces in the region. On and off the television screen, he is an ardent advocate of the community and can often be seen out and about enjoying the city life, participating in charitable events and fundraisers, and exploring the “little towns and little communities that are a patchwork quilt that make up Central Pennsylvania.” Originally from the Philadelphia area, Owens comes to Harrisburg via Bakersfield, California, where he spent some eight years behind the sports desk. His first job, the experience in Bakersfield proved to be a steppingstone for what Owens originally thought was a move to a bigger market on the East Coast. “I always wanted to come back this direction. I think when I first came here I thought that this would be my entry into Philadelphia or to Baltimore, or to Washington, or to Boston, or to New York, and Harrisburg is a good jumping point to all of those places, but the thing is, as I’ve been here I really like it — I’m close enough to those places but there’s a lot of good things about Central PA, too.” At home amid the region’s mix of rolling hills, clean air, and the metropolitan feel, Owens has been a resident of the area and on the air at WHTM for the past eight years. But he wasn’t always a news anchor. For the first six of those years, Owens was a sportscaster, broadcasting the latest news, events, and scores of the sporting world. And while that position was what he had set out to do, Owens has no reservations about having branched out to “Live at Five.” “I always loved sports and that’s where my greatest knowledge was, but I’ll be honest, as I got into sports and did it for a long period of time, you’re kind of doing the same thing over and over. If it’s July you’re doing this, if it’s November, you’re doing this, and there was almost a Groundhog Day feel to it: I’ve done this,” said Owens. “And you can always do it better, I’m not saying that, but it’s a lot of repetition and there were a lot of other things I was interested in.” Owens now has the opportunity to have fun watching the sporting events he enjoys — namely those involving Philadelphia teams — and thrives in being able to unearth a story involving something other than wins and losses. Although it is a news program, “Live at Five” is more human interest and light hearted than the average news show. Not that it doesn’t cover serious topics or breaking events, Owens asserts, it just does more than rehash the same top stories over and over, preferring to inject “some positive news” in between. “You’ve got enough bad news out there, there’s plenty of that,” said Owens. Instead, the “Live at Five” crew searches for the profiles, adventures, and news stories that involve the people of Central Pennsylvania. “The idea of our show — and I’m not saying we succeed everyday, but we’re trying — is to get out and show some of the positive things going on in these areas and towns,” Owens said. “We do every major story, but we also try to reach out and do some of these other things.” During his tenure on “Live at Five” Owens has, among other things, undergone Lasik eye surgery on live television, skydived, and spent a night as a re-enactor at Gettysburg. But what he enjoys most is the chance to tell a story. “Some people can walk with blinders on, but I’m always looking. There are story ideas everywhere,” he said. “Basically every day on television, I’m meeting new people and doing new things.” In his years in broadcasting, Owens has interviewed such notable names as Muhammad Ali, Al Gore, Michael Jordan, and Joe Montana, but counts among his best interviews those he has done with people no one has ever heard of. “See, there are names and then really, this is the other thing that is kind of my niche, finding off-beat local stories, like the man from Harrisburg whose father was in the Civil War. I much prefer those kind of stories to ‘oh, did you interview Paul Simon?’ or whatever.” In his off time, Owens enjoys traveling, “working out a little bit,” and going out to the local establishments. A big fan of music, Owens attends local concerts, and is especially fond of Frank Sinatra. He also clocks in a fair amount of time lending his help, and his name, to local causes, something he considers great fun. “I have a thing, I never turn anybody down unless my schedule has conflicts. I think that it’s important to give back and I know that sounds hokey and athletes say it all the time and it’s usually disingenuous when they say it, but it is very important to give back to the community,” he said. “I’m not rich or anything, but I feel I’ve been blessed. I don’t have a million dollars to hand out to people, but I can give my time — that’s one thing I can give and that’s one thing everybody can give.” Where does he see himself in the years to come? Owens doesn’t have an answer, particularly given the ever-evolving state of modern media. “With the Internet and everything, I don’t even know where television is going to fit in in 10 years, it’s changing so quickly … television is no longer the player that it was, at least it’s evolving or its changing. So I’m not sure where the future lies, I’m just hoping that somebody — whether it’s television or what — somebody has a place for a nice guy who amuses people … or at least tries to amuse people.” A nice guy, “the kind of guy you want to bring home to mom,” Owens considers himself to be driven and curious, two characteristics that have no doubt helped take him this far on his path. And whether his path extends any further than this area, it seems that, for now at least, Owens is happy with the life he’s discovered in Harrisburg. “I came here thinking it was going to be a springboard into something else and found through the course of living life here that I love it, that this can be a destination. It doesn’t have to be a place to go to get to somewhere else.”