CHEK TV weighs anchor with a fresh face on Monday's newscast, welcoming journalist Jim Beatty.

The 44-year-old Beatty will anchor the news from 5-6 p.m. and from 6: 307 p.m. on weeknights. He comes to CHEK after seven years as the Victoria bureau chief for CTV, during which he won a Jack Webster Award for his coverage of B.C.'s welfare system.

"I've been learning the staff, learning the people and the computer system, doing some rehearsals," said Beatty, who officially joined CHEK two weeks ago. He said he already knew many CHEK staffers from their work in the field, where he divided his time between the legislature and pursuing stories elsewhere in the city and all around Vancouver Island.

Prior to his stint at CTV, Beatty spent almost a decade at the Vancouver Sun, concentrating on legislature coverage.

He said moving to CHEK TV appeals to him because it is a "new challenge."

"When I left the Sun, I thought 'Life is a ride' and sometimes you've just got to take the opportunities that come up."

Beatty said it was a bigger leap in many ways going from the Sun to CTV because he had never done any broadcasting. He said he is comfortable moving into the anchor's chair, but intends to remain a member of the press gallery and do some of the key interviews that come up.

He said one attraction of the CHEK job is that it will normalize the amount of time he spends at work, something his wife, Diana, and boys Ben, 12, and Nicholas, 9, will appreciate.

"My kids were thrilled that I'm not going to have the travel that I used to have."

Beatty's hiring follows the departure of Scott Fee, who took a job at Global Calgary last fall. CHEK news director Rob Germain said Beatty has a wealth of experience and will fit in well at the station. "He's got a great presence on the air. First we got Tony [Parsons] to come to CHEK, now we've got Jim, so we've got some of the best, I think, in the business."

Parsons is on the air at 10 p.m., while Stacy Ross leads the noon news and will fill in for Beattie when he is away, and Skye Ryan is the weekend mainstay.

Beatty's roots in the media go back to his hometown of Toronto, where he attended Ryerson University and earned a degree in journalism. From there, he was hired by the Sun, and initially assumed he would end up back in Toronto after a few years out west.

"But I moved out here and fell in love with Victoria, like so many others," Beatty said. jwbell@timescolonist.com