A common suggestion for good small talk is to discuss the weather. This may be why local meteorologists tend to become regional celebrities. This is definitely true in the Rio Grande Valley, where KRGV Chief Meteorologist Tim Smith is one of, if not the, most beloved figures in the community and it’s easy to see why. He’s charming without being arrogant, funny without being pompous and intriguing without being pretentious. A perfect blend of kindness and knowledgeability.
Originally from the small Indiana town of Batesville, about 45 minutes west of Cincinnati, Tim Smith graduated from Indiana University in 1981. He was working as the morning DJ at a local radio station when he got a call from a college friend telling him about a job opening in South Texas, and he needed to apply ASAP. A local news station was looking for a reporter and weekend weather forecaster. Tim wanted to be a reporter, so he called the news director, who told him to send a tape of him doing the weather. He had never forecast the weather before.
Tim took a chance. Smith drew some maps on poster board and asked a buddy to film him. He went in front of the camera and gave it his all. The News Director was impressed with his creativity and offered him the job. At the time, he had never heard of Wes-la-co Texas but wanted something new.
Even as a new weekend forecaster, people started recognizing him immediately. “Every time I would go out,” he says. “Someone would come up to me and say, ‘aren’t you the new weatherman on Channel 5?!'” At first, he downplayed it, “Well, I’m a reporter. I do the weather on the weekends.”
After a while, he gave up on being modest and embraced his new popularity. When the Chief Forecaster at KRGV retired, Smith was offered the job. He and the station decided what they needed was a meteorologist. Tim started correspondence school to make it official.
He finished school and became KRGV Channel 5 Chief Meteorologist Tim Smith. He hasn’t had a day in the Valley since when he wasn’t recognized — sometimes even as far away as San Antonio and Austin — by people who grew up in the Valley.
Tim decided to embrace popularity. It allows him to do things he really loves, like helping people. The people of the Valley love him just as much, as proven by the constant barrage of “know where you are on the map” memes circulating on Valley social media when a big weather event is coming.
A few years into becoming chief meteorologist, Smith started Tim’s Coats, a charity where people donate coats and jackets to underprivileged people. In the first year, they got 100 donations. A year in, 500. Ten years in, 2-3 thousand. Thirty years in, around 10,000. In 2020, they had to stop taking donated items and switched to cash donations. In the first year, they received $50,000.
Then there is the KRGV Cares closet, which had been on Smith’s mind for years. As a child, he was in and out of the hospital. When he was a kid, he was admitted to a hospital around Christmastime. Someone handed him a toy, and he realized he was no longer scared. It was an experience that stuck with him. What started as a terrifying experience turned into a comforting one. So, he took that idea and applied it to his outreach. On air, he would ask for donations to buy toys. Those toys are taken to Edinburg Children’s Hospital. Every child admitted, gets to pick out a toy.
After 42 years at KRGV, he’s happy with the life he’s made. His advice to anyone who wants happiness is, “Follow your dreams, but take a chance!” He cites the time he risked it all to move over 14 hundred miles on a whim. “If I didn’t like it, I could just go back,” luckily for the people of the Rio Grande Valley, he loves it here and wouldn’t change a thing, except maybe for people to know where they live on the map!
