Tim Tooten, a veteran Baltimore television journalist and nondenominational Christian pastor who founded a Baltimore County church, has died, WBAL-TV announced Sunday night.

Tooten, one of the longest-tenured and best-recognized education reporters in the region, retired in 2023 after 35 years with WBAL and more than 40 years in journalism. In addition to his roles at the station and at Harvest Christian Ministries, a church in Nottingham, Tooten served as an adjunct professor at Loyola University Maryland, where he taught broadcast journalism.

When he retired, WBAL colleague Deborah Weiner described Tooten in a farewell video as the newsroom’s “spiritual center.” News anchor Jason Newton credited Tooten for showing him how to do the job, calling him a “community-loving, people-caring, heart-on-your-sleeve-wearing, all-around good guy.” Tooten signed off in December 2023.

On Sunday, Jayne Miller, a longtime colleague who worked with Tooten from 1988 until her retirement in 2022, said Tooten’s sudden loss sent shock waves through the newsroom.

“The thing about Tim was, he always could see the positive,” Miller said. “And he was particular about that.”

Tooten’s first break in media came in high school when a teacher was looking for young Black teenagers to record a public service announcement for the NAACP, encouraging people to register to vote. It was just 15 seconds, but he said in a 2023 Baltimore Banner article about his retirement that he got hooked from hearing his voice on the air.

He received his undergraduate degree in communications from Florida State University, according to his church’s website. As a working journalist, he earned a master’s in theology from Saint Mary’s Ecumenical Institute in 2007 and his Doctor of Ministry from Virginia University of Lynchburg three years later.

Miller said he deeply valued children’s education and worked tirelessly on stories about what might be impeding their success in school. He was known for announcing snow-related closures using an array of hats collected from a variety of Maryland schools, which later became a WBAL tradition.

“He made it fun and really tried to connect with students, and was truly a champion of education and kids,” said Cheryl Bost, former president of the Maryland State Education Association, a teachers union. “And he was truly a good friend.”

His first full-time journalism job brought him to a station in West Virginia, he told The Banner in 2023. There, he met his wife, Charleen. He moved to Baltimore to work as a general assignment reporter for WMAR. But the job lasted only 15 months before he was let go.

He began working for an insurance company to support his family but did freelance television work, which led him to a full-time job at WBAL in 1988.

Tooten told The Banner his most memorable assignment was working on a half-hour documentary shot in Liberia, West Africa, called “Africa’s Maryland.”

Tooten said the documentary detailed the story of the colonization period when freed slaves traveled from Fells Point to Liberia. He won a National Edward R. Murrow Award and a National Headliner Award Best of Show for it. He also won a National Headliner Award for his “East is East” documentary, a work that “profiled life as an African-American growing up on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.”

Tooten specialized in education reporting and said he enjoyed most of the relationships he built over the years among parents, teachers and administrators. He said he often ran into people who wanted to speak to him at length after his workday was done.

He still loved the job. But Tooten said, when he retired at 65, he knew it had been time to move on.

“I never thought about one day I’m going to retire from this,” he said in 2023. “Who thinks about that?”

In addition to his television and religious work, Tooten is the author of “Leading by Example: A Parental Guide to Teaching and Modeling Christian Faith at Home,” a nonfiction Christian parenting guide. He also conducted media trainings, performance seminars and crisis communications sessions for churches, schools and universities, according to his website.

On social media, Tooten regularly posted streams from his church services and other messages about his faith. In one post on Feb. 4, he advised viewers to yield to God’s plans.

“Sometimes that’s hard to do, because we think we know a lot of things,” he said, looking at the camera. “But know today that God knows everything.”

In addition to his wife, Tooten is survived by his children and grandchildren, according to WBAL. Messages left Sunday for his family and his church were not immediately returned.

Baltimore Banner reporter Liz Bowie contributed reporting.

This article may be updated.