There is no way that not having a dedicated reporter on board is due to weight! I have flown hundreds of hours at above 9000 feet doing ENG with myself a cameraman, a reporter and sometimes even a radio operator on a 206 L3, and that with an hours worth of fuel, helicopter being fully equipped with GyroCam and MW transmision equipment, so if it can be done at 9000 feet, I'm sure it can be done somewhere else that is much lower.
Then next, I think making a the pilot the reporter (or the other way around) is the stupidest idea newscasters have ever had, even in Markets where tha news is a little slow.
Lastly midair collisions can happen to anybody anywhere, and any pilot who has flown for a while has had at least a couple of close calls, so don't just focus on the fact that they were doing ENG.
I flown for years on the ENG market where when there is any good news scene you always have at least 3 and up to 7 helicopters in that particular spot, all below 800 feet, but we also had a lot of coordination, such as when we arrived on scene, first thing we did was announce what "flight level" were wer going to use, and by flight level I mean we would call out for example "I'll be at 8,500" and the other guy would maintain 100 above or below, and due to the fact that we can't hover much because we are very high, we would constantly circle and cross each other all the time.