Family Week at GCTV

On Monday morning, "The Dukes of Sports" host Russ Brown brought his father and grandchild with him to the studio for a taping. Russ' dad made a wonderful guest commentator while his grandchild finally got a chance to see where grampa makes his tv show. The staff, meanwhile, appreciated the chance to meet some of Russ' family.

Thursday morning's "Local Bias" shoot was also a family affair in a way. Dr. Andrew Blais interviewed Paul Richmond---a local writer, poet, publisher, and activist. Paul also happens to be the host of "Imagine" on WMCB 107.9-lp FM. You'll be able to see their conversation on Cable Channel 15 within the next two weeks.

Airing on GCTV now are two interesting pieces of programming that came from local government events held Tuesday evening and Friday morning. Our Station Manager recorded the Special Greenfield Town Council Meeting (in which the councilors discussed upcoming repair work on the middle school roof) on his way home on Tuesday and our New Media Producer came in early on Friday to attend the swearing in ceremony of Greenfield's new "Special Police Officer". Both of these videos can also be viewed on our homepage.

While our New Media Producer was at town hall, the rest of the staff was assisting the Greenfield YMCA as they recorded two new shows in our studio. Keep an eye out for them during the coming months.

No More Foolishness!

After we recovered from last week's hijinks, we got right back into the swing of things.

"The Dukes of Sports" kicked things off on Monday morning with Mike Cadran assuring their fans that he wasn't going anywhere and "Valley Homegrown" finished up the day recording a show with a band called "The Demographic". "The Dukes of Sports" will air on Cable Channel 15 at Noon on Saturday and you can watch "Valley Homegrown" tonight at 9PM.

Tuesday was government day here at GCTV! Another candidate who is running in Greenfield's Town Election on June 14th came in to record their video statement and, in the afternoon, we played host to some of the folks participating in National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. Northwestern District Attorney Dave Sullivan was joined by Franklin County Sheriff Chris Donelan, DEA Agent Joe Karas, and Community Coalition for Teens Coordinator Kat Allen for a discussion about the details of this project. You can learn more about it by checking out the story on our homepage.

Our studio was once again in use almost all day on Wednesday. "Dance of the Hoop" shot their second episode in the morning, Mayor Martin brought in some special guests from GCC in the afternoon, and that evening one of our volunteers filmed a scene for his movie in our control room.

Things quieted down a bit on Thursday and Friday but there was still a lot of editing going on. In addition, another candidate came in to film a video statement and Joe Gochinski was joined by Springfield City Councilor Mike Fenton for an interview that will air in May.

Even as our staff kept track of all the productions going on this week, we were planning for the Preliminary Election Debate this coming Tuesday night (April 12th, 7pm, in our studio) that will feature all three of the candidates vying to replace Dan Guinn as Greenfield Town Councilor At Large. This event is open to the public so please show up and be informed.

Providing Access in Many Ways

Empowering citizens to make their voices heard, and keeping the public informed about local government and community events, is the cornerstone of what we do here at GCTV. This was a banner week for that beginning on Monday morning with a special episode of "The Dukes of Sports". Russ & Mike's guest, Carrie Togneri, filled the guys in on her upcoming fundraiser "Ice Stars for Wounded Warriors". They talked about local skating events in general and how she became involved with this one.

On Monday evening the Greenfield Town Council held a Special Meeting in our studio to debate sending a proposal to the state legislature that would allow the town to skip a preliminary election and put all three certified candidates for Town Councilor At Large on the June 14th ballot. This was democracy in action. Voices from all sides were heard and you can watch the discussion for yourself on our Video on Demand Player in the "Local Government" category.

Wednesday afternoon brought Atty. David Roulston and five guests into our studio to record two episodes of "Franklin County Matters". First, Western Mass. ARC Executive Director Ed Porter sat down with Dave for a one-on-one about the resources available to people with disabilities and an upcoming fundraiser. Afterward, Genevieve Fraser, John Waite, and two local farmers joined the host for a roundtable discussion about the Farm to Schools program which puts local food into the hands (and mouths) of area youth.

On Thursday and Friday our back room and studio were shut down during construction as part of a series of ongoing facility improvements. Many of these projects are geared toward allowing more producers to work at the same time without disturbing each other. The next time you're in our office, be sure to poke your head back there to check out the new digs.

Finally, we've created a new space on our "GCTV/WMCB Notices Only" bulletin board (on your right when you walk in our front door). A "Coverage Opportunities" folder has joined "Show Sponsors Requested" and "Guest Possibilities" hanging from the bottom of the board. Not everyone who has an event or show idea is willing, or able, to produce it. If you're looking for a project, make sure to check out this collection of press releases for great local events and emails from people who have ideas for shows.

Productions in Full Swing!

Our studio was in use Monday through Thursday this week providing a location for five shoots, several tours by prospective producers, and a couple of meetings.

"The Dukes of Sports" started off the week with Director Sam Pyfrom filling in for co-host Mike Cadran and showing off his knowledge of, and enthusiasm for, professional wrestling. Just after "The Dukes of Sports" crew left, Joe Gochinski was joined on his "The Western Mass Democrat" set by State Senator Ben Downing for an interview about the local impact of state politics.

Tuesday began early in the morning for our station manager who arrived at nine for a meeting and then at eleven gave a tour of our studio and production facilities to a producer who hadn't been here since we were manually editing VHS tapes. In the afternoon, the crew of "Franklin County Matters" taped a show with local singer/activist Quickchange about her life and featuring her latest work.

Wednesday saw us setting up for the Greenfield Town Council Meeting using our new set pieces. They seemed to be well received by the councilors and we hope the audience liked them too. Recently promoted to full time Production Assistant Philippe Simon found that the new tables allowed him to get things ready for the town council by himself and much more quickly than before.

Finally, on Thursday morning Fred Goldberg shared his ideas about education with Dr. Andrew Blais on "Local Bias".

With all of these folks in our studio, lots of equipment going out, and several programs being edited, it was a very busy week and our staff is happy to be going into a three-day weekend.

Another Busy Week

Turkey Day is coming up and we'll tell you more about our plans for it later in this post. In the meantime let us take a moment to reflect on this week's events.

On Tuesday night, the Greening Greenfield Energy Committee (GGEC) held another of their workshops in our studio. This one, on reducing home energy costs, featured speakers from MassSave, Community Action, the Town of Greenfield, and Franklin County Home Care who introduced attendees to free programs, grants, and low interest loans. In the category of "It's a Small World", the evening was moderated by GGEC member, and WMCB host of "Various Voices", Daria Fisk. The audience came away with many good resources and enjoyed the refreshments provided by GGEC volunteers. If you missed it, be sure to watch it online as part of our Video on Demand Player at GCTV.org. It can be found in the "Special Features" category.

Another program available to watch online is the Greenfield Town Council Meeting that we broadcast live from our studio on Wednesday night. Once again the councilors moved through their business with thought and humor. They quickly dealt with issues relating to Greenfield's 2011 Fiscal Year Budget Tax Classifications and then spent quite a bit of time looking at a proposal for an Agricultural Preservation Restriction on the town farm. Though the latter matter was tabled until the next meeting, in order to receive more information from the town planning department, our local government representatives were able to disagree with each other and yet make jokes at times. This video is in the "Local Government" category and Thursday night's school committee meeting will be joining it soon.

Finally, we get to our T-day sneak peek. We alternate filming the annual Greenfield High School vs. Turners Falls High School Thanksgiving Day Football Game with Montague Community Television. They film it when TFHS hosts it and we record it when it's one of GHS' home games. It's our turn this year which means that Russ Brown and Mike Cadran of "The Dukes of Sports" will be doing a pre-game show on the field that will be full of fun facts about this historic local rivalry and what to look for this year. Keep an eye out on our homepage on Monday afternoon for a few words from Mike and Russ as they get ready for this great event. If you can't be there in person, the game will be broadcast on Cable Channel 15 beginning at 6:30pm on Thanksgiving. Be sure sure to check back here on Thanksgiving morning for a special blog post regarding other traditional holiday programming.

What is Block Scheduling?

The topic came up this week because we are going to be switching time slots for two of our regular programs. Here at GCTV block scheduling means that we try to program certain parts of our lineup so that the same type of programming airs in a regular spot each day.

For instance, if you tune in on any weekday at 1pm you will be watching one of our Polka shows and at 2pm you can check out a variety of historical content. We hope soon to have the 9am weekday position filled with different sports and physical fitness programs. To further that goal we will be swapping the rebroadcasts of "Eaton do Ryu" and "The Greenfield YMCA Presents" beginning next week. The 9am lineup will now be: Monday-"Eaton do Ryu" (martial arts), Tuesday-"Dukes of Sports", Wednesday-"The Greenfield YMCA Presents" (aerobics & other activies), Thursday-"Eaton do Ryu", and Friday "The Greenfield YMCA Presents".

Additional block programming segments include rebroadcasts of recent town meetings, or large public events, on Saturdays at 1pm and a full day of religious and spiritual programs on Sundays. We also focus on bringing you new and ongoing content, from active producers or local sponsors, in our prime time slots from 5pm to 10pm Monday through Friday.

We're done!

Thanks to everyone who followed along on our blog today. As you can see from this picture we are cleaning up, so the office should be back to normal on Monday morning---just in time for the "Dukes of Sports" shoot.

New! Weekly Wrap-up

We put our heads together here, after the tempestuous time we had last week, and decided that posting a synopsis of life at GCTV each Friday wouldn't be a bad idea. (It also might be cathartic for our staff.) To that end, I bring you, (dah, dah!) the first GCTV Weekly Wrap-up:

Our week started as usual on Monday morning with a "Dukes of Sports" shoot. Producer, and co-host, of the show Russ Brown brought us a huge bag of freshly popped popcorn---for which we thanked him greatly. (Always feed the bears in our office!) The only event that marred this day was the final fallout from our technical heck week in which we found that the March 11th Greenfield School Committee Meeting's video file had been corrupted beyond saving.

Tuesday was a boisterous one around here, with about twenty students from Federal Street Elementary School in our studio to help Jonathan Mirin's Piti Theatre Company film "Salmon Falls". Piti Theatre's website describes this show as, "an interactive theatrical event where audience members ages 5 and up are invited to help us tell the Deerfield River's story with movement, song and storytelling." Tuesday evening, a different group filled our studio. The Greenfield Kiwanis Club held their monthly meeting here, and got in some camera training, ahead of their two day auction extravaganza which will be shown live on Channel 15 on May 5th & 6th.

Four shoots rounded out our production week---"Encore Body Art" & a Greenfield Town Council Meeting on Wednesday and "Local Bias" & "Healthbeat" on Thursday. The town council meeting lasted 3-1/2 hours and Alicia would like to profusely thank volunteers Jal, Donna, & Shawn for going the distance. (A belated thank you goes out to Tom Roulston who stepped in at the last minute, last week, to run a camera for two hours at the Greenfield School Committee Meeting.) Al Norman was Drew Hutchison's guest for the "Local Bias" episode that will begin airing on Wednesday and be on the lookout for April's "Healthbeat" which will focus on Advances in Obstetrics and National Volunteer Month.

So far, today is relatively quiet, though I know I shouldn't really type that. Check back next Friday for the second installment of GCTV's Weekly Wrap-up. ---Alicia

Russ Brown in costume!

Russ Brown, co-host of "Dukes of Sports", had a cold and missed the Masquerade Party last month. Our intrepid reporters here at GCTV were, however, able to get a hold of a photo of Russ and his lovely wife, Mary, in their costumes on Halloween. Enjoy!

Franklin County Fair Parade Coverage

Don't forget to tune in on Thursday, September 10th, at 5:30PM for LIVE coverage of this year's Franklin County Fair Parade. Our usual hosts, Russ Brown ("Dukes of Sports") & Tom Dillon (Dillon Chevrolet), will be joined this year by Russ' new co-host on "Dukes of Sports", Marisa Dalmaso-Rode. Marisa adds her winning personality to the great commentary by Russ & Tom.

NEW THIS YEAR! Check back here tomorrow for EXCLUSIVE, WEB ONLY, CONTENT from the fair parade. "Local Bias" producer & host, Drew Hutchison, will be walking the parade route and bringing us interesting stories and pictures from inside the parade itself.

Finally, once the parade has concluded we will join the Greenfield School Committee Meeting, which starts at 6PM, live---already in progress.

Work on the Upgrade has Begun!

Yay! Within minutes of the "Dukes of Sports" wrapping their shoot this afternoon, Scott, Jal, & Philippe began taking apart the old studio cameras and removing outdated equipment from the control room.

For those of you who don't know, during the last few weeks, Scott spent a lot of time in the back room testing the new equipment. Here is what his work area looked like:

Keep checking back for more upgrade updates!

The End of An Era

Randy Lively has left the building. GCTV would like to bid a fond farewell to “Dukes of Sports” co-host Randy Lively who filmed his last show here on Monday. Randy is going to be spending his well-earned retirement living on the Cape and, though he’ll miss doing the show with Russ Brown, he won’t be driving back and forth every week to tape it. Randy and Russ together have given us almost eight years of great shows and a large amount of underwriting through their sponsors. All we can say to this wonderful team is THANKYOU and ENJOY THE BEACH RANDY!

In related news Russ Brown is searching for a new co-host and plans to tape a show on Monday. Stay tuned to find out who will be joining him!