 Good evening and welcome to the 525 live show. We're here at the CCTV and Channel 17 annual holiday party and I am so pleased to welcome you here. We've had quite a year 2016, we've had a couple of elections, we've had a lot of special projects and of course we've had hours and hours of free speech because here at Channel 17, town meeting television and of course all the channels that we serve you with community media on Comcast and Burlington Telecom, we are devoted to free speech and now more than ever this is extremely important. Of course we are very happy because a lot of the time we spend with the next generation who are behind the camera so I'm going to have you guys come over here. I've got Sylvan and Raghav and we have some special recommendations for some special recognition for Sylvan and Raghav because you are a live show volunteer duo. Extraordinary. So you work, yay! So you work on Wednesday nights, is that right? Wednesday nights and you come and help out. Talk about what you do here at the channel. Well, we help out with the cameras and stuff and so we usually come in around 4.45 or 5 o'clock before the live show to help set up and get the cameras running, get the camera shots ready to go on. If it's sunny out we'll put up blockers in the windows so the glare won't affect the cameras and we make sure the guests feel comfortable coming in, coming on camera. We'll help out the director of the live show who's in the control room over there and then yeah. I've directed it a lot of times and like it's fun like he directs a lot of time too because he's like better than me. Well you're both got a lot of skills. So who are the most interesting people you've heard in your shows you've done? Any good ones? I think, I forgot her name, help me out here. Sullivan, I think her name starts with that. I forgot her name but she was talking about the state house and how. Oh Mary Sullivan. Yeah, her. She's here. Yeah, she was like so fun to work with and like and a lot of people were but like she was one of the best. Oh awesome. Well congratulations the two of you. You're fantastic and Sylvan you are going to be a page is that so you're going to get a little more involved in the legislative process this year right? Thank you. Yeah and so I can't wait to see you both back here next Wednesday night. Thanks for all your work. You guys are fantastic. Thanks, thanks. Love you. You're the best. The next generation right here. Thank you. So we have a summer camp that we do. Megan O'Rourke runs that and actually Regav and Sylvan and Sylvan's brother Solomon were a big part of that and we have the opportunity to work with these young people behind the camera and also during summer camp and next year in 2017 we're hoping to do some more documentary training with college kids and we really are very excited about as I said the next generation because critical media skills are again more important now more than ever. All right so we have some other wonderful people. Arnie why don't you come on over Arnie Gunderson is one of our regulars here and how are you? Nice to see you. Nice to see you too. Happy Christmas. Oh happy Christmas and New Year to you. So was this a busy year for you? Yes yes you know I was in Japan for a month and on and on and on yeah and you guys have done a great job by us and you know covered our our work through Margaret Harrington's Nuclear Free and we've spread it all over the world so so Margaret has been she's sitting back there has become an international celebrity because of your station. Well the work that you've done in the area of really protecting us from nuclear power bad decisions in nuclear power is really remarkable because you've been able to provide the science behind the policy positions right? Yeah you know that's important because we're not radical activists we're radical because we know the science and that makes us doubly dangerous. And what's happening in Japan what's the short story on that? Oh my gosh the inhumanity of the Japanese government to its own people is hideous they are overexposing tens of thousands of children and hundreds of thousands of men and women just to get nuclear plants started so they can make some money and it's really sad. In light of the disaster? Yeah I was there and if you can imagine from St. Albans down to Middlebury to the mountains that's about the size of Fukushima Prefecture and it's all contaminated and all uninhabitable. I went to a town like Winooski the traffic lights are working there's not a person that's all evacuated it's incredible yeah it really is. Well thank you for helping to keep our eye and attention on this important issue. Thank you to channel 17 for doing all you do. All right thanks Arnie. All right well covering the tough issues that's what the free speech activists do here at channel 17. Kathleen Swanson how are you? We're gonna get some of our free speech champions bring them up here and have them talk to you. Yeah Margaret Harrington would be awesome we just mentioned her she'd be a really good one. We have some great awards this year. Margaret Harrington is as as Arnie said she's been doing nuclear free Vermont for a long time and not only that but she's been covering a number of issues including the Vermont gas pipeline protests. Here we are that's the party everyone's sort of mingling happily speaking and and that's that's what we like here we like people kind of getting together and having fun because we really need to be getting together and sort of feeling the you know sylvan that other light doesn't work so you can turn them off I think that's fine turn them off that's good there we go I tried to fix it I didn't get it fixed today I tried to be an electrician among other things and you know we have a really wonderful staff here we have Chris we're Sima who's our director and we've got Ned McElaney who came to us from Burlington College he was an intern and we were really able happy to hire him and then we have Kim Vilmaire who is our master control operator and she's really quite something and then of course Dan Higgins just walked in which is just fantastic to have Dan Higgins here he's one of the founders of CCTV now of course channel 17 um covers live covers meetings for seven communities across the region and we're hoping in 2017 to bring more of those meetings to you live and we have Ibnar here Ibnar has got a wonderful show going how are you welcome thanks for coming I know well you crunch and I'm gonna find your beautiful word that we made for you I know I'm looking I'm looking but here it is best all-around engagement oh awesome free speech champion 2016 tell us about your show Ibnar oh goodness um well we've been on for um over a year now I'm trying to count the months but anyway more than a year and um we're we have guests on the show local poets and local musicians and um it seems to be catching hold I'm glad that CCTV has given me the time to get it rolling more guests are coming in and more interesting um topics and diversity in our in our show I think so I look forward to it every single month and I'm so happy to um this is a real honor well we really appreciate the effort and thought you put into that program and so we like to recognize our really fantastic community producers so thank you so very much thank you too so much fun yeah best for 2017 yeah likewise yeah we're looking looking up all right thanks a lot oh yeah I know I know it's nice huh oh yeah we love our warm fires here thank thank goodness for YouTube and warm fires so I just want to also let you know that if you have any requests particular programs that you think would be great for us to be an issue so you think would be important for us to be paying attention to in 2017 we want to hear from you um that's important to us and of course we encourage you always to come and borrow the equipment come and be a live show volunteer or a community producer and uh get your hands on the equipment easy to learn and take it out and get people to tell their stories because that's really what we use our community together in a meaningful way is the stories that we tell each other so we have a number of words I'm just going to let you know kind of who they are because we're not going to see them all tonight but we have Margaret Margaret's here somewhere and eventually maybe she'll come over we have four young women for muslims girls making change and uh we've recognized them for best youth program for social change Lena Genawi, Kitan Wakkar, Wah Adam and Balkeesa Abdi Khadir and they have done some great programming here we really appreciate that Alex Laban who is um he is a new producer here and he gets the award for most enthusiastic field producer Enrique Balcazar who is with Migrant Justice who completed a program last month and put enormous amount of time and thought into it and really got a lot of people to watch it so we gave him the best practice new show award we also have Mark Utter who does a uh a really marvelous show with assisted communication and uh his award is for expanding minds and hearts with innovative communications if you haven't seen Mark Utter's show I really encourage you to see his program and then um we have James Girot and James Girot has um week after week for the past many many years hi Oakley um produced a program on the arts where he goes out and he shoots and he edits and he's moved from analog to digital and uh James is one of our most reliable producers and uh we really um rely on him which is fantastic and then there's Zach Rhodes who who he's great he's got a new fresh communications that's what we're giving him an award for and Sandy Barrett who did one of our most popular programs this year on the history of the electoral college so we're really grateful to all these community producers and all the people that work here hi Margaret welcome nice to see you thank you so much for all your work oh thank you very much Lauren it's it's such a pleasure to be here at channel 17 the Center for Media and Democracy because free speech is needed now more than ever as we saw in this last election year how horrible it was well and free speech is really what knits people together of all different opinions so that we can actually talk out our differences rather than resort to other means what are the means are you talking about sure well I think what the other means I mean is that if you cannot kind of let the steam off opposing political ideas people sometimes resort to violence and and disrespect and you know we need to create a atmosphere of civility and openness to take all the ideas that there are and be able to talk about them and think about them and share them in a way that you can't do on commercial media yes well I feel that the shows that I've done about the nuclear free future about the the horrible danger of nuclear weapons and nuclear power and then the shows about the fracked gas in Vermont are valuable give valuable information because the guests are knowledgeable and unfortunately the guests in the fracked gas issue are people who have been displaced from their homes because of the fracked gas pipeline coming in from Vermont gas from the oil sand the tar sands of Alberta and unfortunately the last the last demonstration they had down at get prex park they did that in union with the Dakota pipeline protest and they got some attention from the media they got attention from here from channel 17 and and they were on my show focus but attention has to be paid to the people who are they actually are losing their homes because of this because they can't live with the fracked gas pipeline coming through their property and the politicians are not giving them support the local politicians are not giving them support and the our our our national our senators and and the representative welch are not giving the fracked gas people support and there is a big problem with the public service board and the department of public services regarding that and so that when you when you listen to the people who are in the know you you find out a lot and you can see that we're in a very bad state and I have to draw attention I have a wound on my face because I was hit by a car here in Burlington I was in a crosswalk and I was just crossing the street and somebody went through a stop sign and I mean if that and and then they didn't stop to to give me the information insurance information and everything like that so on that level people have to to shape up and be responsible accountable to each other and that's part of what channel 17 is is doing and so well we want to recognize your coverage of the vermont gas line vermont gas pipeline protests and all the work that you've done thank you very much of these issues thank you so much margaret thank you very much your free speech champion not just in 2016 in all the years thank you so much and thank you channel 17 thank you thank you margaret herrington so we are having a nice time here at this party and we would take your calls except the phone has disappeared I'm not quite sure where it is but we have the lovely sylvan behind the camera he's got some what do you got in your pocket there you got something he's got his snacks oh I thought you had your snacks in your pocket and I'm you know I'm just wondering if anybody wants to come and be interviewed but of course they're all sort of having such a great time so I think what we're going to do is we've got the idea about the awards we got sylvan here I got Solomon it's also walking through the room and I want to thank everybody for all your support here at channel 17 thank you so much for watching and stay tuned here do you want to interview me all right we're guys gonna interview me all right how do we go hey everyone hey um you make a lot of tv don't you yeah yeah so so what do you um show us every day what do you like to do uh in your fun time am I fun time hey that's a really good question I like to I like to organize things that's right you keep chewing it's all right I like um I like to swim I like to do yoga I like to sew I like to go out hiking all right okay I know you've got if you're gonna like there we go awesome I like to do all kinds of things what do you like to do in your free time make youtube videos yeah where can people find your youtube uh on youtube do they have to look anything up yeah they just have to look up uh a regapo crowd oh yeah okay and um what do you do here at channels 11 team I am the person in charge of making sure that everybody's well taken care of so I'm the executive director at CCTV so I kind of just look out after everybody make sure we have enough money and make sure everything's going the way it should be going why do you like to do this job you know I knew that I had to work in free speech from when I was really young it's sort of like you like I had a pretty good idea of what I needed to do and what path so I it's for me it's not even a matter of liking it or not liking it it's just what I do which is this important work which helps other people be able to get their voices heard and um you know I have like certain political views that were shaped by being a young adult in uh Burlington and I was here when Bernie Sanders is mayor and so I feel that part of what we're doing is part of a tradition of progressive values that are also really important to continue and that's what this work is part of so when you want to ask her a question I think I'm good good standing over there with the vest with the gray hair the gray hair in the cup could you bring him over yeah that'd be awesome we'll have Dan Higgins who's one of our founders come on yeah that man that would be great we could do that television calls television calls the fire isn't your your yule log thank you you look glamorous and I like the uh the holiday touch on your microphone it's a good holiday touch so um how was your 2016 2016 blur I just lose track of the numbers you know it all kind of blurs you get retired and people say how's your weekend all right weekend you know those things don't mean a lot so 2016 is just a continuation of I guess all the numbers I don't I don't break I don't break into small compartments time anymore it's just it's it's more like time is the present so you spent a lot of time in our sister city port of cabezas are you going back there to Nicaragua this this winter I'm hoping very much to be back there this winter and it would be great to bring some people from Burlington I've got about four people that have expressed interest we have a number of people down there that we can connect with their counterparts as you know we haven't gotten you down there yet but we we have had some of your staff and some of your your camera people down there that's right that's right Solomon was down there in port so uh that was this would be probably a February March time period which is a great time down there and not such a bad time to be out of her month exactly so and there've been you know you've been going down how long 25 years almost more than that 30 you know but it's it got blurred I think I first went 1986 wow so it would be 30 years and there have been a lot of changes because I do count in small increments so I can make that math happen you are good at that one of the changes was when we first went down there if you wanted to contact someone in Burlington you had to walk over to the Catholic priest's house and he was a ham operator and he would connect with a ham operator in the states who would place a phone call to Burlington and hold the receiver up to the radio microphone and that was how you communicated with Burlington and then and then one one day and again I don't know where in that spectrum everyone had a cell phone they skipped landlines totally that's amazing and they're connected and has being that connected changed their culture oh yes yo yes yeah they're all it's like here they're all on their on their phones you know the idea of face-to-face contact or the drifting which I like which is you just get up and you say I'm just gonna walk the streets and see who I run into and you always run into whoever you have to run into but you run into other unexpected people well with the cell phone there's no unexpected you call the person that you want to find so it's like the the loss of the library cards in the library a little bit too well and it's also how we watch um consume media we go to the just the thing we want as opposed to drifting around and seeing different ideas I don't know and I think as far as I drift a lot do you have an open mind but you click on tv you watch something and you click and you jump and you I think there's some drifting I think I have completely stopped watching television well I don't actually watch television anymore you've moved on to uh well you always were way ahead of what I like about going back to Puerto Cabasas is I have a few skills that are still relevant um which which which gives me a sense of accomplishment you know and I can talk about things that I'm comfortable talking about that are new to them um but I get kind of lost in and some of what's discussions over here yeah but it's wonderful to see your Christmas party thank you and our and our fire it's kind of nice your fires yeah I don't get too close to that I know you like fires too so you're probably not so convinced by this one I like outdoor fires yeah I do this guy scares me they're awfully close to those curtains thank you Dan uh happy what is your anniversary 84 this is 32nd year next June will be 32nd year yeah yeah and for channel 17 we started in 1990 so this is the 26th year of channel 17 excellent it might be time to go into retirement it's been a glorious history it has and you were there always thank you Dan Dan Higgins Dan Higgins is my mentor at UVM so if you can believe that and we have Aaron Malone who is our board member Aaron Malone how are you hi lg hi guys so I have something for you so um we had a big w formal words you want to hold that up yep and uh we put that w and Aaron's new willard street market which is also momo's market so it could be a w or an m depending any way you want you can come and visit this the corner of north street north willard 141 north willard right that's uh absolutely right we're open all the time so just come by check it out exactly so you wanted a little historical context for the w so that's there you go you can put that right there next to the next to the w so everyone knows what it is um it's not everybody immediately recognizes that because this is kind of an icon and when did it come down well that's a really good question because it doesn't have a year on there but it came down probably 20 years ago would be my guess yeah late 90s nice and that was a great story didn't you well you grew up in S.A. so you went you went absolutely I remember an institution yeah the real institution they had the um place to eat that's when people see the w and recognize it that's the first thing they talk about is the um the lunch counter yeah and then they talked probably about the pet shop part with the goldfish anybody mentioned that um no not yet not till right now that's where after a gear exchange has all his second hand stuff but that was that was the pet shop and the I think you know other utility things but I remember the fish tanks that's awesome you know the blue backgrounds and the little bubbles yeah yeah yeah I well worth was great it's too bad we don't have any stores like that around Burlington anymore you know the kind of utility stores yeah there's not really any um and it's funny to think about uh church street and the commercialization and you're like well actually it kind of was commercialized even then 50 years right by Woolworth's yeah I'm a national brand yeah exactly so um thanks for being on the CCTV board oh you're welcome it's it's good to serve the community I think uh now more than ever it's important to support free speech and uh CCTV has all the the programming and the access to different community members to learn kind of whatever part of what's going on whether it's government or organization so it's an excellent resource and I think it's good that we represent a lot of different points of view absolutely absolutely and or just unbiased representation of what's fact which is often boring meetings that are really long that aren't edited but the truth is in there the truth is in there if you can stand it well thanks so much thanks algae all right Erin happy holidays guys thank you thank you well thank you so much we're just really glad that you could be here with us today and um for all of you out there I'm thinking of Dale Tolotsin in particular happy Christmas happy New Year's and thanks for watching and thanks for being part here of channel 17