 I was waiting for my countdown, I'm sorry. No countdown today. I told you this is not going to be formal today. So welcome to live in 525 here on channel 17 and welcome to the CCTV holiday party. We thought this would be a great opportunity to recognize all of the hard work that goes into getting channel 17 on the air and also the other divisions of CCTV such as cyber skills in the Old North and tech centers. So I'd like to further ado to introduce Lauren Wendividian to get us rolling. Hey, well, it's great to be here. It's the holiday party. It's the shortest day of the year. It's a big full moon. It's a great night. And here we are with wonderful friends and supporters and volunteers in the audience. There you go. There you can see George Dunbar right in the front. There he is in the front. George Dunbar is the chair of the channel 17 trustees and we have a number of other wonderful people in the audience. But what we first wanted to do was start with an award of recognition to Carol Mater who has served on the channel 17 Board of Trustees for 10 years and has resigned from the town of Colchester and will be leaving us although we're hoping to keep her on the channel 17 trustees board. So we'd like Carol to come up because we have a beautiful plaque here and a gift for her for her next stage in life. Carol. Now we know that being on TV is just you've been trying to avoid being on TV for 10 years. So here you are. Great you're here. And we want to thank you so much for your 10 years of service, being a treasurer, counting the money, making sure that we're solvent, making sure Delphia pays their bills. And you do a really good job of it. We may have to keep you for that. And we have a little gift here because we know how much you love sea lions. So this is your fabulous parting gift. So thank you so much for everything. We really appreciate it. And is there anything you want to say about here? I'll give you my mic. I get kind of overwhelmed at these goodbyes. But I will try to make it through one more. I think I hear the baby. The star of this show. When I started in 1989, I think Channel 17 was run primarily out of the living room. And then we got Delphia funding. And as you can see we've made leaps and bounds and come as far as we have. And I'm just so grateful for that. Nat and Lauren Glenn have obviously been the stable anchor of this whole organization and given the reputation that we currently have. But I think that they both agree that it's staff volunteers and everybody here that really makes Channel 17 what it is. And our goal is government access. We're not anybody who's certainly not going to get rich at this. It's really a labor of love. And I've just been really proud and humbled and very glad to be a part of it all. And with that, thank you. Thank you, Carol. Yeah, okay, that's great. I love that. All right, so I'm going to turn it over to Jess and Nat who are going to give some certificates of achievement and awards out to some of our wonderful volunteers. Hey, okay. I'll be right back. Okay. I've got to bring the child on television. Okay. We'll start with Jonathan. Jonathan Barizzi, Channel 17 cameraman. Where is he? So I got to tell you, Jonathan not only just runs the camera once in a while in the studio for the live show, but he also came up with the idea of some promotion for Channel 17, which is very rare. Channel 17 has no public service announcements on television. It doesn't, you know, put ads in the paper or anything. But Jonathan came up and said, why don't you put a poster around town? And so we said, gee, that sounds like a pretty decent idea. So we made up this poster and Jonathan is going around and put up, I don't know, 150 of them or so? 200? 50 every couple of weeks. And actually, in the last city council meeting, I think Matt Gardy, who used to be a Channel 17 representative, was telling us how he was sick and tired of having to go around town and rip down all these old posters. I hope he's not ripping down the Channel 17 ones. But anyway, we've made up these little certificates of achievement and appreciation, and there is yours. And thank you very much. And I think Jess is going to hand out some more. Yes, I have some more, Nat. And I think it's important to mention that this live show that you see every evening at 5.25 is staffed by volunteers. Volunteers run the cameras. They direct the broadcast. And without them, it wouldn't be possible. It's certainly not the money to pay the staff to do all these sorts of things. So we have many valued volunteers. The first one I'd like to call up is Carl. Carl jokes. Come on up. Carl leaves. There he is. There he is. Thank you so much for all your hard work. Carl is here on the cameras every Monday night. We also have, who's running camera 2 right now, David Schoolcraft. David, come on up. Very much for all your hard work. And next, our newest volunteer, who just came in for his first night on Tuesday night, Tom Azarian. Come on up, Tom. Very good. And your volunteer. So if you keep throwing Christmas parties like these and recognizing you on your second night, I suppose you'll stick around. All right. Thanks very much, Tom. Thank you. Come on up. On camera 1. What day is he here? Thank you very much. Excellent camera person. And we also have Tyler Dion. Who doesn't want to come up here. Come on up. Come on up. Tyler actually is also, he's one of the participants in Channel 16. I don't know what you call it, but it's a student show. And they've done one, which is really great. And I hope you guys see it. I don't know how often it runs on Channel 16. All the time. All the time. Good. But it's really great to see all these, they get, it's a show where kids are talking, which is a real treat. And so I hope people tune in and catch up. And Tyler volunteers on Wednesdays and Thursday nights running camera. And he has agreed to start directing. So as of tomorrow night, Tyler will be directing the broadcast that you see on Thursday night. And we thank him. And I have one final one for Alexis Holloway, who's only been a volunteer for a month. And now is a formal member of our staff. But we thought we should recognize all your volunteer efforts for the past month. And it's always nice when we can hire a volunteer on staff. So thank you. That's all I have. But you have a little something more in it. Yeah. So I'm going to go around this side though. Doug Chiaffi. So you got to come up right here. Right here. Yeah, right here. Right there. That's your little close up. Put a microphone on. Yeah, you can put a microphone. Now I got to tell you, no one in the world is getting a single Christmas present from me this year. I have put all my energies into you. So Doug has worked for, you can turn around too if you want. We're not going to do anything for a minute. But Doug has been actually an integral member of Channel 17 forever since it started. Even before. I first met Doug when he was sitting. We have a, I think we have a video of it, but I couldn't know where it is. Anyway, he used to come out and sit at the city council meetings, the same chair, meeting after meeting after meeting. And since I was there, meeting after meeting after meeting, I started to get to know him a little bit. And then when Channel 7, that was when CCTV did these meetings. It was on Channel 15. Then we started Channel 17 and Doug, I guess, wanted a job. So we put him behind a camera and he has been off and on for ever since. It's been 9, 10 years? Well, I'm glad he isn't around anymore. Too long, yeah. Too long. And not only does, so not only has he volunteered for the live show, but he has shot the meetings. You know, all these wonderful meetings. South Burlington was his beat for a long time. And he, not only that, but he watches also. So, and not only just for his own entertainment or benefit, but he will, if the channel, if, you know, if I've made a mistake and I didn't put a tape in or something, he'll call me up at home. And I don't mind it if it's at 2 o'clock in the morning because I'm usually up then. But it's when he calls it like 8 o'clock Sunday morning. That is too much. Anyway, every Christmas, Doug has come up to me and said, where is my Christmas goose? He wants something back. No, I wanted a goose. Well, can you come over a little closer? Can you come over a little closer? This? Well, you're a little nervous, aren't you? No, no. Someone's got to get that phone number. He's not gone. On that monitor. Anyway, I really, I have, I called the Vermont Department of Agriculture to try to find a live goose. Oh, the cats will love it. This is not actually a live one. They'll eat it anyway. But I, I was this close to getting a live goose in the studio. Wow. And if Chris will bring that phone number, we could actually call them up and she will, and this person will talk to you. Take it out, take it out. Well, it's, well, it's a goose, you know, I mean, it's a, it's a cooked goose. It's not cooked. It's frozen. It's heavy. It is, very heavy. There is your Christmas goose. Thank you. Thank you very much. I'll, I'll wear it well. Well deserved. And I did get you a present that I would like to present to you, which is something to remind you of the old days. Oh. A package of cigarettes. That's very kind of you, Doug. You're going to have them right back. You're welcome. Thank you, Nat. So we have no problem with the call, but anyway. Wow. That is true. I found someone who has a live goose they would have brought it over, but we didn't have anything to carry it in. Ah, wow. We would have, we would have been quite something. Ten more years. Ten more years. I would just like to say that the reason I like Channel 17 is, I'm, I'm a sort of a political junkie, and I've been interested in local government. Ever since I took my first course with Andy Newquist back at UVM, who was the dean of local government. And I've, I've been to lots of town meetings and city council meetings, planning and zoning meetings and things. And to me, that's, that's where it's all happening. Where you can see democracy work. And although Chris thinks it doesn't change much, that's the beauty of it. There are rules and procedures and laws that have to be followed in a certain order to it. And in a society that sometimes lacks a lot of order. I think you can find it as a local government level, whether it's a zoning board meeting or a planning commission meeting or city council meeting. And hopefully Channel 17 is going to get into holding live or CAPE committee meetings or legislative meetings in Montpelier, either the center or the house. And then people will be able to see how that body operates. I mean, they pretty much know now, thanks to Channel 17, how a select board meeting goes or city council meeting or a planning commission meeting. Because usually the only people there are the people on the board and the camera, except for, you know, if it's a hot issue, there's a lot of people there. I think Channel 17 does a great service in bringing local government to the people. And that's what it's all about, is having people interested. And I don't know how many people I've talked to who have been elected or appointed to various town offices around Chittenden County that said they got interested by watching it on Channel 17. And they learned the procedure and, you know, how things go. And they put the name in for an appointment or ran for election. And I think they do a great job, although most people don't watch every meeting. If you do catch the ones that you're interested in for whatever topic is on, I think you'll get a good sense of how the government works at the local level. And I want to thank Nat and Lauren Glenn for allowing me to tape all these meetings and run the live show for years. That's no compensation I might add, but I did learn a valuable skill. Good. Great. Thank you very much. Thank you, Doug. Thank you, Doug. Thank you, Doug. So I don't know whether we... does anyone out there who is sitting around want to say anything? Richard, anyone? Zimmi, you can go up to... Zimmi's got a microphone, which you'll point at you. Well, I think this is an absolutely delightful little party that we're having here. But it's just really very significant if one just looks back and you really have to know where you came from to where you're going to go. And I remember this station on Lafayette Place or what's it called? Lafountain Street. And to see that we now have a studio and cameras and volunteers and stuff is absolutely magnificent. And what Doug had to say about bringing government to the people is a very significant kind of thing, and I'm glad to be a part of this. Thanks. Jim, anyone else? Not Jim. Okay, well, I guess... That's going to wrap it up. That's going to wrap it up. Stella has not been on TV yet. There's Stella Rose to your wake. She doesn't like the lights. No, we don't have to get her started with that yet. Mic her closely. There we go. There we go. Close up of the child. I spent a lot of time adoring the child. Here we go. All right, that's fine. That's enough adoration. Thank you. Any closing comments? Tom, I want to say anything. There's our Channel 17 for people. Dean Shaver is our Burlington representative. Oh, I know. And Tom James is our Essex representative. And we're very fortunate to have all these municipal leaders who set the policy for Channel 17. They spend a lot of time, and they're in the middle right now negotiating with Adelphia Cable. We really need to give them a lot of credit because they give this channel legitimacy and guidance, and we appreciate your time. So thank you very much. You know, the other thing we did forget is that a lot of the cyber skills tech center people were here at this party, and they ran out rather quickly when the live show started to get near. So Matthew Tenney is actually the director. You didn't even get the certificate. Maybe Tyler can take a shot of Matt. He didn't want to be up here. He's probably, he can actually block himself out. Come on, Matthew. Chris, there we go, David. Good. Matthew Tenney is the tech director at the Old Northam Community Technology Center, and he's also been directing and working here at CCTV and Channel 17 for the past several months. So we're very fortunate because he continues to volunteer. And for those of you who don't know, we run the Old Northam Community Tech Center, which is a place where you can get computer training and computer access for a dollar a day. Yeah. So that's one of our projects. And CCTV is 15 years old this year. So we're in our 16th year. It's quite exciting. Jess, thank you very much for holding that mic. No problem. And I'm going to let you guys wrap up.