 So, we're having a really great time here, we do this party every year and we also recognize some of our community volunteers like Bob Neal, who we're going to do a little award for tonight and Antonio Nardoza and some other folks who are to be recognized for the work that they do as volunteers. We have some, would you get Bob, he's right there, he's right there, sitting right there. Bob. No, right there, here he is, here he comes. He's usually behind the camera, but tonight he's going to be in front of the camera. You're usually behind the camera, I know that. I like to hide behind the camera, I look better there. Well, you look great here and we appreciate all of your work. You've been volunteering here for about a year, right? Almost two now. Is that right? Yes. Time is flying. It flies when you're having fun. So, tell us a little bit about the work you do for the live show and the other projects that you've been working on. The live show is basically, I can help set the studio up, operate cameras, turn on lights, give them when they're too bright, things like that, just, you know, they're little things but it sometimes takes, you know, three, four pairs of hands to make a good show. I think the folks that sit out here at the desk do a lot better job. I think content is so incredibly important, especially the way that, you know, the city and then the state is going right now. You just worked on a little documentary. What was that about? It's called What Costs Justice. It's a look at the amount of money spent at the federal, state and local level on the criminal justice system, the courts, law enforcement and corrections. And what did you conclude? That there's a lot of questions that need to be asked, that I certainly didn't have time to ask in a one-hour show. And hopefully once the program airs, folks will start calling their city council members and their town select board members and say, why are we spending all this money and what are we getting for it? And especially the reps in Montellier. So you have a background in media, don't you, in TV? I've worked in television at one facility or another here in Chittany County, almost continuously since 1974. This is like 40 years for me this year. Oh my goodness. You've seen real changes in the industry, haven't you? Oh my gosh. When I started in television, I started at Vermont Public Television. It was Vermont ETV back then. And they still had 16-millimeter film and 35-millimeter slides in the control room and two-inch videotape and black and white cameras. I was there for their transition to color. And then 1987, I started over at Channel 3. They were just taking film out of the control room then and installing one-inch tape. So now there's no tape at all anymore. Everything is all digital. Yeah, and high-def. And high-definition. What a nice improvement that is. It is, but we're going to need a lot of makeup, really, when that kicks in, right? Oh, I don't think so. No. No, I think it can all be managed with lighting. Lighting is such a skill, and there aren't very many folks who are really skilled at lighting. And that's, you know, if there's somebody out there who knows how to do lighting or is taking classes and lighting, this would be a great place to practice and share some of that knowledge with us. Because you can paint some wonderful sets with lights. I've seen it done, but I don't have the skill to do that. I've never taken a course in lighting. Well, I appreciate all that you've done, Bob. We wanted to thank you for your years of service. Thank you. I appreciate the dedication that you bring to the work. Thank you for letting me come in here and tromp around and play with all your equipment. Well, it's public access. You should be able to do that. Well, everybody can do that if they're interested in it, and that's the cool thing about this place. That's exactly right. Thank you so much. Thank you. Happy New Year. So, Antonio was sitting right there. I'm not sure where he is. There he is. Antonio's right here. There we go. I just want to remind folks you can call us if you wanted 862-3966. We're celebrating the New Year. Antonio, how are you? Good. So, you started volunteering here at Channel 17, and now you're working with us. Yeah. I'm field producer now, and a few minutes I'm going to Winnowsky DRB to cover that. Do you like Winnowsky as a community? You like covering them? Yeah. Yeah. I like it. It's very good. So, what do you think about normalizing relations with Cuba? What do you think about that news that came yesterday? Well, I am from Puerto Rico. I don't know if it's going to affect the relationship in the United States and Puerto Rico, also the economy in Puerto Rico. So, let's see. But I think it's very good, I mean, that the United States and Cuba have a relationship and start an economic relationship again. It's been a long time. Yeah. A long time. My whole life. Yeah. Exactly. 53 years it's been, I think, and I'm 54, so I'm very excited about that. And yeah. It's great news. Yeah. So, tell us what you like best about working here and volunteering a Channel 17. Well, I like the people here and what we do here. One thing I really like is know what happened in the communities in Burlington, Winnowsky, also Williamstone. I like what happened there, the issues, and know more about the people here in Vermont. I really like that. Well, I'm so appreciative that you've come and worked with us. We're very blessed to have you. We have a little recognition for you. Oh, thank you. Yes. I just need to find it. Here we go. And thank you. You're a 2014 champion of free speech. Yeah. So, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. And happy holidays. Happy holidays. Have fun in Winnowsky tonight. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks. Ciao. So, thanks everyone. We're so glad you're watching here, the Channel 17 party. I think we've got a little shot so you can see what's going on. Kathleen Swanson is here with me, and I'm going to have her come on the set. Kathleen's our development director here at CCTV. Welcome. Hello. How are you? I'm fantastic. It's really great seeing all our supporters here for CCTV and Channel 17. We have a great crew. I thank everybody who supports us and give us our love, and if you want to give a gift to CCTV, you can do it online at cctv.org, or send us a check. That would be fantastic. I think our over $4,000 right now. Great. So, that would be fantastic to continue the work that we do, especially with BT and the Common Good Vermont project. We've had a great year. We have. Yeah. Thanks, Kathleen. So, Aiden actually is behind the camera, and I have a little award for you. So here we go. I have an award for you, and you just, it's okay, you come out here for a second. We'll stand in front of the camera. I won't move. I won't move. I'll stay right in the frame, and Aiden has been with us for a few years now. How many years have you been volunteering with us, Aiden? I think five now. Five? Is that right? Yeah. So you were much smaller at the time. Now you're like a big man. I started working here when I was 11. You were 11? Yeah. Oh my gosh. Well, we have a recognition for you to thank you. I understand. Oh, we're good. Kathleen's doing a good job there. Tell me about why you've been here for five years, and why this is a beneficial place for you to come. I've always been interested in just film and television industry, and I walked in one day and just wanted to do some work with it. And Matt, you've been working a lot with Megan? Yeah. And helping with the summer camps? Yeah. Getting the next generation? Yeah. Well, it's been just awesome to have you here. I just love when you and Avery come in on Wednesdays, and it's like a breath of fresh air just walking right in here. So thank you so much. Thanks. Have a good holiday. All right. Get back to work. Okay. We'll let Aiden get back behind the camera, but it's just a blessing for us to have him with us. It's been a great, great opportunity for all of us, all the people that come in and volunteer as much as they get out of the experience. We all benefit really deeply. So we've had quite a big year here for 2014. We've done a number of different projects. One of them is the Civic Cloud Project, which is a public computer internet space that we've built so that we can post all of our video on it here at CCTV and Channel 17, but also community content so other folks can put their archives and start to use this cloud for higher purposes. So we've been really excited about that Civic Cloud Project. I think it's a major step forward in public access in the digital age. We have Donna Jacobs with us. Donna is one of our wonderful talents. Hi. Hi. How are you? I'm really good. I'm great. So you are a very special volunteer because you have helped behind the camera and in front of the camera. Yeah. I started out as a camera operator by accident. I walked into this building not even, you know, actually wanting to be in this position and then technical director and then host. So it all, and I'm now almost three years later. It's been wonderful to have you. What's been the benefits for you to be here, Donna? I'm meeting a lot of people out in the community, broadening my horizons on what I have learned through people in the community. And I think just the skills that I've learned, the technical skills, big, big plus. And just learning, you know, having a lot of support and friendship in this right here. Yeah. It's wonderful. And we wanted to give you a little recognition. A little 2014 champion, actually 2015 champion all years. We know you're going to keep working with us. So we got, we got all the years on there. So thank you so much. Thanks. And we hope you have a really good holiday. You guys too. Bye. Donna. Bye bye. Now, you know, a program here at Channel 17 would not be complete without my friend and co-founder, Richard Kemp. Richard, good evening. Good evening. It's nice to see you. How are you doing this kind of stuff? I think about 31 years. Oh, 31 years. Yeah. A long time. And it's, it's always a pleasure to come here and see all these folks that are doing what you can't do in the commercial world. That's right. Increasingly difficult to do in the commercial world. Yeah, listen in. When you can say anything you want to say. That's right. And have your own program if you want to. So what have been the more interesting programs you've produced this year? There have been many. Anything stand out? No, I forgot. They're all kind of interesting and it's always kind of interesting, you know, the whole interview process with people and stuff. And I will continue to do it and find some interesting people so that when you ask me that question again, I'll have an answer. Well, last week you interviewed Steve Goodkind who's running for mayor. Yes. That's right. Yeah, the day after he was endorsed. And that was, that was pretty special. And those are the kinds of things that I think that make it worthwhile being involved with public access is the fact that again, you can say what you want. You can bring on who you want and you can also provide DVDs from places far and wide and put it on. Or near and far. And near and far. The name of your show. And I'm so glad that you're doing this 31 years. Keep it up. Thank you. Richard Kemp. Richard is a long time volunteer. He produces near and far and that program runs very frequently to show at least one show a month here. And they're always really interesting and provocative guests, which is one of the great things about public access television is that you've got guests that really shake things up and speak about subjects that you don't normally hear about on mainstream television. And that's, I think, a very important value of public access television. So you know, Kathleen, if you wanted to round up maybe Dan Higgins or any other luminary that we have, we'd love to talk to some of the folks who are the founders of CCTV who are still around and still kicking and still producing really interesting projects. In fact, Dan just did a really interesting photo series in Winniski. We have a little community listserv called Front Porch Forum. And Winniski has one and Dan did a photo exhibit of the different folks that posted on Front Porch Forum. And it was a great show. He's a little reluctant to come, but we'll get him on here eventually. So come on, Dan. I want you to... Hi. Hi. Nice to see you. Happy holiday. Happy holiday. Happy solstice. Solstice. We've got solstice coming right along. Sunday. The light is coming back. It's always a good time. We are ready for it. It's one of the best days of the year. I think so, too. So I was just telling the folks about your photo show that you did on the Front Porch Forum posts, and I wanted to hear...maybe you could just talk a little bit about what prompted you to put together these photographs and a little bit about the show. Sure. Front Porch Forum, the world is becoming more and more virtual in that people get their information and they learn about people more and more from the computer, from the internet. The Front Porch Forum is like that. And Front Porch Forum, I think the way Michael designed it was supposed to be small neighborhoods. But in Wynusky, we fought for having the whole town be on the same forum. So as a result, I don't know how many people there are, but it's the whole town. And a lot of people, a big percentage of the town read Front Porch Forum. And so you have all these postings and you get to know people by name only. And I wanted to put a visual component to these stories, these people. And I did. It's fascinating for me to kind of start with a...as a photographer, I sometimes start with a picture and then look for a story. These were starting with stories. People post things like we had a tree in our yard for the last 150 years, but it's dead and they're cutting it down. Doesn't anybody want to come for sculpture? Or, of course, there's a million lost cat stories. I tried to avoid some of those. The Wynusky Roundabout, a lot of comments on that. And so the idea was to start with these very interesting kind of local comments. Find people, ask if they would collaborate on the making of a portrait that involved whatever they wanted to say about themselves and would somehow relate to their story. Then you put the show up and then people came and looked at that, right? That was the same true part. Yeah, everyone said, is this going up on the internet? No. It's not going on the internet. We had the Block Gallery, which is right in the center of Wynusky. Beautiful big space, big walls, good lighting, and Lorelai Harris allowed me to put my show in there. So we had 28. I think we ended up with 30 large framed pictures that had the photographs and the writings. People poured in there the whole five weeks it was up. What was fascinating was people knew names like Terri Zigmund, for example. She's a local artist. She signs her name T-E-R-R-Y and she puts a posting up almost every day, thought for the day. So everyone knows the name Terri Zigmund. The number of people that came in that saw her picture and thought, I thought Terri was a man. So it was sort of breaking your internet anonymity and giving it a physical space of someone who actually lives in your neighborhood. That was great. That's the two- to three-dimensional part of the work. Absolutely. And it was a lot of fun meeting people. And the stories are just zany. You could say these stories are so trivial, but they're so interesting. They're not the big ... Well, there's always the F-35s and some of the big political stuff. But the little stories, we have a tree we love and it died. I mean, just give those stories some images. And people, those are what is important and that's what nicks communities together. It's what ... I suspect that the stories combined gave a really unique sense of what Winozki is about, too. Because it is a little different than, say, the North End. So another way to try to make sense of what this funny little mile-square community is that we all love. We do. I do, too. Thank you, Dan. And congratulations on ... Thanks. We had a big year. We had a big year and we had some great people here. And we just could not make this happen without all these wonderful people. I know. It's been how many years now? 1984. 1984. My mother's on the phone. Oh, great. I hope you do it on air. Okay. We're going to do it on air. Here we go. I will. Thanks, Dan. All right. Here we go. The speaker. Hold on. How am I going to do that? Speaker. Hello. Hi. Hi, Mom. How are you? Hi, Mom. This is your mom. It's my mother. How exciting. How are you? Are you in Florida? How's the weather? Oh, lucky. I will. I'll be down soon. I'll be down to see you. We're so glad you could join the party. Okay. We'd love to hear it. Okay. I'm calling to, I can see you talking, seeing as well. And that everybody has good intentions for our wonderful CCTV. And therefore I want to be sending you everybody's name. Nice. All the volunteers and all the staff and all the boards. I'm going to send you all a Christmas gift. Because I know that it's going to be well spent. Yes. Very carefully. Now happy holidays. Everybody but a special special to Dan and Jay CTV. And thank you for all your dedication. And I love you especially. Thank you. I love you especially. Have a great holiday. Thanks, Mom. I love you. Bye, sweetheart. Bye-bye. See, I could not have done anything without the love of my mother. Future media makers are good. And then if you find Nat, you can round him up. Okay. You can accept on his behalf. Future media makers. Aiden, come on. Come talk to me. Forget the camera. Just talk to me. How are you? Cameras. You don't have to worry about the cameras. You're talking to me. So, you know, you spent some time here in our office because your dad makes everything happen. He's like the tech IT go-to man. And thank goodness for him. Because then you get to come and hang out here. What's your favorite thing to do here? The little candies? No. The scores because, you know, you can do that here. We let you watch non-public access TV movies. We love that. Drawing. You do some great work on the drawing. I'm so glad you get to come in. And you know you're welcome anytime. Okay? Okay. All right. I'll see you later. Okay. Jane Nodell. Hey. How are you? Hey. You're a little jealous. I left my antlers. I know. I could get you some more if you want. I love those. I know. And so we're with Jane Nodell. Jane is a member of our board. She's also a member of the city council of Burlington. And she has many other important roles in the community, including teacher that doesn't have to teach because the semester's over. Well, actually, today I finished everything up. I decided, okay, I gave my final exams. Okay. But then some of them might want to actually know what the answers were. Yeah. And so I did answer sheets for my final exams today. That was very nice of you. Yeah. And so I had a note and said, for those of you obsessive enough with macro theory to actually look at this while you're on vacation, here's the answers. Some of them will. That's good. Some of them will. Yeah, yeah. You had a good classes here. I had a really fun time. Well, because now you get to teach about financial crisis and great recession and why the government, you need the government to participate in the economy. So what about normalizing relations with Cuba? I was excited. But then my first question was, does that mean we could just go anytime we want? And the answer was, I think not really. Not yet. Not yet, but we're moving there. Yeah. I think it's great. I think Obama's like, if you guys aren't going to participate, you know, cooperate with me, then I'm just going to do stuff. Right. Right. I've got two years to do good things and that's what I'm going to do. Well, I'm really excited because we went to Cuba and we had a really, it was an interesting place, wasn't it? It was fascinating. It was 1992. Special period. Special period. They were just breaking. Well, the Soviet Union had kind of cut them loose. And so they were having to make a go of it on their own. And they had had some crop failures. So they really didn't have very much. No, they were eating very basic food stuffs and wearing old clothes. But they still, you know, they're prioritized education and health. Those are their priorities. So the literacy rate is really high and everyone was in pretty good shape. Yeah. The people were in much better shape than the buildings. Yeah, exactly. The buildings were kind of decrepit. It's kind of like we said, you know, in much of the United States, it's kind of the opposite. Our buildings are great. Beautiful buildings. It's like Burlington Town Center. Yeah. We're going to create these beautiful glittery spaces while, you know, people are, you know, not making it. Outside. Outside of those spaces. Yeah. Well, I really found, I was saying, actually my mother just called, but she was all excited. She said, it's not an easy trip. Like going to Cuba is not like going to Puerto Rico or the Bahamas. Yes. Because it's hard. Right. It's harder work. Yeah. It's harder work. But I was, I thought it was really cool that Senator Leahy went down, got up at two o'clock in the morning, was there. Did you read about that? I knew he went. And they went to get him, like, you know, right, they put the plane down and they get out of the plane and they walk up to the guy. Was it gross as his last name? Yeah. The plane now. Like, we're getting on the plane now. Like before someone changes their mind. Right. So that is, that's some high drama there. Well, and they didn't take off until the Cuban people were landed. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So it was a lot of, it sounded like the whole negotiation and everything was very intense. Yeah. It was kind of a breakthrough. So it's kind of like maybe some good things can happen in the rest of the world too. Yeah. This we're hoping for in 2015, right? Exactly. Hope is what we're going for. Keep hope alive. Exactly. Well, I want to thank you for all your support of CCTV. I'm a big fan as you know, and without CCTV, Burlington's democracy would be nowhere as vibrant as it is. And so we need to keep it going. We will. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Jane. Bye. Bye. Jane Nodell, great supporter here at CCTV. So we're having a wonderful party. I just want to let everybody know that you are welcome here at Channel 17 anytime. We are one of your community access centers and we are part of a network of 26 centers across the state and hundreds across the country. And here is Greg Epler Wood in our last three minutes to talk about. Hi. Hi. Your hair is great. It's great. Tell us about the vibrant network of public access in Vermont. Oh my gosh. You ask the easy questions, don't you? Yeah. You got a minute. Okay. Well, let's see. Who am I speaking to? The general public? We are. Your people. Okay. Vermont has 25 official paid salaried public educational governmental access centers, just like you're watching right now here at Channel 17 around the state. And there are a lot of exciting things happening. And I actually want to do a little footnote here and ask you to help us understand here in Burlington what's happening with the low power FM project in cooperation with our ETN and VCAM. Yeah. It really was the lead and they've gotten a permission for WBTV to go on the air. So that was a Thanksgiving where the FCC gave them approval. 99.3 FM. Okay. And it's going to take about, what, two years to get it up and running, something like that? Yeah. Yeah. It's a good development project, but it's a good alternative form of community media. Yeah. And it's going to be a non, it's going to be non-competitive with existing radiator and WRUV because it's going to draw on a lot of the same kind of public access programming and community local programming that is already done on 17, 15, 16 and 17. Right? And I can't wait to have a radio show on it. I know, I know, I know. I know, yeah. And all these people have great faces for radio, can have their own program. Afraid to be in front of a camera? Yeah. Yeah, this is going to be great. Yeah. Yeah, well that, and I was mentioning the Civic Cloud Project, which we worked on this year, which is really an alternative internet sandbox, if you will, for people to create new applications for the gigabit pipe that we have that Burlington Telecom offers. And then of course we have the Keep BT Local campaign, which is really important that we hold on to our network as closely as possible as a public asset. We have about three years to get that all settled too. Hopefully maybe before three years it might get all settled. Yeah. And at $10.6 million it's a bargain. It's not $33.4 million anymore that we owe to Citibank. That's right. It's only $10.6 million. So we could find that, can't we? I think it will be, I think it's possible to preserve that asset. And then the other news is that we at Channel 15, VCAM or ETN and Channel 17 are talking about how we might move together in a deep collaboration possibly a merger. So that's other work that we're doing because, you know, we have a common horizon that we need to plan for and be more efficient. Sure. So we've got a lot to look forward to. Absolutely. High definition, streaming on the internet. And democracy for all. And absolutely, democracy for all. Free speech. Thank you, Greg. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you everyone for watching here at CCTV's Holiday Party. We'll just kind of cut to the party as we close so you can see what's happening. Everyone's mingling. Everyone's talking. Everyone's sharing ideas, which is really what we hope for. We really depend on people to come and be part of this exciting network of free speech and democracy because without free expression, we have no free government. So thank you so much for watching. And thanks for joining us and have a great 2015 and feel free to come here and use our resources or any of the resources available across the state at your community media centers. Happy New Year.