TOWN OF BEDFORD
BCTV BOARD MEETING MINUTES
January 24, 2008
BEDFORD MEETING ROOM
Present were: Terry Wolf (School Bd Rep), Chairman Gene Mackie, Bob Thomas, Dick Rawlings, Mike Izbicki, Mary Lou Wilson, Coleen Richardson, Bill Jennings, Mike Robinson, and at 7:35 Mike Sills.
Chairman Mackie opened the meeting at 7 p.m.
Chairman Mackie said on behalf of the Board we offer our prayers for Claire Sills, her husband Mike is one of our Board members and Claire was in a recent traffic accident on Rt 101 and the Bedford Police and Fire personnel did an amazing job rescuing her. We wish the family our best. Secondly the Board offers condolences to Councilor Paul Roy for the passing of his father, our deepest sympathy and our thoughts are with you. There are also two men that significantly impacted my life since I came from the recording studio, John Stewart and he wrote 400-600 songs and he passed away in California. In the years to come people will recognized him as being a musical genius. The other person who wasn’t very tall in stature, but strong in volunteerism for those of you who knew him was Ernie
Tatro. He volunteered at the Red Cross for about 20 yrs, he was a Hospice volunteer and Ernie was a compassionate individual and he will be missed.
Chairman Mackie said our first item is to opened this meeting to the public for comments, but seeing no public this evening, we will go on to our regular agenda.
OLD BUSINESS - Approval of the October 4, 2007 Minutes.
Mr. Thomas stated that on page 2 there is a correction to be made the wrong phone number was listed for BCTV. It should be 472-4288, not 472-8888.
MOTION made by Mr. Thomas to make that change. Seconded by Mr. Rawlings.
MOTION made by Mr. Thomas to accept the minutes. Seconded by Mr. Rawlings. Vote taken – all in favor. Minutes from the October 4, 2007 meeting accepted.
STRATEGIC GOAL - UPDATE
Chairman Mackie said on our Strategic Goals, I know of one subcommittee that got together. Ms. Richardson asked before we begin, do the Subcommittee meetings need to be posted? Chairman Mackie said no, not when the subcommittee is made up of two people. Mr. Izbicki said a subcommittee to Town Council has to be posted, but not to a Board. Ms. Richardson reminded the Board that we did post meetings in the past. Mr. Thomas said we did post the subcommittee meetings when we were changing the bylaws, I remember we did post those meetings. Chairman Mackie said some of our Strategic Goal subcommittees have only one member.
Chairman Mackie said well our subcommittee is two individuals and we met for coffee, one is Councilor Izbicki and the other is myself. I will pass these out handout for the Board to review (passing out handouts). We tried to come up with an acronym that seemed to work and in talking about it we decided on the word EPIC. One of the things we came up with, with both of us coming from a business background is that acronyms really seemed to work. In talking about this what we decided was the word EPIC and the meaning being Educate, Promote, Involve and Communicate and that is what we try to do here. I know over the years that I have been with the Board and with BCTV that we have been doing that. It is important to educate the people out there about BCTV, and the tremendous talent we have
and the equipment and the facilities. We have to be able to promote the facility. We have to involve people. All the education and all the promotion does not work unless there is involvement. We have to communicate to our community that BCTV exists, they should know it. The latest stats we had was that 75+% of the Town is on cable.
Mr. Jennings said 84% of the households in Town are on Comcast. Chairman Mackie said that is amazing. Mr. Jennings responded that is very high. Chairman Mackie said I bet there are not others in Towns that are our size. That is just amazing.
Chairman Mackie said what we have done and what I just passed out are the ideas and thoughts that Mike and I came up with as to how we can promote BCTV to nonprofits and just some ideas. This is something for you to look at. I do not know if it is something we want to go through tonight. We do not have meetings all that often.
Mr. Izbicki said it is worth going through and just highlight some major points.
Chairman Mackie said one items we thought would be good is to take advantage of the Town Council, Town Mgr, Board Chairperson and Board members to promote BCTV. We now have, I guess the luxury of being to do some spots that we can insert between programs that we were not able to do for a long time. The concept would be for example to visit Russ at his office and talk to him briefly about BCTV and his feelings and why he thinks the residents of the Town should utilize the facilities to promote their organizations. We can do that with the Town Council members, although they get a lot of exposure at the meetings. Mr. Izbicki said we get good ratings.
Chairman Mackie said it is probably one of our highest rated shows we should promote BCTV during the Town Council meetings.
Chairman Mackie said the second idea was to take 30 and/or 60-second spots using representatives from the organizations already producing programming for BCTV. Again they can say how it has helped their organization and what they have been able to do. So it is organizations talking to organizations and sometimes that works. We are trying all different things.
Mr. Jennings responded that these are some good ideas and actually what you can do is have those organizations do a 60 second promo on their organization. Chairman Mackie said absolutely. Mr. Jennings said people will start seeing that and you will have others say, I want to do one of those. We do a lot of thing with different organizations now, but not on a consistent basis and this certainly, now that we have the capability one way of keeping a representative from the respective organizations showing face during the bulletin board base of our programming.
Mr. Izbicki asked, so what do you do, do you invite them to do this or do you do an outreach for these people. Mr. Jennings said yes, we know a lot of these people. Ms. Richardson said we did that during our Open House one year. Ms. Wilson said we did that during the Open House and I called every single organization and no one took advantage. Ms. Richardson said 8 out of how many organizations took advantage. Ms. Wilson said I called every single organization and I went to many of the meetings for those organizations. Twice I have talked to them. I sent them an e-mail and then a week ahead and we still didn’t get anything.
Mr. Izbicki asked, why is that. Do they understand what BCTV can do for them? Mr. Jennings said they understand what it can do. There are a lot of people who are afraid. Ms. Richardson said they are volunteering already and they do not want to take the time because they are doing other things. Ms. Wilson said I also think the organizations have their own little network and people that they feel they need to focus on are very networked.
Mr. Jennings said we have the bigger organizations. We work very closely with Bedford Men’s Club and the Rotary and the Lion’s Club. We work with a lot of the leagues. We are working right now with the American Lung Association. We have those, it is like okay who do we pull out of the woodwork. Do you go after the Quilt Club and we had some conversations with them. I think what we found is there are a lot of shy people out there. Gene was the host and I know you had to pull some of the information out of them.
Chairman Mackie said with all the work that Mary Lou had done, we had 10 that signed up and 8 showed up, 2 didn’t respond and the 8 were enthused, but I do not know how many came back again. At that moment they were enthused. I just think it is important for organizations unless they want to be so close knit and want to micro target a group of people, they want their word to get out as to what they do. Just the fact that this organization is having a meeting, if you do not know what they are all about.
Mr. Jennings said take the Lion’s Club it is a perfect example to use as someone who is actively involved. They keep it in a controlled environment if the organization wants to do something in the studio; we work with them very heavily. If they want to start going out. Camp Allen they are aware of us, but it is not going to be a 10 minute interview, but if we can get a 60 second sound byte. You will get that out of Paul Bordeleau. The 60- second spots may actually work, but they will promote their own organization, which is fine.
Chairman Mackie said they can also get the other organizations to come in and see the facilities and meet us. Mr. Jennings said after the years of being here, I would love to say, yes the Rotary Club. We have worked with these organizations and you cannot get them to come in. With the Rotary Club we were actually going to see what they were doing down in Mass they had a Rotary Show and profile their members both internationally and nationally and then there was a special guest. Like, Mike Izbicki, Mike come on in, Mike is the owner of blah…Tell us a little bit about and they went beyond what we think we can do properly because certainly as a nonprofit you have more flexibility, but one of the shows they went into this Rotary Club members store, a Craft Show and she took them around the whole
facility. She showed them what the business was and that is an extensive amount of work which really borders on Commercialism which is an exposure for us as a Department, but every single one of the clubs, especially the Rotary Club is losing membership the changing of the guards the older member are trying to draw in new members. The 60-second sound bytes or 2 minute sound bytes, we have done two things that we have put up on the line. We have done “Fund the Field” and the “Bedford High School Booster Club”. Hopefully when people start seeing the spots they will start coming in, but you have to reach out to these nonprofit organizations.
Ms. Wilson said so Bill, do you feel you have already done some of these? Mr. Jennings said yes we have. The Bedford Men’s Club has a couple of things for us each year, like it is time for the “Live” Candidate Debate or if they have something coming up they will have Tom Green and Ken Hawkins come in with stuff like the Christmas tree sale. The Lion’s Club comes in with stuff about Camp Allen.
Ms. Richardson said that the Women’s Club has come in with their Birthday Celebrations. We have had quite a few Boy Scouts come in and the Girl Scouts with their Cookie sale. Mr. Jennings said most of these groups come in when they have something.
Chairman Mackie said the approach that we were thinking about here, is to have them utilize the facilities here and come in and state that we use BCTV and to let other groups know that if you have a message to get out come visit BCTV. Mr. Izbicki said just keep playing their message over and over.
Mr. Jennings said if we think of the spots, just like the Bulletin Board that is running right now only it is graphics. What is easy for us to pursue this is if someone wants to go out and get after these organizations to come in, which we have done that in the past. It is just like any business you can go back to those customers if you do not get a response and ask them again. Maybe we can ask them to come in here to do a spot at the studio. I feel to load up the cameras and go out to their location it is a lot of work. So if it is a lot of work for a 60 second sound byte, but who knows where that may lead.
Ms. Wilson asked can I just ask for a clarification and maybe you can help me with this. What is, we as a Board, what is our responsibility? Chairman Mackie said the basic responsibility of the Board is a policy making function that is the primary function of the Board. Ms. Wilson said isn’t this actually hands on and administrative types of things that the staff should be doing not the Board. Chairman Mackie said this came about as a result of our facilitation sessions basically it was coming up ways that the Board can help promote BCTV and make better use of the facilities, but this was a goal we had coming out of the session.
Ms. Wilson said this is a lot of work, are you saying pick a couple of items? Mr. Izbicki said just pick some of the ideas. Chairman Mackie said we could even just try one. Mr. Jennings said Mike Robinson you have been on TV quite a bit. If we did a spot where I am the host and Mike talks about his program and I got involved with BCTV that would be a good spot. Mr. Robinson said I would love to do the first promo, but come up with a standard script, make it simple like, Hi I am (fill in the blank) I am associated with (fill in the blank), I am a huge fan of BCTV come and check us out. If your at an event with another organization you can ask them if they wouldn’t mind reading this script it will promote your organization and drop those segments in and
you’ll get the kids out there saying hey there is Daddy or Mommy on the screen promoting their event. That is a great idea.
Ms. Wilson said I don’t know how much time this would take unless you can get someone to do the filming and editing, I think asking Bill and Coleen to add to their list of duties might be overwhelming. Chairman Mackie said our intent was not to add work for staff. Ms. Richardson said but that is what you are doing if you’re having them come into the studio. Mr. Jennings said what we can do is to tell our volunteers when they are out doing a show to ask the organization, oh by the way can you read this and we will get a 30 second or 60 second spot. Mr. Robinson commented if you just have the script in his bag.
Mr. Jennings said before we had the new system we had to assign a deck as we didn’t have the server and now we have the software so the Bulletin board has becomes more of a program than a public service between programs. I am looking at this saying we will program a ½ hour the music comes down and up comes the sound byte. Ms. Wilson said I like that better than the crawl, either listening to the news or reading the crawl. Mr. Thomas said at the subcommittees are throwing ideas up on the board. Some are new ideas because we have the server and we are Bill and Coleen will come back to the boa4rd and say we need volunteers. Mr. Izbicki said a whole bunch of ideas and hopefully 4-5 will stick and these are what we want to focus on. Mr. Jennings said we have tested things out and we
tested the server now we can take this and move it up the priority list because everything is now working. This is a communication media center and the best way to reach out is to use what is available. I think it has a lot of merit to it and excitement and invitation is the best form of flattery. If you start seeing people up there like Russ Marcoux or Mike Izbicki “Hi”. Chairman Mackie said I am waiting for the next generation then all we have to do is get a picture of somebody. Mr. Rawlings said what Mike said with the script a lot is what is the first step. Maybe framework can be completed and an announcement if you are interested in doing something with BCTV we can send you information. Mr. Izbicki said that is where we started Educate. Mr. Rawlings said lack of familiarity. Mr. Jennings said you put stuff in the paper and on the board it is like a salesman making calls what is the best way finding out who is
the buyers. It is like direct mail if we got 1/2^% then go out and knock on doors, but it was the most unproductive but because we carry the IBM name they would open the doors. We have to work smart and what would work is opening up the television station. Four years ago and we need to update it what is community TV, get Tim involved, get Russ involved we talked to volunteers and it was an hour long, but now that we have high-speed burners drop by and we will let you know what Community Access is all about. Mr. Izbicki said that is what we are talking about.
Chairman Mackie said having BCTV making DVD copies to go out to the organizations. We are talking nonprofits. Mr. Jennings said I am hesitant to mail something. Chairman Mackie said only if they requested. Mr. Jennings said I would rather have them come in. Ms. Wilson said they have to come to the plate and say they are interested if you are shoving it down their throat. Mr. Jennings said once we get the server and the DOD online. Mr. Izbicki said when is that coming. Mr. Jennings said once the budget is approved. We are an enterprise fund so I might be able to order it earlier. We can start exchanging electronically programming. I would like to get it in earlier I would see if I could get it by Crystal once Budget is approved by voters. Mr. Izbicki said March 11th. Ms. Richardson said no March 5th the Budgetary Town Meeting when it is approved.
Chairman Mackie said it expands BCTV you can be anywhere in the world and you can download. If Mike is traveling he can watch his councilors. Mr. Jennings said we have some who do not have cable they have satellite, but now because of the video server VOD they can watch on their computer.
Mr. Sills said she woke up after 5 days, thanks for all the e-mails and I would like to say it is better, but there is something about the word trauma. Mr. Izbicki said we all wish you the best. Mr. Thomas said we have been passing the e-mails. Mr. Sills said the kids started a website. Chairman Mackie asked can we put a promo on for BCTV. Mr. Sills said we bond with the other families. We had some programs going this last quarter and I didn’t want to miss that.
Chairman Mackie said what we are going over now is something that Mike Izbicki and I worked on as a subcommittee. We have been going through some points with options utilizing the crawl, which Mary Lou doesn’t like. Ms. Wilson said it is a personal thing. Chairman Mackie said BCTV Bulletin Board and I know that we use the Bulletin Board as BCTV’s name is all over. Contact local newspapers to write an article. I know Coleen and Bill have an excellent relationship with the newspapers. Some kind of contest between nonprofits to get a program done for free. Mr. Jennings said we don’t charge. Chairman Mackie said the production staff why do you want to be on BCTV. Mr. Jennings said we don’t want to make this more difficult. Ms. Wilson said that
is what we did at the Open House. Chairman Mackie said things have changed. The other item is posters. The other is establish an e-mail, do you do a mass e-mail. Mr. Jennings said yes we have an e-mail address file for our volunteers. Chairmen Mackie asked Bob. Mr. Thomas said that is one of the tings on my list to do. It should be able to get it together, but we just have to some volunteers. Ms. Richardson said they would have to sign up on the website. Mr. Thomas said it is due able. Ms. Richardson said there is some software that we found out at our workshop. That is something that we have on our list. Mr. Thomas said the key is updating. Mr. Jennings said it is a reasonable fee it is template. Mr. Thomas said once we get that up we can network to our friends to go visit the website and then community wise, but we are not quite there yet. Chairman Mackie said we are making some giant steps to
make programming and make BCTV known. Mr. Jennings said it is areas that you tape that will become routine certain programming. I and saying it is exciting and informational. We have a tool that would bring in more participants or call them volunteers, it may increase the volunteer participation it is free advertisement, so we are pretty excited.
Mr. Izbicki asked where do we go from here, what is the board’s pleasure and what is our next step?
Mr. Jennings said our schedule right now and Coleen is responsible for this schedule is in February it is political month and we do not know how many will sign up for a local position in Town or why they should be elected, if someone on this board wants to take the responsibility of contacting the nonprofits and sending out a letter. As Mike said we can get Terry as a Rep of the School Board, Russ and Tim can make an announcement. I think that is the way to start. Let’s handle things that we can control.
Mr. Izbicki said over the next 6 weeks this TV station will get a lot of. Ms. Richardson agreed between the debates and candidates interviews. Mr. Izbicki said the controls are here in the studio, but when are we out bound, would it be the next School Budgetary Meeting?
Ms. Wolf said Election Day could be fun. The other thing is you were in the schools get the principals. Mr. Jennings said Ken Williams would be great. Ms. Wolf said teachers or just people around Town. Mr. Sills said some standard tag line that you can hand to someone and just read this the tag line..
Mr. Izbicki said how do you make BCTV a happening thing that is why we came up with EPIC and that was the start of the conversation.
Ms. Wolf suggested, “BCTV it is just local”.
Mr. Robinson commented that I am on “You Tube” and I presented hats on behalf of Red Sox nation recipients of the metal of honor. If you go on metal of honor dinner you will see the last 7 seconds. Listen guys we are going to film this and ask if we get enough people and selectively put them out during the day it may gravitate them.
Chairman Mackie suggested the tag line “Be on BCTV, I am on BCTV”, people will remember that. Again Mike and I came up with some ideas. Mr. Izbicki said this is just a start. Chairman Mackie said the rest of the packet is articles and other promotional things in the areas.
Mr. Sills said that Mary Lou and I were trying to promote additional programming to gain more viewer ship. I ran into the National Domino Arts Program and a non-profit NE Regional had the grant for 5 libraries to run the program and they choose the Joy Luck about a Chinese mother and friends and as part of that it has things to do with China and they had a musician fest at the library with instruments that I have not seen. This is a whole day seminar for teachers, what I noticed is they had access to a National Geographic and reporter combination that did a show on Vietnam following 5 Vietnamese around during and after the war. These were PBS. This is a program that would be good to have on our BCTV. I have already spoken to Bill, Coleen, Mary Lou and I asked what they thought of the idea and
everyone wanted to do this. We did one hour show on China an economic competitor primary sources is the contact and I have a list of other shows and the concept would be teachers would want viewer ship as they cannot get the time off, but it is so much in line with the normal programs that we see on 60 Minutes. We will pick the shows that would be of interest and I would volunteer to produce them, as you have to bring along your own labor.
The first show I interviewed Blanch Milligan the Director and we talked about this and that and that is what started me regretting that I didn’t videotape what was at the library. A lot of it is business oriented for those of us who try to use Asia or China as part of out business activities and how it affects our own as well s pure cultural things. We always thought of China as a junky product and Japan how did they get so good, but China is coming out of it. The concept is to use nonprofits CEREST a big regional teacher assisted nonprofit that we below in Bedford and they have programs. The viewer is the teacher and the student if there is a school project. We are going to try a few of these and see what shakes out. They had access to expensive speakers and I am having no
trouble with intellectual part, but a lot of speakers are in nonprofit mode. I was looking at this agenda and it is another way to promote nonprofits by using nonprofits.
Mr. Jennings said we and I have to thank Mike got us involved with photos and a lot of stuff until you take a look at it, but it opens up other avenues and it might open up an avenue for our volunteers. It is intellectual, it is entertaining and there is some interesting stuff. There is the Tim Mays Room, Dennis Pope Room. Ms. Wolf said because those people helped build it. Mr. Sills said back with Russ Rugerio and CEREST was Derry office park this whole set up now is educational support on star wars and they run a lot of Northeast Coop things. I was interested in this one on signs still and I would be responsible, but some way to get into Harvest with the current programming if there is some way to do it. Mr. Jennings said being as a Town Dept what we can and cannot do as far as
signage. We have the sign out here stating BCTV. I do not know why we have to put a sign at Harvest Market that says BCTV. I do not feel it is necessary, but you are the board.
Mr. Sills suggested running a show at the counters at Harvest like Shaw Supermarket does. What they do at the supermarkets is they show commercials of groceries, apples etc. Some are almost showing network because the lines are so long. We throw out these ideas and they do not shake out.
Mr. Thomas suggested that we put something on the sign at the Transfers station.
Mr. Sills said maybe we could do some commercials or highlights of the show. I am trying to suggest places where people see the programming being advertised. I am seeing people that watch us all the time. If they see a program on basket weaving for the 3 fingered grandmother, but they will only see it at these locations. Mr. Jennings asked would you have it rotating? Like this week we have the School Board meeting and then next week we have the Town Council meeting. Mr. Sills said just some active discussion. Ms. Richardson said there is digital signage like in Londonderry they have different Town events running, whether we could get digital signage in buildings other than the Town buildings? We have BCTV running all the time we could add others to the other Town
buildings, I am not sure about commercial buildings. Mr. Sills said so many people go through Harvest.
Chairman Mackie said last meeting we were talking about a drop at the library. Mr. Jennings said they have a drop at the Library, not a live drop. Chairman Mackie said they put events and meetings on there should we be filming. Mr. Jennings said they do concerts there and we use our volunteers. Mr. Izbicki asked what is the cost? Mr. Jennings said the infra structure, probably bout $5,000. Mr. Izbicki said we are investing in the library maybe something like a live drop would be something to consider, as the Library is becoming the heart and soul of the Town. This is like a big quilt and we need to knit all of that together. Ms. Richardson said you need the manpower, the cameras and the power to be able to do that. Mr. Jennings said when we go to another location we are
paying for people to cover this stuff.
Mr. Izbicki said that is part of the educational part of this. Mr. Jennings said you have to set modules it is not just pushing a button but it is an area to explore. Ms. Richardson said I would like to get some more people to tape a show and edit a show and get them on BCTV that would be great.
Chairman Mackie said again these are ideas that we are approaching.
Mr. Jennings said the more live drops you have the more exposure. Chairman Mackie said whether it is coverage at the election or part of that and it is interesting people like that. Mr. Thomas suggested that you go live with the voting. Mr. Jennings said we are restricted. Mr. Izbicki said if you go live this would be huge. Mr. Jennings said there are reservations about getting them involved. We had Ed giving a training. I am looking more at an opportunity our revenues are increasing and there are some good things that take place.
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