TOWN OF BEDFORD
BCTV BOARD MEETING MINUTES
April 2, 2009
BEDFORD MEETING ROOM
Present were: Coleen Richardson (Asst. Station Manager), Bill Jennings (Station Manager), Norm Longval (Town Council Rep), Vice Chairman Mary Lou Wilson, Dick Rawlings, Mike Sills, Mike Robinson, Katherine Potter, late arrivals Chris Bandazian (TC alt) and Chairman Bob Thomas.
Vice Chairman Wilson opened the meeting at 7 p.m. stating she was filling in for Bob Thomas as he was umpiring a game. We will have any input from the public if there is any. I would like to introduce our new board member, Katherine Potter who is new to the board and we appreciate her volunteering.
Ms. Potter said I am a senior at UNH Manchester; I am a Communication Arts major and a Psychology major so I thought with my background in technical and theoretical knowledge of communications that this would be a good spot for me. I saw the opening in the paper and thought there was no reason to not go out for it and I am here to see how I can help the board out.
Vice Chairman Wilson said and our new representative from the Town Council is Norm Longval. The first item on the agenda is nominations and elections of Chairman, Vice Chairman and Secretary.
Ms. Richardson said I do not vote and I cannot make any recommendations, but you may want to change the order of the agenda? Vice Chairman Wilson said that was what she was wondering, I just do not know if Bob is going to be here later. What would the board like to do? With Norm being new and Katherine being new.
Mr. Sills suggested subcommittee reports. Mr. Rawlings said I would rearrange it and do that at the end. Vice Chairman Wilson said we will hold it off and wait until the end of the meeting that works for me.
OLD BUSINESS – Approval of Minutes from January 22, 2009.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked if there were any comments on them.
MOTION made by Mr. Sills to accept them. Seconded by __________.
Vote taken – all in favor. Minutes approved.
SUB-COMMITTEE UPDATES
1. Criteria for Volunteer & Producer of the Year Awards
Vice Chairman Wilson commented that Bob and she were on this committee and they approached Coleen and Bill because we felt that we really did not have enough time to prepare for this the way it should be. It was initially going to be the end of March and looking at it and appreciating the fact that we really wanted to thank people for what they had done, we didn’t feel we gave it enough time. We have moved that to the end of September.
Ms. Richardson said we picked September 24th which was the last Thursday of September.
Vice Chairman Wilson said when Bob and I were talking about this and this is open to the board as he and I were brain storming. We do have a couple of awards that we want to give and we would like people to come in and see the studio because it is so beautiful and it has been so much work, but in the course of talking about it, we were talking about BOTD and this is something we were wondering if it would be a good idea to do the awards at BOTD and have that become part of what is going on with BCTV. That would work in conjunction with the other things that we do, but really the Town is there, there is a lot of people there and the ones getting the awards and recognition would get the recognition from the community as oppose to just here. We would like to film it obviously as we are doing it. We
thought it might tie in nicely if the point is just to get people to the studio, perhaps we could do an Open House another time during the year and invite people in for refreshments. We were wondering what the board thought about this idea. We would like to open it up to a discussion.
Mr. Rawlings asked when is that. Ms. Richardson said it is September 19th. Mr. Robinson said it is the weekend before. Ms. Richardson said it is actually the Saturday before the Thursday that we were planning it.
Mr. Rawlings said I really did not pay a great deal of attention when I was there last year. Did they have a big platform or stage, so it is all set up. Mr. Jennings said yes, that is actually where Gene acted as the host and I have done it a couple of times.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked, Bill and Coleen what is your take, is this something you need to think about or how do you feel about that?
Ms. Richardson said I like the idea if the history didn’t repeat itself, but with the history of the activities around the stage it is very minimal. Everyone is more in the field area and Jane has talked about that and wishing the stage was more down at the other end of the field because the location is just not optimal to people hanging around it. So unless they are specifically involved with someone on the stage they are not there. So as far as getting the recognition you would lose the live broadcast of the volunteer night by doing that and I am not sure how much activity would be around the stage area depending on the time. The only time there is a lot of people around the stage area is when the Taste of Bedford is going on and at that point they are eating. If you are doing it
while they are under the tent that would be the majority of the time that you would see the most people there. It has been a challenge for Jane all along and she wished it was in a different area and she has been trying to figure out how to do that, but with the stage being permanent it is hard. That would be my comment.
Mr. Jennings said I concur. In terms of it being an ideal spot, it is not really, but it is a venue. There are people who fill up that area as Coleen mentioned right when the food comes out. That is probably the only area that you have a concentration of a lot of people at one time. I do not want you to think it is abandoned, but around noontime people come up and eat and they have all bought their tickets. What you are saying this is for the key awards not the certificates. Although it would be nice to have all those people come through as well. I am not opposed to it. I actually think it might be a good idea.
Mr. Sills said I agree with Bill and Coleen, but that is where we set-up our tent when I did that year. It is a good place because everyone is there to eat. Then I am thinking the people who are related to the recipient are going to be there anyway whether it is here or there. Mr. Jennings agreed.
Mr. Sills said here it is tough to see through 10-15 presentations where there, I do not want to say that I sit by the food all day, but I would sit there by the food. It is easy to do and timing it when the food first comes out when everyone is moving over there and then the recipient’s general friends will be in front of the stage.
Mr. Jennings said it is just doing something different and if works it works, if it doesn’t work it doesn’t work. I do feel it present a venue where there is recognition going on and you do have folks sitting there.
Mr. Rawlings asked how many people are there at BOTD around the noon hour time? Ms. Richardson said it is weather dependent, so if you have a rainy day. Mr. Sills said it is at least 100 to 200. Vice Chairman Wilson said BOTD itself has about a few thousand people that go through it. Mr. Rawlings said I was thinking at that time. Mr. Sills said that area because it has a tent with tables and chairs and if it is nice people are outside and they are watching the shows. Mr. Rawlings said and they do not tend to have a musical act or entertainment that attracts a lot of people. Mr. Sills said that is what is there mostly. Ms. Richardson said they do have the acts, but that is the other challenge. People are not there watching it, they walk and they bring their kids to do
the games and to visit the organizations, but like Terri Shawver was up there last year doing here show and Paul Bordeleau was up there and we were walking around with the camera interviewing it and I remember that area the only time it was busy was when the Taste of Bedford was going on. Vice Chairman Wilson said food brings everybody. Ms. Richardson said otherwise people were going from point A to point B and not really paying attention to what is going on on the stage.
Mr. Rawlings said so there is not necessarily “entertainment” of a name brand so to speak that comes in for the day. Mr. Jennings said it is a mixture of local residents and non-residents as well. Jane works hard to pull it together. It is a good venue to try something like this. Mr. Rawlings said I would say give it a shot and see what happens. Of course if it rains you could do it inside, a rain date might be the Thursday that follows. Ms. Richardson said that is a good idea.
Mr. Sills asked how difficult is it to set-up a monitor under the tent where the tables are and run some of their things that were done as a loop? Mr. Jennings said we have done that in the past, but it is not running on a loop basically someone is pumping in DVDs and did we have a lot of people stopping by to watch it and this was a long time ago. Mr. Sills said under the tent having some of the work that the winners have done showing.
Mr. Jennings said I cannot recall did we have the BCTV sign and you were close to power? Mr. Sills said yes. Mr. Jennings said if someone wants to man that and have a DVD player and take a monitor. Depending on the weather if it is a nice day you would have to have it under a canopy or you will not be able to see it.
Councilor Longval said this is all relatively new for me, but from what I heard the idea of having a crowd when you hand out these awards is a good idea, because the more people the better the reception and food is always an attraction. You do have a larger crowd there which is a good thing. This tent, how many people can fit under the tent?
Mr. Sills said there is one tent that has the tables for eating area and then our little tent which holds four. Mr. Jennings said one year, Rich Beyer and George LePage and this was going back 6-7 years we actually did a “BCTV All Sport Show” there and we combined it and interviewed the different Councilors and I know we had Mike Scanlon and some of the other older Councilors. I had the camera and a monitor hooked in so people could see exactly what I was shooting and it attracted a lot of people. That is something we can do. Again Coleen and I will do it again this year, we went around and Coleen hosted it and I did the shooting. We can set up a table have a monitor, have a DVD player and put it in a bigger environment. Mr. Sills said I was talking about the table where
people sat to eat so they could watch it during the day.
Mr. Sills said I was going to ask one more thing, if you are shooting it, you are going to film it also? Mr. Jennings said actually we would not be interviewing people. Mr. Sills said not interviewing, but when the ceremony is going on can we live feed the monitor so people in the tent that cannot see the stage can see. This is a trick that the colleges use. Mr. Jennings said no. Could we?
Councilor Longval asked again you have a four man tent and how big is the other tent? Vice Chairman Wilson said a couple of 100. Councilor Longval said so if there is a light rain this will accommodate. Ms. Richardson said there is 8-10 round tables that hold 8-10 people. Councilor Longval said you have enough room in that larger tent to accommodate a sizeable crowd in the event of a light rain fall. Vice Chairman Wilson said yes. Councilor Longval said I think it is a good idea.
Mr. Robinson said I like the idea. I like the idea of trying it, why not, try it and see if it works? I like the idea of tying it into the food it is going to bring crowds in. To Coleen’s idea of the rain, if it does get rained out we can bring it back the next week and have it here. It is a great opportunity to try something new and get more people involved. I would be for it.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked Katherine, I know you’re new, but what do you think? Ms. Potter said I was thinking about you are trying to give a person an award and recognizing them so I like the idea of having lots of people and BOTD has that, but I was thinking the people in the tent may not be that interested or they will have their kids and they will be eating, so even if there are people there they may not be paying attention to the awards being given so maybe a reception afterwards for the award winners, where it is more personable and their families can walk around talk to you guys. I am thinking a big crowd is nice, but if the crowd is not there for you.
Mr. Jennings said again as part of the publicity we will present the awards there, but then again later on have them back in here and we can broadcast out live here, we can do that.
Vice Chairman Wilson said so now you are talking about having two award ceremonies? Ms. Potter said not really two awards, but give them the award and then have a reception at a later date or later that evening here and then you can talk and reiterate your thanks.
Councilor Bandazian said that is interesting to give the awards out on a more solemn environment and have a reception for the people the award recipients can walk around and talk to folks at the same time about their videos if we have a clip.
Vice Chairman Wilson said then it sounds like we would like to try. How we go about doing the details we will work that out. A couple of things that Bob and I talked about we all know that food and kids attract. You know your kid goes somewhere you are going to be there to see it. What we were wondering and this is the technical part of it is what if we said from 11:30-2 p.m. we are going to do 30 second spots where people can come in and do a spot saying “Hi Grammy this is your new grandchild” or “Happy Birthday Uncle Roy” and they get a 30 second shot at it, we video it and it goes on the feeder to show and they can also download it and send it to their relatives if they want to send a message to somebody. We thought that gets enough interest because so many people love to
be on the screen. These awards do not have to be given on the stage. We could have our own little raised platform at BCTV and do our own ceremony apart from that more into the field. When BCTV had their set-up inside the field there were more people going by. Ms. Richardson said I agree, but you just do not have audio down there. Vice Chairman Wilson said you don’t. Ms. Richardson said you would have to hire Molloy to get an audio down there. Vice Chairman Wilson asked and how much would that be? Ms. Richardson said probably $500 minimum. Vice Chairman Wilson said we could charge these people, 30 seconds, $30. I still feel if we market this properly and we say from 11-2 p.m. you can come on and be the star of your own show, 30 or 60 seconds to send a message to do what you want and you can have it seen on BCTV and then you can download and advertise that. What that does is a) it gets our name out. It gets people who
have not come by the station and they may want their children involved and then they can say I can download it off my computer as well. I think it kind of does what we are doing and it puts it out into the community. If we get 30 people to come by, that is 3 times more than we had when we called people individually and asked them.
Ms. Richardson said I like that idea for BOTD and I would like to be the opposite and say keep volunteer night or recognition night separate. This would be a great thing for OTD to set up a booth down in the field, do what you said, produce a show of everyone coming in and having their 30 second spot and then having that run on BCTV. You had also come up with a great idea for doing the recognition night doing a “Red Carpet” event here at the studio going live, balloons, big celebration and you sold me on that and now I am having trouble switching back and forth. I thought that was cool an Oscar Night at BCTV with the whole scenario.
Vice Chairman Wilson said again this is brainstorming, what if we did this the Friday night before BOTD and then and I do not know how much work. If we did this on Friday and Saturday we could announce the winners there and still do the 30 second thing, but we would tie it into that weekend.
Mr. Jennings said you want to move the recognition. That is interesting. First of all we are thinking about the time that it takes to edit this stuff and I know you are saying 30 seconds which is short and sometimes we get PSA that are 15 seconds and we also get them at 20 seconds. You would be surprised how long 20 seconds is. I suppose in order to give fair viewing we should give 30 seconds. I like that idea. I look at the Grand Opening and thinking about the time frame and we could do like in Hollywood with the big lights. Vice Chairman Wilson said I like both ideas, so I am open.
Mr. Jennings said they are both good. Vice Chairman Wilson said the board has to make a decision which way you want to go. I am just throwing out ideas, as that is my job.
Ms. Richardson said you do not have to do it the night before you could do it the week before BOTD so we are not all ragged for BOTD.
Ms. Potter said I really like the “Red Carpet” idea when you are honoring volunteers you are trying to motivate them and show them they are appreciated and doing something like that would be good.
Vice Chairman Wilson said what if we do that and then run that at BOTD. Mr. Sills said do the raw feed do not edit it. Mr. Jennings said you would have to edit it. Ms. Richardson said not the recognition part because we are going to broadcast that live and hiring someone to come in and tape it for us? Mr. Jennings said we can do that. I was thinking as people are coming in, but if we leave the camera here we can decorate this area. Vice Chairman Wilson said it has to be by the door with the red carpet and the lights. Mr. Jennings said so again when they are coming in and you are interviewing them and you say Congratulations. Ms. Richardson said you want a separate production, I thought it was that we were broadcasting live in this room. Mr. Jennings said that is
bringing them in. The lighting in here that will be installed will change the dynamics of this room and will add to a real studio kind of environment with people getting recognized and that is exciting.
Vice Chairman Wilson said she would like to capitalize on what we have and not become segmented to BCTV and the Town does their thing and the School does their thing and we are a unity and we need to work with each other and play off of it. We have an Olde Towne Day weekend that has grown and really touches a lot of lives and people watch for it. So if we can some how add our PR into that weekend, whether it is the 30 second spots for people to see, which I think would help people becoming aware of what they can do with the downloading on the computer and sending it to somebody. I understand too the idea of the recognition awards and we could do both. I am fine with that; I have no problem with either one.
Councilor Longval said so what you are talking about is having the Friday not before Olde Towne Day, but the week before that. I think it is a good idea! Vice Chairman Wilson said or maybe Thursday. Councilor Longval said and the concept of the balloons and the red carpet is a very good idea. On the flip side of that if you wanted to do it on Olde Towne Day you might want to add a raffle to that as more people are there. Vice Chairman Wilson asked and what are we going to raffle off? Councilor Longval said I don’t know.
Vice Chairman Wilson said does everyone like the red carpet idea? Hearing yes around the table and I do! Do you also like the idea of the 30 second spots at BOTD? Hearing yes around the table again. Okay then that is what we are going to do.
Ms. Richardson said so the week before BOTD we will do the red carpet? Vice Chairman Wilson said is the room available. Ms. Richardson said if I can excuse myself I can go out and look at the calendar. In the meantime I have the sheets that have the criteria that we had recommended do you want that? Vice Chairman Wilson said yes you can pass those out.
Vice Chairman Wilson said originally we talked about the Rich Beyer Award and the Doug Pearson Award. As we talked about it we were trying to narrow the criteria too much and we really wanted this to be something that we could give to more people and open the door to more people and thank more people for what they have done and give them a chance. So we just made it broader criteria, but we actually came up with three and the fourth one the “Viewers Choice Program Award” I have some concerns about that.
Mr. Jennings said it would be difficult to get a lot of public information and input. Vice Chairman Wilson said I think you will get one person who will send in 4,000 things and he will get everybody and his brother and sister sending it in and I just have an issue with that.
Mr. Jennings said when Coleen and I looked at this and how we had put names to this initially we had Rich Beyer and then Doug Pearson and I found it difficult as well as Coleen knowing these individuals and knowing what they did and do for their respective programs and then to try to come up with a definition that could be applied across the board and we realized we were trying to put a round peg into a square hole. That is why you see the awards reclassified to make it easier and it is broader based so we have more people participating. We probably put significant amount of time into this, changing this and adding to this. Every time we adjusted something a personality would come to mind. We said lets come up with a broad definition, make it work and it is up to you guys to accept it or reject
it.
Mr. Rawlings asked are there numbers associated with these awards Bill. For example, in the first one would that be just one individual, one award. Mr. Jennings said yes. When we say talent of host and if you read the definition it is basically talking about that individual who is uncomfortable as an audient personality and does a lot of research. You could take a look at Mike Robinson for an individual like that. We have a number of other people like that as well. Then you have the producer award which again is someone who produces and is pretty independent throughout the whole process, they very rarely use us. Believe it or not we have more and more producers like that now. What Coleen and I were trying to do we were thinking about the different people that are here and
how can we recognize a group of people. We have several organizations that do participate here, so that is why we came up with the Production Crew award. It is one, one and then the group.
Councilor Bandazian said I wouldn’t necessarily discount the “Viewers Choice Program Award” because it might not have the intended fact of honoring somebody that every body out there thinks is the best, but it would generate a lot of interest and you could do it with survey monkey or one of those things and have an easy mechanism for people to cast their votes. It would have the integrity of American Idol that goes awry, but it still generates a lot of interest in the community and if one person is so enthused that they vote 40 times, then it is good enthusiasm to tap into and maybe there would be some competition that way. It is what it is. Any viewer’s choice is not going to have complete integrity, but I would think it would generate a lot of enthusiasm. I would not
reject it.
Mr. Robinson said that is a great point, my only question is would the Board or would Bill or Coleen put together four choices, six choices, ten choices, how many choices would you put out there. Would it be a limited amount of programs and say these are the ones to vote on or what would the criteria be? I think it is a great idea. I agree with Chris it would generate people saying let’s look at it.
Mr. Rawlings said I know that increasing the viewership of BCTV is one of the objectives, but along the course of the year do you get e-mail responses. Like, gee I saw a program and I thought it was really good, thank for airing it. Mr. Jennings responded very rarely do we get that. We do get them, we have gotten some phone calls, we have had people that we have seen on the streets who say, and I just saw that program. It is minimal, but people know about BCTV and they are watching. It is like the producer and I will use Mike as an example and say I saw your program and it was great. You have touched on a sensitive subject in terms of promoting viewership which is our objective, but sometimes I take the other approach that says we have a lot of viewership and how much work do we want to
put into that to feel that we are still not reaching that attainable number, whatever that thing is, because it is not something that we can measure. Chris mentioned and Mike as well, I like the idea of “Viewer Choice Program Award” but I am looking at the amount of time and amount of work that would go into it. When you mention something like that software the Web Survey, I think that is what Bob Thomas was talking about when he mentioned web Monkey one time with us with something that he wants to do down at the Town. I am not familiar with it; we can certainly come up with a list.
Vice Chairman Wilson commented that I do not see how this should be your job. I think if we want to have something like this that would require that much then the Board should put together a subcommittee of two and that is all you need and go through it and do it. I think that we should not choose to do something unless we can do the work ourselves.
Ms. Richardson said I think it could be done maybe the old fashion way as far as putting a list of the programs in the newspaper with a coupon that says mail this in with your choice. Vice Chairman Wilson said somebody has to set that up. Ms. Richardson said our software, I can print out a list of what was produced last year and I could compile the list that would be minimal. That is the other thing you cannot just say watch BCTV because we run shows that are produced in other communities. They may vote for a show, but no one produced it in Bedford. You would have to pick out a certain number of shows or a certain time period whatever the criteria is that you come up with. I do not believe I would have trouble giving you a list.
Councilor Bandazian asked Coleen how long a list would that be? Ms. Richardson said I do not know, depending on what you say, if it is only over the last year. Mr. Jennings said how far back do you go, we have programs that are no longer running or do you want recently run programs. My feeling is that we do a two year search.
Ms. Richardson said we run shows that were produced in 2004 and they are running now, so I do not know if you want to include it or not. I guess it depends on the criteria. It could be 50 shows.
Councilor Bandazian said I like the idea of putting it in the newspaper rather than stuffing the ballot box there are only two newspapers in Town. If it is a list of 100 long, I think the newspapers may be reluctant to publish that. Mr. Jennings said you can work the list down very easily. Councilor Longval said you can go through a process of picking or choosing and whatever you feel. Councilor Bandazian said if it is a manageable list I believe the newspapers would do an article along with it.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked how much work will this entail. Ms. Richardson said I go along with your idea of having a subcommittee of two and they can work with me and we can look at it and see if it is manageable or not.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked is there anybody who would like to work on this. Councilor Bandazian said I would. Mr. Robinson said I would too. Vice Chairman Wilson said time frame would be July and August, because you need it in. Councilor Longval said I am going to suggest that Chris and Mike be the two to do it.
Vice Chairman Wilson said Katherine if you would like to join on just to get your feet wet a bit. Mr. Robinson said I was going to recommend bringing on a third and recommending Katherine only because it would give her an opportunity to see what the shows are that are out there and get a little feel. Ms. Potter said I also have a little experience with Survey Monkey too as it is used frequently at the school. Vice Chairman Wilson said okay Chris, Mike and Katherine.
Mr. Rawlings said I would like to get back to Bill’s comment regarding viewership? Is there a possibility at the tail end of a show having the little tag that says, brought to you by and let us know how you like it, send us an e-mail. Mr. Jennings said we certainly can do that. When we do the editing we say thank you for watching BCTV. Mr. Rawlings said I am thinking if you just add something like that just let us know what you think. If we do that after every production maybe the e-mails you get that becomes the pool for going forward in terms of viewership and things that hit the people’s hot button a little bit better. Vice Chairman Wilson said you could have a file on the computer for that. Mr. Jennings said excellent suggestion.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked any comments on award #2 and award #3. Mr. Sills said they are both basically the same criteria the only thing is one person does it and the other the crew does it. Mr. Jennings said absolutely.
Vice Chairman Wilson said if all the comments are in, can we say we are going to do these, is everyone in agreement that these are good. Mr. Jennings said we are coming up with some good lists.
Vice Chairman Wilson said they are simple explanations and that is always the clearest. Good job guys. I am going to skip to any subcommittee reports only because; I apologize because the agenda is a little disorganized because Bob is still not here.
Ms. Richardson stated Thursday, September 10th is open and BOTD is September 19th, so the Thursday before a week before. Is that the night? Vice Chairman Wilson asked is that the date that everyone is comfortable with. Mr. Jennings suggested 7 p.m. Ms. Richardson said between 7-9 p.m. and not keep it too lengthy. These awards will be given, but then every volunteer is recognized with their certificate of appreciation. So when we send out invitations we will ask them to let us know who can make it or not and then we will call them up and they can tell us what they have done to volunteer and we will give them the certificate and then we can have the final awards. Vice Chairman Wilson said we can work on the whole program. So September
10th.
Ms. Richardson asked so for BOTD do you want me to fill out a form for us to have a booth and you want it in the field area, but then you need electricity, so I am not sure how that is going to work. Mr. Jennings said we can get electricity, but the closest to the feed is the better. Vice Chairman Wilson said if you have people who can get on TV and do a 30 second spot they will find you. If we do enough PR. Ms. Richardson said, but you do not want to be by the stage if it is noisy. Vice Chairman Wilson asked isn’t there a gap during the Taste. Mr. Jennings said that is probably because there was a gap in the entertainment. Mr. Rawlings asked what about under the tent. Vice Chairman Wilson said you will have people eating and it will be noisy there. What about
over by the shack the old snack shack is there power out there. Ms. Richardson said down by the pond? That is where they put the petting zoo. Joppa Hill Farm comes in and that is where they are. Why don’t I check with Jane and tell her what we need and were she would suggest. Vice Chairman Wilson asked there are lights in that field in Riley. Mr. Jennings said yes lights at Riley, but you are talking about Sportsman’s. Vice Chairman Wilson said, but there is no electricity? Mr. Jennings said if we ask Wayne and Jane and we will find out the areas that we can get some juice away from the stage and then we can get back to you. We want it in a heavily traffic environment. Vice Chairman Wilson said and big PR from August right on.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked do we have any reports from subcommittees. Mr. Sills said I will pass this around to you and I will leave it with Coleen and Bill. Last year one of the things we were doing was working with the Educational Non-profit Group, Northeast Culture Co-Op and CEREST is another support group. Northeast Cultural runs the “Big Read” and it was an idea from the National endowment for the arts and community council to have the Libraries read one book and have discussions and all kinds of themes around it. Last year it was Chinese things. The library had a Chinese band one Sunday. This year it is the “Great Gatsby” so they had a big Gatsby party at the Currier last Friday which they are repeating tonight without the food and all the librarians came
dressed. We came somewhat in garb, but not like the librarians. I asked Blanch who runs this to possibly during the next two months have an interview show here at the studio and we have enough slides to show actual pictures of thing as we go along. This Sunday there will be a concert at our Library. The other good part is they let us take and video teacher training workshops. A couple of teachers training workshops where teachers in the State would like to come down from the north country, but they are too far, it is too expensive, so once we tape them and they are on BCTV then it is available on demand through any computer screen. That is how we are trying to attract more viewership especially from the teachers and their classes. This year I am hoping we can do the same with the Great Gatsby. That is why I was asking Katherine being a communications media major if she wants to see what we did last year. I am still not
having any luck getting a closed loop monitor running at Harvest, but I will keep pushing that and see if they will do it. It would show some of the more interesting parts of our productions, particularly kids during athletics or whatever they were filmed at. Vice Chairman Wilson said good job, your working.
Vice Chairman Wilson said we are running out of agenda items that we can do. Ms. Richardson said I know we are jumping around, but on May 17th is the Pre-Memorial Day Parade. Bill and I are doing a show with Russ Marcoux, Town Manager so we will be set-up with Russ and along the parade route and he will be interviewing the participants. I have not signed up for BCTV unless the board wants to work independent and have a float or participate in any way, let me know and we can help coordinate with the Town. Vice Chairman Wilson said it is up to the board.
Mr. Sills said I had a brief idea of you on a float. Mr. Jennings said Paul Bordeleau did approach us as he is having a flat bed truck and needed it decorated; we passed on it initially, but if someone wants to be behind him. Councilor Longval asked how large is the float? Mr. Jennings said they have a flat bed truck with a piano on it. It was one of those items that came up when we were doing half a dozen things and he mentioned it to us. We did not think that the committee was into the floats.
Councilor Longval said I think a float would be nice. Mr. Jennings said we have had them in the past and we have won. Councilor Longval said you have? Mr. Jennings said yes we have won two awards in the past and then it reached a point where it was lack of participation and we were the only float. Councilor Longval asked how far back was that, over the last 3 years, I do not recall seeing a float? Mr. Jennings said it was two years ago. Councilor Longval said 2 years ago, I was in that parade and I didn’t see it. Ms. Richardson said we did the float 2 years in a row.
Vice Chairman Wilson said it is up to the board. Ms. Richardson said the theme of the parade “Remembering the past and celebrating the future”. The line up is 12:30 p.m. and it will be on Nashua Rd and going to McKelvie. They are no longer crossing Rt 101 as before. Vice Chairman Wilson said so they do not go by the library and up here. Ms. Richardson said from the High School to McKelvie. If anyone wants to be in charge of a float contact me and I will give you all the supplies I have and you can add to it.
Vice Chairman Wilson asked Bill Jennings to give his report.
Mr. Jennings said I want to go over the report a little bit. Obviously as we meet every 3 months it is hard to write everything down and in the past I have been asked to keep it nice and short. When we talk about getting a lot of participation is during the political season. We had a lot during the November elections and the Town elections in March as well. We had a lot of people who were volunteer hosts and people who participated behind the camera and a lot of information was given out and we hope that people had the opportunity to catch all those programs. I cannot thank the Bedford Men’s Club enough for sponsoring the live council and live school board candidate debates. That is always a very popular program and again because of our capability to broadcast now we can do that
on the internet. Certain those who are watching right now we do have video on demand and when I get into my report I can tell you about the equipment that we are adding to allow other things to take place as well. Why create a mystery, I will tell you now. Basically we are going to be adding a second video streamer to channel 16, it is installed right now, but the earliest that I can work with the manufacturer and software folks is on April 8th. The large streaming programs that you are getting on channel 22, you will now be able to get the public and educational programs on channel 16 as well. Those people who cannot catch it during the day or evening on a regular schedule basis can have an anytime opportunity to see it over the internet. I would like to thank Coleen who is extremely efficient as you know for posting the instructions on the web page because people were having a little bit of confusion and certainly people can
print out that page and follow the directions.
A lot of live broadcast out of the BHS Theater from school prospective and Town hearings and people are watching. I have to commend my guys that work down at the high school and they are high school students and they did a great job the other night for the Governor’s piece when he spoke to the Town of Bedford.
Looking at again the best thing we did, something new was to add two cameras and a video production switch down at the high school for our live election coverage and adding the graphics and the two cameras certainly added a professional effect to the whole process. I have to tip my hat to Doug Pearson and certainly Russ Marcoux, Town Manager who acted as host and co-host. We were conscious and it was a decision made by the host that they didn’t want to show any favoritism one way or the other by having candidates who were running for office that evening in prior to the final election results coming in. Because the tally took so long, and the hosts were getting worn out, we decided to shut it down as soon as the election results were over. We spent a lot of time breaking the equipment down and
everyone is gone so the people in front of the camera and us breaking down and getting out at 11 p.m. at night, we appreciated everyone’s patience with us, but we had to get out of there. We have hired the School network administrator, Randy and we have hired him to assist us and do a lot of installation work and he is the guy that is making things happen in the control room right now. We will have some functionality in there as described in the notes that I gave you which will allow us to have 24/7 access to all the different servers that are there. Sometimes there is a problem when a server goes down and we cannot have access to them.
The other item is we are going to be participating in a program that has a central server, it is up in Maine right now where you can access programs with simple file transfer so we can go in on a menu and select programs that we would like to download and we can play those. We can also upload. So say “Warriors Defenders of Freedom” is a program that the producer and I will use Mike as an example, say I would like to have it on the home based server up there, we can do that as well. There is a little write up that you can do and post it up in terms of what is available and then we can download the files overnight. So this is pretty slick.
Last, but not least of course the Emergency Operation Center, we are working very closely with several different generator manufactures and installers to provide and I think you knew this the last time we met that we want to provide 24/7 support to an Emergency Operations Center that we will provide infrastructure to. The infrastructure will consist of cameras and maybe some graphics and video switch. We have not come up with the final decision on what we are going to put down there, but what we want to have is the capability for our Emergency Personnel to be able to broadcast during emergency times 24/7. Without a generator here, we will not have it happening.
Our room and we continue to get a lot of comments with regards to the design of the room. We have to thank the contractor who did an excellent job and was very meticulous in making this room look very professional. The next phase is the one that will have the dramatic effect. If you thought this had it, wait until you see the lighting. We have had a vendor in here who has done the design work and has made the recommendations based on the input that he received from me and Coleen and we are now waiting for the bids to come back from two other hardware vendors. It is a cost that we really have to take a look at to make sure we are getting the best bang for our buck. Vice Chairman Wilson said again, this is not tax dollars. Mr. Jennings said to emphasize we are using Cable Franchise Fees
and again self-funding. Vice Chairman Wilson said good words.
Chairman Thomas said he talked to a few people on the Planning Bd and they said it is nice to have to not have to turn around and the little things with the switches you have done a great job with. I am very pleased with how it is.
Mr. Jennings said and again, I am really thankful to Bob in his support in his design recommendations and I know the Town Manager, Russ was very thankful. Everyone else who provided input, either directly or indirectly. That is about it.
Mr. Rawlings asked when you talked about the school Bill; do you have the ability to live stream right here from the school to this site? Mr. Jennings said absolutely. We are classified here as the head and soul. We are the central distribution point. Our drops certainly at the high school they feed directly down here. All the Town meetings that took place down at the high school, the budgetary hearing, the two school deliberative sessions they all went out live. I continue to refer to this as a Communications Media Center and even though people who do not have cable access those who are not Comcast customers they will now have access to Town Meetings because of the internet. We feel that the demand will be there and people will start watching. Again that is one of our ways
to promote BCTV and its accessibility no matter whether you have a dish or if you are a cable customer.
Chairman Thomas talked about the BCTV Subcommittees. What we have right now is Gene Mackie Chairperson of the Awards along with Mary Lou and myself. If anyone else would like to be on that just let me know. I would like to read these off and if anyone is interested we will talk about it and make a change. Vice Chairman Wilson said when we were discussing the awards, Chris came up with the idea that he and Mike were going to do the People’s Choice Awards and Katherine is the back-up.
Chairman Thomas said on the Viewership it is Mike Sills who is the Chairperson and since he left he is still nominated. What we had was both school board rep and town council rep to have feedback. It is still Bob Donahue for school and for Town council it will be Norm.
Chairman Thomas said web & surveys it was myself and I did it with Bill and Coleen were we were trying to set something up with a data base and surveys and I will meet with them later to do a business plan, review it with Russ and make sure it makes sense and we will bring it back at the next meeting. The goal is to create a media person who we want to interact with the web during surveys, if the Town Council wants a survey or the Planning Bd while the shows are going on and make it a live thing. There is a lot of planning that I will have to do to see how this will work, but we have some technical capabilities doing it with certain web programs to do surveys, both live and off line. I would like to tie the web in more with the live shows that we are doing. From that I would like to gather a
data base with e-mails to send to the viewership to find out who is interested in BCTV and some how tie this into the Town and see how to do this correctly. Again it is a concept thing, but I would like to talk to Bill. Mr. Jennings said it is a good idea. Chairman Thomas said it is not going to happen overnight. I do not want to over burden Coleen and you; this is why I said I have to figure out how to man this. Mr. Jennings said again when you look at this, I think it is a good idea, are you proposing like a half a person on payroll to do that. Chairman Thomas said I do not know I have to look at the numbers and what the cost and what is involved. I know Brian Davis has wanted to do it, but if it is something more involved or daily it would be more than that and I think it would overburdening Coleen. Mr. Jennings said I would not expect Coleen and we do have some times that do call to volunteer, but again the challenge that you have
is the consistency from a volunteer. Chairman Thomas said, as I said, once I put the business plan together then I will fund it with people and how it is going to be done, I do not have that clear in my mind yet. My expectation is if we can do this and budget it for next year and do it for half a person, then I will talk to Russ about how we would do it and what we would do. I do have to sit and talk to you and Coleen too. I do not know how much work is involved, but I think it is more than you guys can handle right now. That is my expectation. Mr. Jennings said in terms of what we want to do and trying to accomplish in terms from a budget perspective as we plan, conceptually it is not a bad idea. Chairman Thomas said again it is not something that will happen over night, it is something we would have to do in sections. If we start doing poles, we should have constant contact and get the contacts in there and do something. So
there is information gathering and data base gathering and it may be folded into one, but I do not know what Brian would have to do to make it happen.
Vice Chairman Wilson said why you don’t research what you need before we talk about it, because we are talking about something we don’t have information on. Chairman Thomas said yes, I will write a business plan. Vice Chairman Wilson said and then I can say forget it. Chairman Thomas said it is something that I am working on so if anyone wants to help me that would be great.
Chairman Thomas said Community Involvement, Mary Lou is the Chairperson with Gene and Bill Dermody who was on it, so Norm is that you. Councilor Longval said yes.
Chairman Thomas said Training, Equipment and Workshops. Mr. Jennings said I am not sure when you talk about training, equipment and workshops why there has to be a subcommittee for that. The training came up with Lauren Horton having a background in community access in Manchester and she and I have chatted in the past and their approach parallels our approach and there really was nothing brought forward from Lauren and that committee. I really think the training, equipment and any workshops that are conducted should be handled by the operational people without getting the Board involved. We are always modifying and changing, when I say that this is for our volunteers when we train the people who are directly involved in doing the training should be handling this directly you do not need a
subcommittee. I am just making that recommendation. Vice Chairman Wilson agreed that is a great idea. Chairman Thomas said we didn’t meet so if we need it in the future we will review it. So we will disband that subcommittee.
Chairman Thomas said the last one is political coverage and that is a seasonal thing and we did an excellent job and we had no issues that I know of and a lot of that is because we worked so hard on the Policies and Procedures and that worked out very well. Vice Chairman Wilson said nice job.
Ms. Richardson said speaking of the Policies and Procedures there are some things that we have come up with and they should be re-visited and looked at some more and maybe that should be a subcommittee instead of the training one as a Policy Review again. Mr. Jennings said I have one thing that I would like to discuss. Chairman Thomas said does it have to do with subcommittees? Mr. Jennings said it could be discussed under subcommittees.
Chairman Thomas said the question is should we have a Policy & Procedure subcommittee. Mr. Jennings said yes, that is a great suggestion. Chairman Thomas said I think that is a great idea, is there any interest? Councilor Bandazian said I will put myself on that.
Ms. Richardson mentioned that Katherine said she has had some experience with Survey Monkey so you might want to recruit her on the Survey subcommittee. Chairman Thomas said okay, perfect so I will add you.
Chairman Thomas asked Mike Sills and Dick would you like to be on that. Is there anyone who wants to be the Chairperson on that? I know Lauren and I talked and she suggested looking at commercial and so this is the perfect opportunity to discuss that.
Vice Chairman Wilson said we have not done the nominations and we should. Chairman Thomas said so all the subcommittees are done. You cannot have more than four in any one meeting. Ms. Richardson said our quorum is five. Chairman Thomas said so four or less. That is why we have three. Certainly with the e-mails, we want to be careful sending e-mails out about doing board business especially as a group. If there are any questions on it, please see myself or one of the Town Councilors who are aware of it. We want to make sure that we are not doing business not in public view. If there is more than that we have to take minutes we want to make these informal. The goal is to do more off line and come here with results rather than having detailed discussion here.
Chairman Thomas said let’s have the election now. It is time to do the annual nominations. Let’s start with the nominations for Chairman are there any?
Vice Chairman Wilson nominated Bob Thomas. Seconded by Mr. Rawlings.
Move that the nominations be closed by Mr. Rawlings. Seconded by Mr. Robinson. Vote taken for Bob Thomas to remain as Chairman– all in favor.
Unanimous Bob Thomas, Chairman BCTV.
Chairman Thomas said the next one is for Vice Chairman.
Chairman Thomas said Mary Lou has done a great job and I would like to nominate you. Councilor Longval seconded.
Vice Chairman Wilson said she would like to nominate Mike Robinson. Mr. Robinson said he would defer to Mary Lou.
Move that the nominations be closed by Mr. Rawlings. Seconded by Councilor Longval. Vote taken for Mary Lou for Vice Chairman – all in favor. Unanimous Mary Lou Wilson, Vice Chairman BCTV.
Chairman Thomas asked for nominations for Secretary, Dick Rawlings has it now.
Vice Chairman Wilson nominated Dick Rawlings. Seconded by Councilor Longval.
Chairman Thomas said the role of secretary has changed as we have a transcriptionist and the main role is to read through the minutes and find out of there are mistakes that are major. All of us are responsible to read what we said in the minutes, but the secretary is supposed to do that. It is not transcribing them as they used to be, but there is still an official capacity and it is in our bi-laws which Dick will be the Chairman for that sub-committee and he can see if he wants to change that. Mr. Jennings reminded them which then has to be approved by the Town Council. Chairman Thomas said the whole Policy & Procedures.
Move that the nominations be closed. Seconded by Councilor Longval.
Vote taken for Dick Rawlings for Secretary – all in favor. Unanimous
Dick Rawlings, Secretary.
Chairman Thomas asked if there is any other New Business. We have finished everything then except the dates. Right now we have meeting dates for July 9th and October 1st. July 9th is that a due able date for a majority of the board. I wanted to make sure everyone’s schedule is fine.
MOTION made by Councilor Longval to adjourn. Seconded by Vice Chairman Wilson. Vote taken – all in favor.
Meeting adjourned 8:30 p.m.
Submitted by: Jane O’Brien
#25000
| 
