Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
www.crtc.gc.ca
Common menu bar links
TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS BEFORE
THE CANADIAN RADIO‑TELEVISION AND
TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
TRANSCRIPTION DES AUDIENCES DEVANT
LE CONSEIL DE LA RADIODIFFUSION
ET DES TÉLÉCOMMUNICATIONS CANADIENNES
SUBJECT / SUJET:
Various broadcasting applications /
Diverses demandes de radiodiffusion
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Quartz Ballroom Quartz Ballroom
Matrix Hotel Matrix Hôtel
10001-107th Street 10001-107th Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
June 5, 2008 Le 5 juin 2008
Transcripts
In order to meet the requirements of the Official Languages
Act, transcripts of proceedings before the Commission will be
bilingual as to their covers, the listing of the CRTC members
and staff attending the public hearings, and the Table of
Contents.
However, the aforementioned publication is the recorded
verbatim transcript and, as such, is taped and transcribed in
either of the official languages, depending on the language
spoken by the participant at the public hearing.
Transcription
Afin de rencontrer les exigences de la Loi sur les langues
officielles, les procès‑verbaux pour le Conseil seront
bilingues en ce qui a trait à la page couverture, la liste des
membres et du personnel du CRTC participant à l'audience
publique ainsi que la table des matières.
Toutefois, la publication susmentionnée est un compte rendu
textuel des délibérations et, en tant que tel, est enregistrée
et transcrite dans l'une ou l'autre des deux langues
officielles, compte tenu de la langue utilisée par le
participant à l'audience publique.
Canadian Radio‑television and
Telecommunications Commission
Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des
télécommunications canadiennes
Transcript / Transcription
Various broadcasting applications /
Diverses demandes de radiodiffusion
BEFORE / DEVANT:
Elizabeth Duncan Chairperson / Présidente
Rita Cugini Commissioner / Conseillère
Candice Molnar Commissioner / Conseillère
ALSO PRESENT / AUSSI PRÉSENTS:
Cindy Ventura Secretary / Sécretaire
Lyne Cape Hearing Manager /
Gérante de l'audience
Véronique Lehoux Legal Counsel
Conseillère Juridique
HELD AT: TENUE À:
Quartz Ballroom Quartz Ballroom
Matrix Hotel Matrix Hôtel
10001-107th Street 10001-107th Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton (Alberta)
June 5, 2008 Le 5 juin 2008
- iv -
TABLE DES MATIÈRES / TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE / PARA
PHASE III (Cont'd)
INTERVENTION BY / INTERVENTION PAR:
ArtStart/E4C 1873 /12105
Slowburn, Blues Band 1877 /12124
Harpdog Brown and the Bloodhounds 1880 /12140
Barrypatch Records 1901 /12281
Sarah Pocklington 1905 /12307
Nestor Pistor Productions Ltd. 1913 /12349
CKUA Radio Network 1930 /12469
Community Radio Fund 1945 /12550
Byron Christopher 1954 /12588
Edmonton Public Schools 1961 /12630
UrbanDNA Events 1973 /12714
Jonny Chung 1980 /12756
Q99 FM 1983 /12773
Peter Kossowan 1986 /12791
Aboriginal Voices Radio 2002 /12910
Laura Vinson 2011 /12949
Canadian Rocky Mountain Festival 2014 /12967
Western Canadian Music Alliance 2020 /12997
Gateway Entertainment 2042 /13131
- v -
TABLE DES MATIÈRES / TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE / PARA
PHASE III (Cont'd)
INTERVENTION BY / INTERVENTION PAR:
Hipjoint Music Group 2046 /13152
Shiloh Schramm 2053 /13187
Community Radio Fund / 2064 /13248
Fonds canadien de la radio communautaire
The Amber Affair 2077 /13338
CIRPA 2091 /13414
Department of Family Medicine, 2099 /13451
University of Alberta
Christian Hansen 2116 /13569
Stew Kirkwood 2121 /13593
Katie Perman 2126 /13617
Sandro Dominelli 2131 /13640
PHASE IV
REPLY BY / RÉPLIQUE PAR:
Rawlco Radio Ltd. 2150 /13743
Evanov Communications Inc. (OBCI) 2151 /13749
Harvard Broadcasting Inc. 2152 /13757
CTV Limited 2153 /13766
Jim Pattison Broadcast Group Limited Partnership 2159 /13795
- vi -
TABLE DES MATIÈRES / TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE / PARA
PHASE IV (Cont'd)
REPLY BY / RÉPLIQUE PAR:
John Charles Yerxa (OBCI) 2161 /13809
Rogers Broadcasting Limited 2165 /13831
Don Kay (OBCI) 2183 /13940
Aboriginal Multi-Media Society of Alberta 2189 /13974
Black Gold Broadcasting Inc. (OBCI) 2190 /13983
Frank Torres (OBCI) 2191 /13994
Multicultural Broadcasting Corporation Inc. 2198 /14029
Guldasta Broadcasting Inc. 2200 /14037
Edmonton, Alberta / Edmonton (Alberta)
‑‑‑ Upon commencing on Thursday, June 5, 2008 à 0905
L'audience débute le jeudi 5 juin 2008 à 0905
12097 THE CHAIRPERSON: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
12098 Just before we start we wanted to make an announcement that today we will break for an extended lunch hour, probably about two hours, so we are looking at around 12:30, depending on the timing of the interventions, just to give you a little advance notice.
12099 Thank you.
12100 THE SECRETARY: Good morning.
12101 Before we begin, for the record, Aboriginal Multimedia Society of Alberta, AMSA, has filed in response to undertakings a list of the locations of all transmitter sites operated by AMSA. This document has been added to the public record and copies are available in the public examination room.
12102 I would now call ArtStart/E4C; Slowburn, Blues Band and Harpdog Brown and the Bloodhounds to appear as a panel and present their interventions.
12103 We will start with ArtStart/E4C. Please introduce yourself, after which you have ten minutes for your presentation.
12104 Thank you.
INTERVENTION
12105 MS KONOPAKI: Thank you.
12106 My name is Cadence Konopaki and I have been the Program Coordinator for E4C's ArtStart program over the past year and a half. I came to ArtStart after several years of working in the health charity field. I loved working with organizations that promoted community development and contributed to quality of life in our society. However, I missed the arts in my life.
12107 I grew up in a household filled with the arts, as my father was a formerly professional drummer. He is now a visual artist at Emily Carr. My mom is a professional actress. Galleries, concerts, live theatre and more constantly enriched my life. I wished I could work in a position where I was able to combine my passions for community development and the arts and luckily I found ArtStart.
12108 Thousands of children in Edmonton have no access to the arts. We believe that every child deserves the opportunity to be exposed to and mentored in the arts. Research shows that the arts aid social and cognitive development, as well as motivates, engages students in learning and builds competence. These are clearly benefits that children from low income families deserve to receive as much as any other child.
12109 In fact, children and youth involved in the arts use up to 50 per cent less social, justice and health services throughout their lifetimes. Therefore, the arts provide a proactive tool to involve children and youth in healthy individual and community development.
12110 With this in mind, ArtStart was created to provide high‑quality lessons, field trips and performance opportunities for children aged 6 to 14 who come from low income families. We are multidisciplinary programs so our classes, field trips and performances are all within visual art, drama, dance, music and creative writing.
12111 In September 2007 we experienced a 300 per cent growth increase due to demand of parents, social service workers, teachers and others to have their children involved in healthy and enriching activities outside of school.
12112 The ArtStart goals are to reach students who are often ignored or forgotten in ways and with methods not always used to teach children to work together building healthy group identity and strong friendships, provide challenges to students at all levels and reignite their level of learning, teach students to take instruction and use it in a self‑directed manner and, last but not least, create lifelong patrons of the arts.
12113 Both myself and ArtStart as a whole are very excited to support the application of DAWG‑FM to receive licensing to create the first Blues radio station in Edmonton.
12114 First, Blues is an amazing form of music that crosses all social demographics in its fan base. Anyone who knows anything about music loves the Blues and are clearly missing the opportunity to fully immerse themselves in the genre through radio play.
12115 Second, radio stations are becoming more and more generic. It is hard to find a station that does not play Easy Rock, Alternative Rock or Top 40 music. This severely limits the growth of new artists. Without being within one of those categories, most musicians do not receive radio play. Without radio play they will not attract as many new fans, thus limiting their success on a whole.
12116 As an individual, I strongly support the independent arts and would like to see artists have the opportunity to attract a larger fan base.
12117 As an ArtStart representative, I would like to say that the arts do not come in one form, nor are they for one demographic, nor are they created by one type of person. By diversifying the music on the radio, DAWG‑FM will not only be promoting Blues music but independent artists and the diversity of arts and culture in our society.
12118 Last, ArtStart wants to support DAWG‑FM because they are committed to supporting us in our mission. Through their financial support we will be using the money to support our children in the ArtStart Music Program. These students learn drums, guitar, piano, violin, to name just a few, and this money will be used to obtain better instruments, recruit more instructors, provide food to our students who may not have adequate nutrition at home and much more.
12119 We will also be working with DAWG‑FM to hopefully create somewhat of a Blues specific focus. This may mean providing scholarships to students to work with Blues musicians within the community or perhaps for students to attend Blues concerts.
12120 In conclusion, I would like to say that I hope the CRTC will recognize the need for this new station. You will not only be supporting musicians and arts and culture, but also hundreds of children in Edmonton who would otherwise have no access to the arts.
12121 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12122 We will now proceed with Mr. Phil Wilson‑Birks from Slowburn, Blues Band.
12123 You have ten minutes for your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12124 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: My name is Phil. I guess I'm here to let you know that the Blues in Edmonton is alive and doing very well.
12125 My background, I just retired about five years ago as a teacher. I taught for 25 years and decided that it was time to really get involved in my passion and my passion was Blues. I formed the band at that time.
12126 Today we are proud to say ‑‑ and I quoting Bruce Stovel, the late Bruce Stovel from CJSR radio ‑‑ we are proud to be the busiest and hardest working Blues band in Alberta.
12127 We perform on average over 100 shows a year, 98 per cent of which are in Alberta, probably 70 per cent of those in the Edmonton area. We play every weekend. That's our goal. We love to play.
12128 When I heard about this radio station possibly coming online, a Blues radio station, myself and the rest of the band, we just about jumped for joy. We have been waiting for something like this for a long time and I think there is a real place for it in Edmonton.
12129 There is a good, solid base of fans, as well as musicians in this community, well enough to support a radio station of this nature.
12130 We are presently in the process right now as a band of putting together our second CD for release in July. Of course we are independently produced, putting the money up ourselves. The problem that we have had in the past and we are still having is getting radio play. Being a local band, trying to get your songs heard on the local airwaves, there is very little opportunity.
12131 We do have some exposure. We have been played on other radio stations, at best very minimally because obviously we don't have 24‑hour a day Blues in this community yet. So we are getting airplay, but once a week, twice a week. If you are lucky to turn the radio on at a specific time in the week on a specific day, you might be fortunate enough to turn it on to a Blues program on one of the other radio stations and hear our song, but the odds are very slim.
12132 As a listener myself, I kind of view the radio as a smorgasbord. I am always changing channels trying to find the songs that appeal to me.
12133 The Blues programs that are available in town right now are very specific in their times. We gig every weekend, Friday, Saturday, sometimes Sunday, sometimes Monday nights, and those are when the Blues programs happen to be on so we don't even get a chance to hear. We hear that we are played on the radio because fans come to our shows and say well, we heard you on Friday night. They played one of your songs. They were just fortunate enough to have the radio on that particular station at that particular time.
12134 I really believe that this radio station could be a huge success in this community. At present we have three Blues festivals in this province. As a band that works every weekend, live music is alive and it is out there.
12135 The genre of music, we play at clubs that feature all genres of music, all ages of music. This music spans ages 5 years to 90 years. It has a broad appeal and we really believe that it could be a very big success.
12136 Thank you.
12137 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12138 We will now proceed with Harpdog Brown and the Bloodhounds.
12139 You will have ten minutes for your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12140 MR. BROWN: Thank you.
12141 I'm Harpdog Brown and I have been that for about 20 years now I think. 1989 is when the name was thrown upon me, so I predate Snoop Dogg and all the other dogs.
12142 I guess to start things off, I am really nervous. You know, I don't usually have to stand ‑‑ although I'm used to looking at 20,000 people, but it's different when I'm just performing.
12143 THE CHAIRPERSON: Don't be nervous.
12144 MR. BROWN: Well, you know, okay. Okay, I won't.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12145 MR. BROWN: I have to say, the last few nights I didn't do much sleeping either because I was racking my brain on what to say and how to say it and not to say too much, you know, like to go on and on and on, because I have been known to do so.
12146 Just a little bit of information.
12147 I am an adopted child and I think thousands of adopted ‑‑ millions of adopted children on this planet have one thing in common: we don't really feel like we belong. Loved by all and owned by none is kind of how I felt.
12148 You know, I was raised here in Edmonton, born in Edmonton, and although I had all this love I never really felt like I belonged anywhere. I tell you, I got into the music business primarily because I didn't want to become another one of these people that I was seeing as robots working in welding shops. We figured that music would be the only way to actually not have to conform to that mindless drivel of going to work and just waiting for the 20‑minute call to play some cards and then your personality goes back in your back pocket when you go back to work to grind welds.
12149 So we figured music would be the way out. I was 18 at the time.
12150 Now, a few years later I found the Blues. I stumbled upon the Blues and that was the first time in my life I really felt like I belonged. I found a place that would ‑‑ undeniably a place that I belonged that would never fail me.
12151 This comes back to ‑‑ this goes into the need of Blues in the society, in the schools. In this day and age we have so many broken families and people, adults, dropping the ball on the children, letting them down, not being there for them.
12152 Well, the Blues has never let me down. People do, but Blues never does. And that is why I have been really wanting to get Blues in schools and in the youth because, you see, I think it really saved my life. It gave me something to stand up for, something to believe in and something that would not fail me.
12153 The one thing made by man that is not made to fail, that is Blues music.
12154 Music, all music from western Canada or the western world is really Blues, because Blues defined like this, somebody reporting life as they see it. Now, when we report life as we see it, it is not always good. But when we hear that I'm not the only one that life is picking on, that he even has it a little worse than me, then all of a sudden I don't feel like it is not so bad because the weight of the world is not on my shoulders; it is on all our shoulders.
12155 Another thing is when I get on the stage and I sing and I play harmonica and I choose the songs that I perform, it is the message. It is not because I know you are going to like the song. I do it because it is my therapy. The thing is, I am very fortunate that my therapy also is therapeutic to others.
12156 So when they hear what I'm speaking or singing about, they realize that hey, we are all in this together. That is why the Blues is the foundation of all Western music.
12157 The Blues are the baby and they called it Rock 'n Roll, said Muddy Waters, and I've got to admit that that is really the whole root of it all.
12158 I think it was Count Basie when he was asked what kind of music you listen to, he said don't you know there is only two kinds of music, good and bad.
12159 I thought about that too, yes. Good music is the performance. It is not the genre so much; it is the performance. I would rather hear a good song ‑‑ or a bad song sung well as opposed to a good song sung bad, you know.
12160 So, I don't know, to me I was racking my brain all night for the last two nights, so I'm thinking, you know, this is really a no‑brainer, for me anyhow. I understand the CRTC and all the regulations and the rules and stuff, but this is something that needs to be done. This is something that Canada needs, that the world needs.
12161 I have known for Edmonton, Edmonton has always been on the cutting edge of arts and culture. We are the City of Festivals. There is no other city in Canada that has more festivals than we do. That's fabulous. Not just music festivals, that's comedy festivals, and so on.
12162 Our Citadel Theatre is globally known.
12163 It just makes sense and it makes me proud that we could be ‑‑ Edmonton could be the first Canadian city to actually stand up and say yes, Blues 24/7. I think that is very positive.
12164 Now, in the music business as well, yes, I have recorded three CDs. I have recorded in America. I have won awards in America. I have played from Alaska to San Francisco, all across Canada and the Pacific Northwest. And I got into music to travel. I love to travel. I still live out of a suitcase. I love it that way.
12165 But Edmonton is really my home and for me to be able to say that Edmonton is the first city ‑‑ it was the first city to have American Blues coming to Canada, or western Canada, The Ambassador Hotel two blocks away. The King Eddy in Calgary picked up on the slack from what Edmonton was bringing up to western Canada.
12166 Edmonton has always been the starter and I think it is just a no‑brainer. This really is what Edmonton should be doing. Then of course all of Canada will follow suit, I'm sure.
12167 But that will also help with distribution of getting the word out, you know. I can only play at one place at one time, but the beauty of radio, that allows you to be heard across the whole country.
12168 And I do get my airplay, you know Hogart on CBC plays me. I was talking to a guy I was working for out on the coast driving a truck last summer and he said, you know, it's funny, I turned on the radio and I thought that sounded like you. Then the DJ comes on and says it was Harpdog Brown. He said well, isn't that cool.
12169 You know, he didn't know what station it was because, once again, he is on the search dial to, right.
12170 So, I don't know, all I can say is that this is really good for society. It is good for humanity. Blues music is a healing power and I think we really need to heal society.
12171 You know, we have problems with drugs, we have problems with all kinds of things in our social structure these days and, you know, I feel the war on drugs is a moot idea. What we have to do is heal our society. If we can heal humanity, we will eliminate the need to erase what we call, you know, reality, and then we can start embracing reality instead of trying to erase it by gambling or drugs or alcohol, you know.
12172 The thing is that all comes from understanding and healing. So we have to heal ourselves and I think this is the start.
12173 Do I get more time?
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12174 THE SECRETARY: Two minutes.
12175 MR. BROWN: Two minutes? See, I call my own two‑minute warning.
12176 So you know, the live industry, I mean the live music industry has really kind of, you know, been kicked in the teeth and that is all live music.
12177 Well, now we are really clamping down on drinking, all right. Winnipeg went down to .05. Even though .08 is the legal, well they went no, that's not good enough; they went .05. Well, the live music in Winnipeg is really hurting because of that.
12178 The smoking bylaws are hurting the live music industry.
12179 So, you know, it is eliminating us to actually get out there and do what we do, which is spread the word of life.
12180 Now, with a 24‑hour Blues programming station, that allows us to be heard. That's really all it is.
12181 We have churches on every block, but if you don't listen, the same thing. If you go to school and you don't listen, you don't learn. You have to pay attention.
12182 So here is a chance. We have 24 hours. People want to pay attention and learn about life and maybe heal a little bit.
12183 Thank you.
12184 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.
12185 Commissioner Molnar...?
12186 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you and welcome. I am pleased all of you came and you are all obviously very, very passionate about what Blues can bring to Edmonton, so I understand that.
12187 I am hopeful I'm going to say your name right, Ms Konopaki. Is that what you said?
12188 MS KONOPAKI: Just Cadence is fine.
12189 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Cadence?
12190 MS KONOPAKI: Yes.
12191 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay.
12192 Cadence, I had initially read your letter of support that you sent in and was wondering as to how you would possibly use this to make it Blues specific. I think you said but maybe you could just tell me again how you would propose to take this and focus it upon the Blues.
12193 MS KONOPAKI: Yes. Well, all the money will be directly to our music program, so some of the money will be allocated to things like new instruments, so violin. You know, you can't guarantee that it is going to ‑‑ or guitar. It may be used for other music.
12194 But then what we hope to do is also do some specific Blues focus within that program such as we may do workshops with Blues musicians that we otherwise wouldn't be able to work with.
12195 We also hope to take our kids ‑‑ we always take our kids on field trips and we want to take them on more always, and it would be nice to take them to some Blues concerts.
12196 Again supporting live music and the arts, we want to pay for those tickets. So this gives us the opportunity to pay for more tickets to go to more shows.
12197 So those would be two ways that we would try to do it.
12198 But the most important thing I think is getting the musicians to work with the kids directly. Although it may be nice to go to a concert once or twice a year, all the kids wouldn't be able to get that opportunity and the impact that comes from our instructors and from the artist is really the one‑on‑one work or the one‑on‑three or whatever it is, that work of where their passions come from and the talent and skills that they can pass on.
12199 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you.
12200 Are there any Blues artists within the city who do work with your group today?
12201 MS KONOPAKI: No.
12202 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: No. Okay. Thank you very much.
12203 I'm going to turn my questions to ‑‑ is it Mr. Wilson‑Birks or Mr. Birks?
12204 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: Phil would be good.
12205 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Phil.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12206 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: And I'm just going assume it's Harpdog and not Mr. Brown.
‑‑‑ Laugher / Rires
12207 MR. BROWN: Yes. My friends call me Dog.
12208 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Dog?
12209 MR. BROWN: Sure enough, yes. Harp is my instrument, Blues harp, right.
12210 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Oh, I see.
12211 MR. BROWN: Harmonica.
12212 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. I'm going to open this question to both of you to try to help me understand.
12213 I understand your passion for the music and many, many of us enjoy going to Blues festivals. What I am trying to understand, and maybe you can help me with, is the scope, the extent to which the audience ‑‑ like who is the audience?
12214 How large is the audience for Blues here in Edmonton?
12215 MR. BROWN: Here in Edmonton or globally? Because you know I find ‑‑
12216 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Well, let's talk about Edmonton ‑‑
12217 MR. BROWN: Okay.
12218 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: ‑‑ because that is of course where we are looking to bring in this 24/7 station.
12219 MR. BROWN: Yes, sure. No doubt. No doubt.
12220 If you have been to any festivals you will see even in the Folk Festival there is Blues arts, you know, Blues artists there.
12221 All festivals that I have ever played have children as well as adults, you know, children of all ages. So I have found that there really is ‑‑ the requirements to love Blues is have one good ear and a little bit of heart.
12222 So children of all ages really stand up and take note and be touched by and moved by the Blues.
12223 You can play restaurants. I mean we both talked about this, a little joint on White Avenue called Murireta's, a great little restaurant, and they have Blues bands on Fridays and Saturday nights. The beauty there is ‑‑ I have an 11‑year‑old son and opportunity, restaurant, no smoking, he comes in on a Friday or Saturday, you know, to watch dad work.
12224 But I have seen babies, you know like actual babies in little carry‑in cases, you know, that are sitting on the floor in their little carriers, right.
12225 So children of all ages, big and old, you know, young and old, really do find a draw to the honesty and the truth of what Blues is.
12226 See, that's the thing, is it is really ‑‑ it is all about honesty and truth and we are all drawn to that.
12227 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Phil, you have said that you have operated here, you work every weekend, 25 years and now you are doing this fulltime, I understand.
12228 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: Yes.
12229 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Do you have loyal listeners? Do you have people that follow you or are you playing to new audiences every time?
12230 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: I would have to say both, hopefully picking up new fans everywhere we do play. And I think everywhere we play we do pick up new fans.
12231 But my experience ‑‑ and I can only speak for the last five years in this particular band that I'm in right now ‑‑ I think we are about 450 shows, so every weekend and then some in midweek. So we play everywhere.
12232 We see people of all ages. We don't play just Blues clubs because really there aren't that many Blues specific clubs. It is hard to support live music to have music seven nights a week in any genre of music.
12233 But I can tell you that we see ages, like I said before, young kids to older people. We play festivals and it doesn't matter what the age is. Just the love of the music, what it does to you, what it makes you feel, how it gets you moving.
12234 I don't think you can say that about every genre of music over all those age ranges.
12235 But we do have a following, people do follow us around. Of course, we can't expect people to come to every gig that we play every weekend. That would be a big much. Even my family has quit doing that after 400 shows. We will see them once every little while.
12236 The radio station really is a bonus in that it gets your music out to that audience on a larger scale.
12237 We have had radio play locally and it is a thrill when somebody comes to the show and they have had the fortunate happenstance to be listening to the radio at a specific time in the week where your song came on.
12238 I have only experienced that once myself, driving home and turn it on and here Slowburn comes on and it is just the biggest thrill you can imagine, but I think it should happen more than that.
12239 This is a great band that we have going here. This is music that should be heard by a lot of people, but it is just not getting out to as many. You know, every weekend a few people is fine, but the potential for a radio station to draw people to your shows, which in turn sells your CDs, and the more CDs you sell the more chance as a local band struggling to make it, the more chance you will sign a record deal.
12240 At this present time we are selling our CDs but basically at the gigs that we play at and anywhere we can. It is hard to get a record deal based on that kind of sales.
12241 Throw in the mix of the radio play and that just opens up a whole new world of possibilities.
12242 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I just have one more question.
12243 Once again I will let you both have an opportunity, but it sounds like you have been in the situation. You worked 25 years and now have the pleasure of dedicating yourself to your music.
12244 It sounds, Harpdog, that you have had the opportunity to have music your career.
12245 MR. BROWN: Oh, yes.
12246 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Is that right?
12247 MR. BROWN: Yes. I mean I have dabbled in a lot of other angles. I have driven truck, I have welded, I have done a lot of things, but I have only committed to ‑‑ you know, in the course of the 28 years I have been in this racket, I have really consciously tried to get away from the Blues and the life and stuff, you know.
12248 For the love of a woman when I was younger and I thought I didn't really need Blues. Well, it turned out I did.
12249 When I became a father I consciously took 10 years off. You know, he is 11 now so I'm kind of getting back in the swing of things again.
12250 But yes, it was a conscious effort of ‑‑ well, it's a life, right, and in order to live it you have to actually put all your eggs in one basket and go for it. Now, luckily I was born this gypsy, never really belonged anywhere, so I'm comfortable living out of a suitcase and from motel to motel in town to town.
12251 So you know, it worked for me and it still works for me. I'm still planning on global domination, you know, but that is going to help. The radio station and stuff like this will help that.
12252 I have sold a lot of CDs, thousands of CDs. You know, I have won awards in America. I was up for Juno in 95 with an American release. I signed ‑‑ a little label in Portland, Oregon, signed me. I was the first Canadian to play their 20,000 seated festival for two years, 1992 and 1994.
12253 So I have had a lot of opportunity and I have really done a lot of ‑‑ I have a lot of fan base and it seems to be getting bigger and bigger all the time. As there is Internet and everything, the world is getting smaller.
12254 You know, I almost gave up on this ‑‑ six years ago I was getting tired, I was like man, I can't even get arrested in this town but I will get a gig, you know. But then I ask myself, well, I'm treating the three main people in this city who are booking live entertainment the same way as I treat everybody in Ontario or British Columbia and America. So I thought okay, it's not me, it's them.
12255 Now, I was going to just hang her up, you know, and say well, I'm 40 years old back then and maybe I should look at another career.
12256 And then the Internet came into my hands and Napster came into my hands. My first download ‑‑ my first search on Napster was Harpdog Brown. Lo and behold, I found me. My first download was a song I wrote.
12257 My first Internet conversation was with a guy down in San Diego that I was taking my songs out of his hard drive, and then he told me, man, I know fans of yours all around the globe.
12258 So that actually saved my ‑‑ he changed my whole perspective. I said well, maybe I shouldn't give up yet. Maybe life was just beginning, you know. Maybe there is more out there. Maybe just because I ‑‑ because at that time I felt like I couldn't get arrested in this city, well, everybody else wanted me. So with the world, it's my oyster, right.
12259 So it's a matter of just keep on keeping on.
12260 The fact of the matter is we are only here to do what we are here to do, right. If you are here to spread the word, if you are a teacher, well than you have to have somebody to listen to your thoughts, right. And I kind of feel that in actual fact it is a teaching experience. Being on the stage, choosing what works and what messages you lay out to the people is really all what it is ‑‑ that's what it's all about.
12261 So that is why I have people coming to hear me. It is not because I play the songs that they want to hear, because they don't know they want to hear them until they hear them. It takes somebody to kind of cut it out a little bit differently and say, no, no, no, yeah, you heard that before. Let me give you something you haven't heard.
12262 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you. I just wondered which of your models is the more frequent, if you will, or the most usual model for a Blues musician here in the local community, somebody who has to work fulltime and do it once they are financially secure or is it that you can make a lifestyle playing Blues here in the west?
12263 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: From my perspective ‑‑
12264 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Or is it just both?
12265 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: Yes, it is both. For the 25 years as a teacher the music was always there, just not as often.
12266 At some point in your life ‑‑ I loved doing the teaching experience, this whole concept of bringing Blues into the schools, that is my ultimate fantasy. Sign up Slowburn for that, you know. To be able to go into the schools and bring the Blues into the schools, back as a teacher that way, that would be just unbelievable.
12267 But I was always performing but not quite as often and now the opportunity ‑‑ my kids are grown up and to be able to do that. I would say at this point I am probably making half my living at playing and performing every weekend, but I would have to say it is a real mix of musicians out there. A lot of musicians, just like actors or any of the arts professions, you need a day job to supplement because you don't have the record deals, you're not getting the play.
12268 I think that kind of thing would open up a lot of people's possibilities with the advent of a radio station that can promote your music, not only in one station in Edmonton, but the possibility in other provinces, in sister stations, you know, spreading the word across the country and getting out that way.
12269 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I would like the thank you all for coming. Those are my questions and thank you again for coming here today.
12270 MR. BROWN: It is a pleasure.
12271 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: Thank you very much.
12272 THE CHAIRPERSON: I will just add to the thanks. It is a pleasure to meet the three of you. You certainly have added some insight into our deliberations and we appreciate it.
12273 Thank you very much.
12274 MR. BROWN: Thank you.
12275 MR. WILSON‑BIRKS: You're welcome.
12276 THE SECRETARY: I now recall the Community Radio for Beaumont to come forward to the presentation table.
‑‑‑ Pause
12277 THE SECRETARY: It appears that Community Radio for Beaumont is not in the room so we will now proceed with the next one.
12278 I would now call Barrypatch Records, Sarah Pocklington and Nestor Pistor Productions Ltd. to come to the presentation table to appear as a panel and present their interventions.
‑‑‑ Pause
12279 THE SECRETARY: We will start with Barrypatch Records.
12280 Please introduce yourselves and you will have ten minutes for your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12281 MR. POWIS: Thank you.
12282 My name is Barry Powis. I own and operate a small independent record label in Edmonton.
12283 First of all I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak before you.
12284 How I got into the music industry, by the way, is first of all I am a music fan. When I moved here from Calgary in 1990 I would hang out at all the local venues and be continually blown away by the bands that I would see. I mean, I had not seen talent like this anywhere.
12285 When I would see a band that would blow me away, on the Monday or the Tuesday after I had recovered I would call the radio station and ask about this band, where I can find more music and why I'm not hearing them on the radio.
12286 One example I can tell you is I saw a band called The Rockin' Highliners at the Sidetrack Cafe. I called the radio station asking where I can get music from these guys. They didn't know who they were and I thought there is something wrong here. This is a Juno nominated band and the radio station for that genre did not know who they were.
12287 So I kind of realized that there was something wrong in the industry.
12288 Excuse me, I am a little nervous here. I'm not used to public speaking.
12289 Some of the other bands that I would see ‑‑ this was before the Internet was around so I couldn't research them afterwards ‑‑ I would call the radio stations to try to find again where to find them. They didn't know. I would go to the record stores. They didn't know.
12290 One particular band I saw, it was at the Sidetrack, I was just so impressed with them. They were so original, so dynamic, so energetic that I thought, you know what, there is such a problem in this industry and I want other people to hear this band. So I formed the record company.
12291 When I did that, I took a course at Grant MacEwan, Record Label Management. I spoke to a number of friends in the industry, and I thought I did everything right. I brought the band into Homestead Recorders with Barry Allen, you know, may as well get the best ear in the industry to work on him, and we did everything right.
12292 We sent our 200 copies across Canada to all radio stations and we just couldn't get played.
12293 The reason why we couldn't get played is that couldn't be pigeonholed. We were different. We didn't sound like every other band on the radio.
12294 So other bands would come up and ask me, you know, how can I get on your label and can you do anything for me? The only advice I could give them is, if you want to make it in this genre in Edmonton, either change your genre or move away, because you are not going to get played here.
12295 So when I heard that The Planet 107 with Don Kay was applying for a licence, I thought this is finally the opportunity we have been looking for.
12296 In doing some research I found out what they are doing to the industry as far as giving back, i.e. money to the Edmonton Folk Festival, the various schools, you know, just supporting the various genres out there. There is so much good music out there that is falling through the cracks and no one is playing it because, again, the band doesn't sound like somebody or ‑‑ I don't know what the cases.
12297 I saw the band The Smalls in Edmonton quite a while ago and this band again, I was completely blown away by them. The lead guy, Corb Lund, in order to get heard, had to change his genre to get his music heard.
12298 There is just again something wrong with the industry in Edmonton if this kind of talent has to go away from its roots to get heard. I don't get it.
12299 So anyway, as you can tell, I am very frustrated with the radio in Edmonton.
12300 My band has, you know, they are a Rock band with bagpipes, not your normal thing. Out of the 200 copies we sent to radio across Canada, we have been played on an AM Country station here in Edmonton, we have been played on CKUA in Edmonton and we have been played in Colorado, if you can believe it, and satellite radio.
12301 We can't get played on the radio stations that are close, the closest match to our genre. I don't think it is for lack of talent. The people I talk to in the industry just love the band.
12302 We now have five albums out that nobody will hear unless the check out or website and again, my advice to them now is rather than put a new album out, either change your genre or move away because, you know, if you don't sound like somebody else, you are not going to get played.
12303 So anyway, because of this and for all the other bands out there that continually blow me away in these live venues that will never be heard, I really ask you to consider strongly the application by Don Kay and The Planet 107.
12304 Thank you.
12305 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12306 We will now proceed with Sarah Pocklington. You have ten minutes for your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12307 MS POCKLINGTON: Thank you. I am really delighted to have the opportunity to be here.
12308 As you have mentioned, my name is Sarah Pocklington, no relation, for anybody who is a hockey fan.
12309 I have spent the majority of my life living in Edmonton but I've had the good fortune not only to live in various cities across Canada but also internationally.
12310 I am a graduate of the Vocal Performance Program at Grant MacEwan. I have taken courses on percussion, theatre and dance and I have been singing professionally since I was 15 years old.
12311 I guess I like school. I have an Honours B.A., a Masters in Native Studies and I'm currently working on my Ph.D. focusing on Contemporary Aboriginal Music in Canada.
12312 I have been teaching at the post secondary level for almost 20 years, most of that as an Adjunct Professor for the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta.
12313 I have co‑developed what I have been told by the University is the first course offered by a Canadian university on contemporary aboriginal music.
12314 I am Cree‑Métis and actually had ‑‑ when I first met Don, I would say that was several weeks ago, I found out that Don is also Métis and I think that stands Don in good stead. He obviously knows a lot about his heritage, which makes him a person that really understands the needs of community and what community is about.
12315 I am also a member of the aboriginal women's trio Asani, and Asani in the Cree language means rock.
12316 Our music is really distinct. We carry with us the traditional influences of First Nations and Métis music accompanied by drums and rattles, and more recently World Beat rhythms, and we combined that with our own blend of traditional vocals infused with the sounds of Jazz, Folk and Blues. We also sing a high percentage of our songs in indigenous languages, predominantly Cree.
12317 Asani's debut CD Rattle and Drum ‑‑ and yes, it is a play on U2's Rattle and Hum ‑‑ was released in 2005.
12318 The thing I found very interesting about this was we had a lot of people asking us to make a CD and we really didn't know very much about that. We ended up receiving a $3,000 grant from the Alberta Foundation from the Arts and that is what we used to make our CD. That is all the money we had.
12319 We ended up recording our CD in one day live from the floor at Convocation Hall at the University of Alberta. I had the help of a terrific producer and an engineer who believed in us enough to help us.
12320 I have to say, initially to our dismay and great delight, this CD has been nominated for 11 music awards across North America, including a 2006 Juno for best aboriginal recording of the year.
12321 We were the recipients of the Canadian Aboriginal Music Award for best female traditional cultural roots album of 2005.
12322 We are currently in the process of recording our second CD and ‑‑ and this has been mentioned several times here ‑‑ we are in a position where we are struggling to complete this CD because of lack of funds.
12323 However, we are very fortunate to be working with Barry Allen from Homestead Recorders, who has been mentioned here and has also presented. I have to say that everybody knows that Barry is a renowned producer‑engineer. He has received many, many awards. But what is astounding about Barry is his passion and support for aboriginal and Alberta artists and, I have to say, he has an incredible ear.
12324 So Asani, like so many artists, especially those who are working in the area of specialized music, is trying to find funding for our CD. Our music is so different that I think it often falls between the cracks even within funding institutions.
12325 Asani has performed at Carnegie Hall in New York City, the Kennedy Center, as well as the Smithsonian Folk Life Festival in Washington, D.C., Talent du Sud at Medan, France.
12326 We have performed at festivals across Canada, U.S., Finland, Africa. We composed the music for the opening section of the opening ceremonies of the World Champions in Athletics in Edmonton in 2001, and we have been featured artists at Canada Day celebrations in both Montréal and on Parliament Hill where we have our own version of O Canada that has gotten really strong support. We sing that in three languages, including Cree.
12327 We also received the prestigious Fleck Fellowship from the Banff Centre in 2003.
12328 I have to say it can be very discouraging. Asani has never been invited to perform at any major festival in Edmonton or in Alberta.
12329 Edmonton needs a radio station that will play music by Edmonton, Alberta and Canadian artists whose music doesn't fit the format of many of the other commercial radio stations out there.
12330 As has been mentioned, there are many great musicians and bands around Edmonton and other parts of the province that fall through the cracks. Even if their music is fabulous, it isn't heard on the air. Obviously, if artists' music isn't heard they don't get offered those opportunities that are out there to perform at amazing venues. They struggle.
12331 So not only are the artists missing out, but the public is missing out, too, because the public is not having access to this great music.
12332 The Planet's commitment to playing diverse music styles means there is a greater variety of artists that will have their music played and I think that is hugely important, especially for groups that are like Asani.
12333 The Planet and Don Kay have made a commitment to highlight the music of these artists on their station. That is a huge bonus for this city and for the artists.
12334 But further to this, I have to say I didn't know Don Kay prior to three weeks ago and the fact that Don Kay took it upon himself to find an artist like myself who creates and performs this specialized music, and I also happen to be Cree‑Métis, and then offer me the opportunity to speak here to you today really highlights his and The Planet's commitment to actually follow through with their mandate to include these diverse music styles and this greater variety of artists in their programming.
12335 The fact that The Planet would be actually located in Edmonton and operated by people who live here rather than 1,000 miles away, how can you beat that? It gives a voice to Edmontonians. It celebrates all that Edmonton is.
12336 It offers a real and meaningful way to support the vibrant music and the arts scene, as well as the artists in and around Edmonton, Alberta, a place where local artists' music is not just played on the air, but where we have the opportunity to get to know, in a real sense, the people who are operating the station, a place where our music, our voices and our opinions can be heard not just through a telephone call, but through real relationships with real people that have the opportunity and the authority to make decisions about how this station operates.
12337 The fact that the decisions are made right here in Edmonton, that there is no checking with the head office some place in the eastern part of Canada is a powerful thing.
12338 Under these circumstances there is a strong likelihood that the decisions that are made by this radio station will be made in favour of what is in the interests of Edmonton and Alberta and the artists that live here. I think that is hugely important.
12339 The Planet's commitment to Alberta's independent artists is backed up with meaningful financial support, festivals, special programs, sessions that offer emerging artists information required to build their music career, beginning on how to access funds through institutions like FACTOR.
12340 This program that they would have where artists can compete for $10,000 at the beginning of their music career to make CDs and then have that ramped up for three different artists or groups so that they have enough money not just to make the CD, but to actually do promotion and marketing, that is where independent artists really struggle.
12341 So from my perspective that is just huge.
12342 On a personal note, I have to say that Don and I have had several discussions about The Planet's commitments to get involved with musicians here and help them make things happen. I can't say enough, quite honestly, about how I am so impressed with his passion, his dedication and his ability to pull together the team that you saw present a few days ago.
12343 That speaks a great deal about his character, his knowledge and his track record, in my opinion.
12344 I hope that you will support The Planet's application. I think that The Planet will become so much more than just a radio station. I think that The Planet can become a viable component of the fabric of what makes Edmonton and Alberta a great place to be.
12345 Thank you.
12346 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12347 We will now precede with Nestor Pistor Productions Ltd.
12348 Please introduce yourself, after which you will have ten minutes to make your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12349 MR. AST: Good morning and welcome to Alberta. My name is Don Ast. I am also known as Nestor Pistor.
12350 I sit on ACTRA's board as the national representative for Alberta. I have five Juno nominations, five gold records, two platinum records and this all didn't happen by circumstance.
12351 When I first put out the record of Winestone Plowboy ‑‑ which is a parody on Rhinestone Cowboy ‑‑ we needed a vehicle. The vehicle naturally was radio. I am going back a few years now when radio was really radio, when radio gave the personalities or the DJs on the air licence to communicate with people.
12352 This doesn't happen any more. They are tightly scripted and it has just taken the personage out of radio. But I did get airplay.
12353 I did get airplay and when my third record came out January 6th, 1976 there was an unprecedented sale of 78,000 albums on the first day of release. This was because radio gave me the opportunity of going on the air, talking to DJs, having fun and letting people know who you are, what you are.
12354 It was a marvellous trip, and it still is in certain circumstances, because there are still radio stations that will say, "Oh, Nestor is in town. Let's give him a call and see if we can get him on the air."
12355 That's a plus to any artist, because once they know you are in town the phones start ringing at the venues that you are in and all of a sudden you have SOR on your door. But without that, you don't get that opportunity to do so. You don't get the opportunity of reaching people and having them hear you.
12356 Radio is a communication device and I don't know how many people in the world sit at home alone and the only people that they can talk to or talk with is the guy on the radio. I do it myself. I do it myself.
12357 It is a communication device and with what Planet has in mind it is going to give every artist of every genre a chance to be heard, to be played, and to make something of themselves.
12358 It has to happen. It is a commitment made. And knowing Don, and being on his radio stations where he welcomed every artist with open arms to sit down and talk for almost as long as they wanted to, I know that his resolve is going to hold through right up until the end.
12359 But I have to say something as my alter ego, Nestor Pistor.
12360 Now Nestor is an old country guy that speaks with a dialect. I don't know if you people are familiar with Nestor Pistor or if you have ever heard of Nestor Pistor, but there are two languages that Nestor Pistor speaks at home. One is English and one is broken English.
12361 So I am going to relate to you a story about my uncle Tom Pratchuk(ph) who was live over here to Harry Hill, Alberta. It is very true.
12362 One day he was kind of puttering around the yard, you know, feeding the chickens, throwing the horse over the fence some hay. Pretty soon a guy drive up in a nice automobile and say, "You Tom Pratchuk?" He say, "Yeah, that's me." He say, "You live in Rural Route 3, Harry Hill?" "Yes, that's me, Rural Route 3." He says, "Well, listen, I got to do something over here to your land. I'm a Commissioner, you know. I want to go around your land because I have to find what water levels are and what everything is about, and I need access to every place of your entire farm." He said, "Mister, you go do whatever you want, but whatever you do, whatever you do, don't go to that field over there." He said, "And why can't I go there? I'm Commissioner. You see this piece of paper here?" He say, "Yes." He say, "Well, that's licence. That's licence give me every opportunity to go where I want to go, to do what I want to do and to see everything and you can't stop me. You understand that?" He says, "Sure, but I got to say, please, be my guest, go wherever the hell you want. You know, what can I say. You got the licence. You do whatever you want."
12363 So that Commissioner, the first thing he go to that field. Oh‑oh. Now my uncle, he putter around, do some raking, water the plants. All of a sudden he hears, "Help me! Help me! Please, Tom, help me!" He looked and he ran to the field and there is this Commissioner running as fast as he can and uncle big bull with horns like that chasing him. Every step he take, every step that bull get closer. He says, "Help me! Please help me! This bull is going to kill me." My uncle look at him and he say, "Ha, you smart in the pants Commissioner, show him your licence."
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12364 MR. AST: Well, kind of a two‑way street here because when you people hear all the wonderful things The Planet has for all the great artists, Alberta artists, Edmonton artists, what they could do for them, they need one thing. They need you to give them that licence because without that licence, none of this great stuff is going to happen.
12365 So I ask you humbly and with respect, please, Edmonton needs the station. Give them that licence.
12366 Thank you.
12367 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: (Off microphone)
12368 THE CHAIRPERSON: You should at least use your microphone.
12369 Commissioner Molnar...?
12370 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Thank you. I'm a bit afraid.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12371 MR. AST: Don't be afraid, I don't bite.
12372 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: No. I will tell you that my parents were very big fans of yours and there were many times they were laughing about Nestor Pistor.
12373 And I come from a farm, so you are not going to catch me in a field without looking for a bull.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12374 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I understand you have had a long experience with ‑‑ I'm sorry, now I have lost his name with this ‑‑ with Mr. Kay, and that it has been a very positive experience, but you are an established artist and I wonder if you can tell me, is this something that is truly unique?
12375 There is a lot of radio available across Canada and even here in Edmonton. You come here representing Mr. Kay specifically, and I wondered if there was something specific that you have found through your relationship with him, through your experience with him, that is in fact unique?
12376 MR. AST: Yes, I do, Candice. It's his openness and willingness and unselfishness to artists. He is not a man that says we have a radio station here and we have a formula or we have a format that we have to follow, and if we don't follow it to the precise thing it is going to kind of throw everything up in the air.
12377 That is neither here nor there with Don.
12378 Ever since I have known him, ever since he has been a manager of many radio stations and you walk in there or he tries to get a hold of you, he is a gentleman that you don't have to really attempt to contact. He is a gentleman that attempts to contact you if he knows that you are in town, if he knows that you are in a venue.
12379 This speaks well of him because this gives me the knowledge within myself that this man is not going to shirk on what he says he is going to do.
12380 I think it is a true commitment, I think it is a noble commitment and I know for a fact that he will follow through with everything that he says he is going to do. That is a big plus for Edmonton and Alberta.
12381 I hope that's what you wanted to hear.
12382 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes, thank you. And thank you for coming here today.
12383 MR. AST: It's my pleasure. Thank you.
12384 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I would like the ask Mr. Powis ‑‑ if that is correct ‑‑ you are talking about your Alternative band and I guess being frustrated with the inability to get on existing stations.
12385 Are you speaking particularly of Edmonton?
12386 MR. POWIS: Yes, pretty much. We did send packages Canada‑wide, but I am speaking specifically about Edmonton.
12387 I think the problem is that it seems like radio stations' programming is all done out of eastern Canada and therefore the Edmonton stations just don't know what is here and what they have.
12388 Yes, so I was speaking specifically Edmonton.
12389 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Let me ask about when you are with this band, one of the other things I wondered is, there are a number ‑‑ and we have heard through this week our applicants come forward with a number of different packages to support Canadian Talent Development, Canadian Content Development, and one of the established funds that are available is called FACTOR.
12390 Is that something that you ‑‑
12391 MR. POWIS: That we have applied for?
12392 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes, would have applied for?
12393 MR. POWIS: Yes. Yes, we did apply for the last album with FACTOR. We actually achieved an Alberta Foundation for the Arts grant for the last album.
12394 We applied for the last two and got the last one. FACTOR, we applied for both and were turned down on both.
12395 I think it wasn't ‑‑ they're musicians. They don't really know how to fill out the application properly and I think we learned from our mistakes. I think if we were to apply to FACTOR again for a grant, I think we would get it.
12396 I guess the point I'm trying to make is I think we were turned down because our application wasn't strong, not because the music wasn't strong.
12397 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Okay. Fair enough, because we have heard that there is not a lot of Albertan, frankly western ‑‑ I am from Saskatchewan and it is the same; that the artists are not getting a significant amount of the money out of FACTOR. It is not landing was artists within these prairie western provinces and have had discussions that it is not ‑‑ you know, it is not the organization. It is just how do the artists know about it and how are they able to successfully, as you mentioned here, even fill out the forms to get access to those sorts of funds?
12398 MR. POWIS: Right. I think that is all improving now. There are instructions on the Internet now and there are people who will coach bands on how to fill them out correctly.
12399 I think the bottom line is I don't think the bands out there are looking for any handouts. They just need to be heard. You can throw as much money as you want at our band. It doesn't matter. They just want people to hear them.
12400 They want to make it on their own merits and their own laurels. They are not looking for handouts.
12401 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes. Fair enough.
12402 Thank you and thank you for coming here today.
12403 MR. POWIS: Thank you.
12404 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Ms Pocklington, you have really given us some compelling reasons to listen. Obviously you are passionate about this and your band sounds truly ‑‑ it is kind of an interesting story to hear how successful you have become and yet, as you say, somehow falling through the cracks here in Edmonton and perhaps across Canada to some extent.
12405 MS POCKLINGTON: Yes.
12406 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: You, too, mentioned FACTOR. Is that something that has been available to your band?
12407 MS POCKLINGTON: We have applied for FACTOR. We have never received a FACTOR grant and we do know how to fill out grants.
12408 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: I can't imagine you can't fill out the form.
12409 MS POCKLINGTON: No, we know how to fill out the grants. We have received ‑‑ for the CD that we are working on now we received a Canada Council grant as well as an Alberta Foundation For the Arts grant,
12410 But the Alberta Foundation for the Arts grant ‑‑ and I mean we understand this is the way things go. But the Alberta Foundation for the Arts grant was very small.
12411 In fact, I have sat on several juries and it was very interesting to me that the grant that we received from Alberta Foundation for the Arts was less than 50 per cent of what we asked for, which is very rare.
12412 So I will leave that with you.
12413 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes.
12414 Just following up on what Mr. Powis said, "it is not the money, we are not looking for handouts, we are looking for airplay", would that be what you feel would be most effective to help your music as well?
12415 MS POCKLINGTON: Absolutely.
12416 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Is it the airplay that is in need?
12417 MS POCKLINGTON: No. It's absolutely airplay and I will say this. We have had just extraordinary situations where people are like okay, you know, whoever, who are these women? And then we perform and we have had so many people say, "Oh my God, this music is fabulous. You know, where do we find you? We have never heard you anywhere. Why aren't we hearing you?"
12418 So yes, I think that airplay for Asani would be huge.
12419 We are played occasionally on CBC and occasionally on CKUA. I have never heard Asani played on any other radio station.
12420 If what people are telling us everywhere we go ‑‑ so it is not just across Canada but other places ‑‑ if what people are telling us is true, then people are interested in our music. They just need to hear it to know that we exist.
12421 COMMISSIONER MOLNAR: Yes.
12422 Well, thank you very much. As I said, you were very eloquent and very passionate as you brought it forward. So thank you for coming in, all of you for coming.
12423 Those are my questions.
12424 THE CHAIRPERSON: Just two quick questions.
12425 Mr. Powis, I may have missed your comment there and I'm just wondering, you said that the reason you didn't get the money from FACTOR was more related to your application than the quality of the music.
12426 I'm just wondering what that was, because I did ask yesterday one of the applicants if it was an involved process to apply to FACTOR and I understood it was not.
12427 MR. POWIS: Our first application was two pages long, and I spoke to another band that had received a grant and they showed me their application and it was 45 pages long.
12428 There seemed to be a little bit of a problem there filling out the application.
12429 THE CHAIRPERSON: I thought it was a form. It's not a form then?
12430 MR. POWIS: Well, you have to make a lot of attachments.
12431 THE CHAIRPERSON: Oh, I see.
12432 MR. POWIS: Basically what we found out later, you can't just say you are going to send it out to 200 radio stations in Canada. You have to provide addresses and a contact person to every radio station.
12433 THE CHAIRPERSON: Oh, I see.
12434 MR. POWIS: Basically making it your marketing plan. We found out after the fact.
12435 THE CHAIRPERSON: So once you learned that, did you apply again and still not successful?
12436 MR. POWIS: No, but we will for our next album.
12437 By the way, one thing I didn't mention is our newest album, we have actually changed our genre a little bit. We have made it much more commercial, radio friendly, again just to get it heard on the radio.
12438 I don't necessarily like that idea, going away from your roots, but again, that is the state of the industry here.
12439 THE CHAIRPERSON: Do you play in the band or are you ‑‑
12440 MR. POWIS: No.
12441 THE CHAIRPERSON: You represent them.
12442 MR. POWIS: No, just a fan that has lost an awful lot of money.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12443 THE CHAIRPERSON: Ms Pocklington, I just wanted to know how you spell Asani, because I is soon you have a website.
12444 MS POCKLINGTON: We do have a website.
12445 THE CHAIRPERSON: Do you? How do you spell that?
12446 MS POCKLINGTON: I am delighted that you want to look.
12447 THE CHAIRPERSON: Yes.
12448 MS POCKLINGTON: It is A‑S, as in Sarah, A‑N‑I.
12449 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. It is a good thing I asked. Thank you.
12450 I was just curious, do you have a video? Would I see you on APTN, for example?
12451 MS POCKLINGTON: Yes. We are on APTN probably quite a bit, yes.
12452 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay. I will watch for you.
12453 Thank you.
12454 MS POCKLINGTON: Thank you.
12455 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you all for your comments. We appreciate you coming. Thanks very much.
12456 THE SECRETARY: I would now call CKUA Radio Network to come forward to the presentation table.
‑‑‑ Pause
12457 THE SECRETARY: Please introduce yourself. You will then have ten minutes to make your presentation.
12458 THE CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, if I could. There seems to be something wrong with the copies we have. We are not starting with paragraph 1 or is that paragraph removed?
12459 Are we supposed to start at 8?
‑‑‑ Pause
12460 THE CHAIRPERSON: No, it's not there actually.
12461 MR. REGAN: My apologies. That's the photocopier.
12462 THE CHAIRPERSON: Maybe what we could do ‑‑ is it possible to fix that? We could just take a break now and then we will start again in about 20 minutes.
12463 MR. REGAN: Sure.
12464 THE CHAIRPERSON: Would that be all right? Would that give you enough time?
‑‑‑ Off record discussion / Discussion officieuse
12465 THE CHAIRPERSON: So that would make it 10:40.
12466 Thanks very much.
‑‑‑ Upon recessing at 1015 / Suspension à 1015
‑‑‑ Upon resuming at 1045 / Reprise à 1045
12467 THE SECRETARY: Please be seated. We will now resume.
12468 We will resume with the presentation by CKUA Radio Network. Please introduce yourself and you will then have ten minutes to make your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12469 MR. REGAN: Thank you very much.
12470 My name is Ken Regan. I am the General Manager at the CKUA Radio Network. I apologize for the disruption. It is one of the reasons why I am protective of CKUA. We need more money so that we can afford a photocopier, a better photocopier.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12471 MR. REGAN: Madam Chair and Commissioners, thank you for the opportunity to speak to these important deliberations.
12472 Appreciating that my time is limited I would like, for the record, to provide a bit of history about CKUA, some background.
12473 CKUA is one of this country's great broadcasting institutions and pioneers. Founded in 1927 at the University of Alberta, CKUA was created for the express purpose of using the medium of radio to serve the community.
12474 One of the things I am most proud of today is that after 80 years of history, CKUA remains true to that founding principle.
12475 Over its 80‑year history, CKUA has established many firsts for Canadian radio: Canada's first educational broadcaster; Canada's first public broadcaster, predating the CBC by almost a decade. CKUA was also the first radio station in the British Commonwealth to broadcast as a public service the proceedings of a Legislative Assembly. In 1995‑96 CKUA was the first radio station in Canada to stream its signal via the Internet while the Internet was in its infancy.
12476 Following the deadly Edmonton tornado of 1987, it was CKUA engineers who, with the encouragement and support from the Alberta government, developed and today continue to maintain as a public service Alberta's Emergency Public Warning System. It is the only province‑wide public alerting system in Canada, and it is a system considered by jurisdictions worldwide to be one of the finest anywhere.
12477 Today CKUA broadcasts via a network of one AM and 16 FM transmitters which cover 95 per cent of Alberta's populated regions from Fort McMurray and the Peace country in the north to Lethbridge and Medicine Hat in the south, from Banff, Canmore, Valley in the west to Lloydminster in the east.
12478 CKUA's product consists of some of the most eclectic, intelligent and informed Alternative music programming to be found anywhere. It is made up of Jazz, Blues, Classical, Country, Celtic, Contemporary, Folk, Roots, R&B and World Music and, I am proud to say, including the music of fantastic musicians like Harpdog Brown and Asani.
12479 I think, if I may suggest, during the course of your deliberations when you have heard oblique references from artists about getting some airplay on radio in Alberta, that more often than not they are probably speaking of CKUA, perhaps Campus Radio, but more than likely they are talking about CKUA.
12480 It is what we do. Support for local, regional and Canadian artists is our chosen mandate.
12481 This music programming is backed up by immensely dedicated, knowledgeable and experienced programmers, many of whom are accomplished or professional musicians themselves, and by one of the largest most diverse music collections in North America, consisting of more than 1.5 million selections.
12482 I think this number is particularly relevant, given that when you consider that the Encyclopedia of Life, which is an internationally recognized online repository of information on every known species on the planet, has 1.8 million entries.
12483 The CKUA music library is a national treasure and I think if you ask any working musician who knows about it, they will tell you that visiting this collection is akin to completing a pilgrimage.
12484 But CKUA is about much more than music. It is also a place where listeners can hear outstanding information programs. I will just mention a few.
12485 Inspiring Leadership, a series produced in conjunction with the acclaimed Leadership Development Program of The Banff Center, which examines the essence of leadership and its relevance, increasing relevance, in society.
12486 Similarly, an earlier series entitled The Folkways Collection, which told the story of Moses Asch, the founder of Folkways Records, and which was produced in collaboration with the prestigious Smithsonian Institute. It is now a very popular podcast on iTunes music platform, and during the first two weeks that the series was available on iTunes it was downloaded 50,000 times.
12487 Madam Chair, this unique content and the intelligent, informed and respectful way it is offered are why people in Alberta, across Canada and around the world support CKUA, to the tune of roughly $3 million annually, a fact even more remarkable when you consider that these are voluntary contributions for a product that can be acquired for free.
12488 This support has made CKUA without question the most successful community‑based broadcaster in this country.
12489 But inherent in this success is CKUA's vulnerability, because it is this unique programming and CKUA's history of serving niche markets that will forever relegate CKUA to having to survive with the support of a loyal but relatively small audience. Implicit in that equation, then, is the fact that any potential erosion of an existing small audience that is so crucial to our existence, particularly one that voluntarily funds our operations, can have a disproportionately negative impact on CKUA's viability and sustainability.
12490 The situation is really no different for any community‑based broadcaster serving its community, I believe.
12491 But it is specifically because of this particular vulnerability that it is incumbent upon CKUA to defend its audience position fiercely. To not do so would be an abrogation of responsibility.
12492 Which brings me to our intervention against DAWG‑FM.
12493 Madam Chair, even though CKUA has intervened against DAWG, I have tremendous respect for Mr. Torres and his desire to support the Blues community of Edmonton. CKUA has its own history of supporting Blues music in this province.
12494 Our intervention, though it referenced several issues we feel are relevant, was largely borne out of concern that a broadcaster seeking to commercially develop a niche music format, particularly one that has been a mainstay of CKUA for 50 years, does represent a potential threat of audience erosion.
12495 That being said, I will say that subsequent to our intervention and Mr. Torres' vigorous defence, I have had opportunity to meet with and discuss my concerns with Mr. Torres and I'm happy to inform the Commission that we have agreed that should Mr. Torres' application be successful on its own merits, we will work collaboratively to address the concerns specific to CKUA.
12496 In truth, CKUA's biggest concerns are not specific to Mr. Torres or any one application or company. I am excited by what I have seen and heard at these hearings because it speaks directly to the passion, the dedication and the ongoing entrepreneurial spirit that are the hallmarks of this industry.
12497 It is the nature of the business that we will all have occasional differences, but I have been around the business a while and the Canadian broadcasting industry is one of the most collegially competitive enterprises I have ever seen. Differences will crop up, but behind the competition is the foundation of respect and friendship.
12498 Because of this kinship, I wish that CKUA never had to intervene or challenge anyone's applications, but the vulnerability is real to CKUA, and I might suggest to all community broadcasters.
12499 The broadcasting industry today is staggeringly dynamic and challenging. CKUA and other community broadcasters face exactly the same challenges and threats as our private and public sector colleagues: technological change, rising costs, audience fragmentation and increased competition.
12500 The difference for CKUA and other community broadcasters is that the resources needed to face these challenges are extremely limited, our margin for error is minuscule and our sector is, frankly, handicapped by a patently unfair playing field.
12501 As much as CKUA may have concerns with individual applicants from time to time, our primary concern is with the systemic inequities that exists within the Canadian broadcasting system. On one hand, unlike our friends in the private sector, CKUA is not allowed to compete on an equal footing for advertising. We cannot simply sell more or charge more to improve our bottom line.
12502 Unlike the CBC, CKUA receives absolutely no tax subsidy to fall back on. Unlike the public broadcaster, we have no choice but to earn our keep. That's fine, because in fact we don't want government handouts.
12503 While it may not be specifically germane to these discussions, I have to tell you that it causes me great concern and intense frustration when the tax funded public broadcaster uses our own money to revamp its entire network schedule to, in effect, emulate if not copy CKUA programming models to create, at the very least, a serious potential to erode our audience.
12504 I am more than willing to put CKUA's product up against any other stations in the country, but I cannot compete with private radio's immense marketing machinery or the guaranteed tax funded CBC resources which allow them to leverage a place on SIRIUS, XM, on most if not all telco mobility services, and which allows them to dominate the broadcasting Internet platform in Canada.
12505 CKUA and other community broadcasters have made and are making very important contributions to our respective communities. We all know we could do much more and we want to contribute more. Like any other broadcaster, we have a right to not only exist but to thrive. Any other suggestion would be pure paternalism and is, frankly, unacceptable.
12506 The problem is not a lack of will, Madam Chair. The problem is our sector's ability to survive, let alone thrive. The problem is the absence of an appropriate funding framework of support and systemic inequities that preclude us from competing fairly in the marketplace on the basis of our product.
12507 I am happy that Mr. Torres and I have found common ground to resolve our specific issues, but CKUA's greatest concerns are not with Mr. Torres alone, or with Rawlco Radio or any of the fine applicants who have appeared before you in these past weeks. Our greatest concern is with these inherent and systemic inequities in our system and their potential for significant negative impact on CKUA and the entire community broadcasting sector.
12508 I thank you for this opportunity.
12509 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
12510 Commissioner Cugini will do the questioning. Thanks.
12511 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: This is going haunt you, Madam Chair.
12512 I'm just saying, if you weren't here, Mr. Regan, she ‑‑ to say mispronounced my last name on a day of the hearing would be an understatement.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12513 MR. REGAN: That's why I have stuck with a simple one like Regan.
12514 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: Thank you for your intervention here today. Believe me when I say that the Commission understands and appreciates the special role that CKUA plays in the Canadian broadcasting system.
12515 I am going to start with the end of your presentation and I can't help but think that it is a preview of a submission urging us to review the Community Radio Policy.
12516 MR. REGAN: I think that's fair to say. It may also may be a preview of a submission that we plan to make with respect to broadcasting in the new media as well, because there are issues specific to that particular component of the industry that are crucial in the underlying case that I'm trying to make.
12517 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: I would suggest that that is probably your best route, in the sense that the Commission will continue to license commercial radio stations if the market so warrants, and I think that you raise some very valid points that the Commission must keep top of mind in those decisions, as I said, the role that community radio plays and the potential impact and that perhaps a bigger form is also something that needs to be added to your schedule.
12518 Now, your written intervention did focus on the Torres application in particular.
12519 MR. REGAN: Correct.
12520 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: I think it is great that you and Mr. Torres were able to reach an agreement to collaborate, so you know I am going to ask you if you can provide us with more details as to what shape that collaboration will take.
12521 MR. REGAN: Well, it's not in writing as yet ‑‑
12522 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: I understand.
12523 MR. REGAN: ‑‑ but I can say that Mr. Torres has offered to assist CKUA in providing free air time to promote our fundraising activities, for example.
12524 We conduct two fundraisers a year to try to raise operating revenue from the audience. We have been very successful, but certainly any support that we can achieve around that is helpful.
12525 He has also offered to purchase advertising on CKUA ‑‑ we have a limited advertising, restricted advertising licence ‑‑ not to promote his station so much but to promote community‑based activities that his station may be engaged in and we can ‑‑ when I talk about working collaboratively, I think it is a good thing, a way that we can also assist the work that they're trying to do in the community by promoting those things within our Blues programming on CKUA as well.
12526 So those were couple of things that we have spoken about specifically.
12527 We intend to get together and talk further about other things that we may be able to do, but those are a couple of specific examples.
12528 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: How much Blues music do you currently broadcast?
12529 MR. REGAN: We broadcast three hours on Friday evenings, from 9:00 to midnight, and we broadcast two hours on Saturday afternoons, from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Those are Blues specific programs, block programs if you wish.
12530 It may sound like odd times within the schedule, but it is not to ghettoize those things at all. In fact, those programs have garnered significant audiences in those timeslots, so we are reluctant to move them around because we don't want to be upsetting or alienating the audiences that they have developed.
12531 Natural Blues, which is the program produced by Holger Petersen on Saturday afternoons, is the longest‑running Blues program in this country on radio. So our history in supporting the music and the artists and the industry is well established.
12532 As I say, it is unfortunate that the systemic issues require us to intervene from time to time and our arguments, the points that we made in our intervention, we feel are appropriate. But it is not a personal thing and we don't wish any ill will to anyone.
12533 As I say, we feel significant vulnerability because we are a small player in a very big and very competitive market. We have been fortunate to achieve the success that we have, thanks to the generosity of listeners who appreciate what we do, but we know without doubt that we are riding a very strong economic wave at the moment and increased competition, whatever form it may take, audience fragmentation, however it evolves, are serious issues for all of us in broadcasting. We feel a particular vulnerability because of our reliance and the capricious nature of listener funded radio.
12534 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: And your position is that the deleterious effect of licensing more commercial radio stations is that it takes away audience from you, because it doesn't take away advertisers, being a non‑commercial.
12535 MR. REGAN: No, that is correct. That is correct.
12536 There is only one audience at the end of the day and we are all trying to carve out a piece of that audience, so the more players there are it stands to reason that the smaller the piece is going to be for somebody.
12537 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: As far as interventions are concerned, we all know that for the most part broadcasters are grown‑ups. The great thing about your intervention is that you were able to strike at least a conversation with the Torres Group.
12538 MR. REGAN: Absolutely. As I say, you know, CKUA has a tremendous relationship with everyone in the industry, particularly I would say with the private sector broadcasters who I think really not only appreciate the niche that CKUA serves, and not only appreciate the fact that we are survivors and the success that we have been able to achieve, they appreciate the fact that we earn our way; that just like them, we make our way on our own product, if you like, the fact that we are not subsidized in any way.
12539 Again, I worked at the CBC and I believe in public broadcasting. So my issue is not with public broadcasting. But it causes me grave concern, as I said, to see our money being used to essentially mimic or replicate a lot of what we do in this market and I can't compete with their resources. I can't compete with the wage scale that has already lured many valuable CKUA employees away from us because we can't compete with their wage scale.
12540 I can't compete with the honorariums that they pay to musicians. CKUA insists on paying artists who perform at CKUA. We insist on paying them a stipend, but when CBC can offer them three or four times as much as we can afford, that is problematic for us. I don't blame an artist for preferring to go to CBC.
12541 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: Well, Mr. Regan, thank you very much for your intervention here today. It was quite useful.
12542 MR. REGAN: I appreciate the opportunity.
12543 COMMISSIONER CUGINI: Thank you, Madam Chair.
12544 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr. Regan.
12545 MR. REGAN: Thank you.
12546 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12547 I would now call Community Radio Fund and CRA/ANREC, ARC du Canada, ARCQ; Byron Christopher and Edmonton Public Schools to come to the presentation table and present as a panel their interventions.
‑‑‑ Pause
12548 THE SECRETARY: We will start with Community Radio Fund.
12549 Please introduce yourself and you will then have ten minutes to make your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12550 MS KAESTNER: Thank you.
12551 Good morning, everyone. My name is Melissa Kaestner and I am the development consultant for the newly formed Community Radio Fund of Canada, La Fond Canadien de la Radio Communautaire. I have worked in radio for 15 years and was most recently the National Coordinator for the National Campus and Community Radio Association.
12552 We are here today on behalf of not only the Fund, but also for its three founding associations.
12553 MR. HANNLEY: Hello. My name is Jay Hannley. I am the Program Manager at CJSR Radio here in Edmonton, Alberta. It is a campus and community radio station.
12554 I was the Music Director there for five years and I just recently got to the position as Program Manager.
12555 MS KAESTNER: The Community Radio Fund of Canada is a national fund established to support the development of local community radio. It is our goal to help these broadcasters reach their collective potential as a well resourced, independent, diverse, vibrant and accessible media sector.
12556 The activities of the Fund will reflect the commitment of the sector to principles of localism and access, respect for and promotion of the official languages of Canada, diversity and multiculturalism, social justice and high quality programming and innovation.
12557 We are here today to talk about how approving the licence for Rogers Broadcasting will contribute to community radio broadcasting across the country. We will talk about the details of the program and provide examples of projects that stations could receive funding for, but first we will give an overview of the Fund itself.
12558 The Fund was created by Canada's largest community radio associations, the National Campus and Community Radio Association, l'Alliance des radio communautaires du Canada and l'Association de radiodiffuseurs communautaires du Québec.
12559 Since the fall of 2004 they have worked together to build this arm's length not‑for‑profit organization, from initial discussions and research to creating bylaws and policies, to meeting the CRTC staff and Commissioners and to making our case to Canadian Heritage, Senators and MPs. The Associations have contributed considerable financial, staff and volunteer resources.
12560 The result is a transparent and accountable funding body that will have a meaningful and significant impact.
12561 The Fund is open to all non‑commercial community and community based licensed broadcasters in Canada and their associations. It will ensure that financial support is well targeted and used efficiently. Applications for funding will be judged on a combination of need and merit for projects and activities under the following program areas: sustainability and capacity building; dealing with emerging broadcast distribution technologies; local news and spoken word programming; and, finally, Canadian Talent Development.
12562 In terms of structure, the Fund is member driven, its membership comprised of the stations and associations it has been created to serve. These members will elect an independent board with no directors having any affiliation with potential recipients, meaning they will not be board members, officers, staff people or active volunteers at recipient stations.
12563 Additionally, each founding association will have an ex officio representative to act as an advisor but will not have a board vote or participate in funding decisions.
12564 In the future, we may add ex officio positions to represent our long‑term funding agencies or sectors, which would help achieve our goal of ensuring transparent management of the funding we receive.
12565 While we intend to diversify our revenue sources in the future, we are currently focusing on soliciting contributions from the private broadcasting sector and the federal government, including the Department of Canadian Heritage.
12566 With regard to private broadcasters, we have already made significant progress toward achieving our funding goals. Last month we publicly launched the Fund by announcing our partnership with Astral Media Radio, resulting in a $1.4 million contribution over seven years. This will see the Fund distributing grants as early as this fall through two programs, the Astral Media Radio Artist Development Assistance Program and the Astral Media Youth Internship Program.
12567 Now that the Fund has been officially certified by the CRTC, we are able to develop new funding partnerships with other broadcasters as well.
12568 One such partnership is with Rogers Broadcasting. After indicating in their application they wanted to support campus and community broadcasters, they learned of the existence of the Fund from CRTC staff. Rogers then approached us to discuss possible news oriented grants for our stations.
12569 The result is our proposal to manage the Rogers News Access Program. This program would provide funding to assist eligible stations in Alberta and across the country to develop and increase local news and public affairs programming.
12570 MR. HANNLEY: One of the primary functions of community media is to provide people with a voice that reflects what is happening in the community around them. With so many people turning to digital forms of media, terrestrial analog radio now competes with a wide range of music, news and other content from around the globe. But no matter how much choice they have, people still need to know about the events and issues in their home communities, where they live, work, learn, pay taxes, raise children and socialize.
12571 Local news orientated programming not only keeps people informed and offers in‑depth analysis and relevant local issues, it can also help hold local decision‑makers accountable, encourage dialogue and participatory decision‑making and contribute to sustainable community development. Increasing the capacity for not‑for‑profit community stations to carry this out provides community members with a unique opportunity to actively participate in researching and broadcasting their own news orientated programs as an alternative to passing consumption of news.
12572 It will play a key role in ensuring that the not‑for‑profit community media remains relevant in the future.
12573 Having consistent on air news programming is a common goal of stations in our sector. Most stations offer at least some programming geared towards news and public affairs. For the most part this occurs through weekly programming focused on specific issues.
12574 For example Terra Informa, an environmental news program on CJSR in Edmonton, Dynamic Health on CFRO in Vancouver Co‑op Radio, Aboriginal Connections on CKUW in Winnipeg and Critical Thinking, a municipal politics program on CFRC in Kingston.
12575 There are a few stations that have the resources to produce daily news programming such as CKDU in Halifax, CKUT in Montreal and CHRY in Toronto, but this is rare.
12576 The key challenges the stations face in realizing regular local news oriented programming can be attributed to a lack of resources, which leaves them with insufficient staff, equipment and inadequate training to produce frequent, thorough and reliable news.
12577 Through the Rogers News Access Program stations will be eligible to apply for grants to help with the infrastructure, training and production. Half of these grants would be given to stations in Alberta and the remaining half to stations in other parts of the country.
12578 In the area of training, stations could receive grants to strengthen the presence and improve the quality of news oriented programming to serve their local communities.
12579 For example, a station could bring in experienced researchers, journalists, reporters and other news producers to conduct workshops and training sessions so that new and experienced volunteers and staff can learn skills relevant to high‑quality news broadcasting.
12580 In the area of production, grants could be available for stations to purchase portable recording equipment. It can also enable stations to develop custom software to facilitate digital editing and enable stations and their volunteers to share news and information locally and nationally across the community radio sector.
12581 In the area of infrastructure, stations could receive grants to hire consultants to help establish a sustainable news department or develop news and editorial policies and style guides. They could also hire short‑term interns or producers to develop story ideas, conduct research and recruit local volunteers to help create news oriented programming.
12582 MS KAESTNER: Rogers Broadcasting's contribution to the Fund will increase the capacity of stations in the community radio sector to produce news and strengthen the presence and quality of the news and public affairs programming they provide. It will also foster increased opportunities for community members to participate in newsmaking, thereby increasing the diversity of voices and perspectives on the airwaves.
12583 We ask the Commission to consider this impact when awarding licences for the Edmonton market.
12584 Thank you. We welcome your questions.
12585 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12586 We will now proceed with Mr. Byron Christopher.
12587 You have ten minutes to make your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12588 MR. CHRISTOPHER: Thank you very much and good morning, Madam Chair and Commissioners.
12589 Right off the bat, a very belated warm welcome to Edmonton and to Alberta. I think I have new respect to the CRTC after watching you in operation for about a week and a half. You certainly have an awful lot of information to go through and I do not envy your job. There have been very good presentations here.
12590 I am a little bit like Harpdog in that I'm kind of nervous talking to the group. It is not the microphone. I feel like I am appearing before the Broadcasting Supreme Court. There is a lot at stake here.
12591 I would like to thank Cindy Ventura for her help. She has been an excellent traffic cop. I have been badgering her to find out when I am appearing and she has been very patient with me.
12592 Yes, I am here on behalf of the Rogers application for an all news operation here in Edmonton. I support that fully and with my heart.
12593 Another news operation here is desperately needed. The key word is desperate. It is like we need it like a slow steady rain after a long drought. The fact is Edmontonians have been suffering through an information drought for about two decades.
12594 Radio news rooms here have been decimated. I know you have heard this probably from one end of Canada to the other, but you are going to hear it again.
12595 I don't think there is one FM operation here in the city that has a dedicated reporter, not one. That is a huge change from the time I got into the business 30 years ago. The proof is over here.
12596 I mean, you have a media table set up and I haven't seen too many reporters here. But if this was the early 1980s, there would have been quite a few reporters.
12597 So for a long time now there has been no real competition.
12598 I notice that with all the speakers here ‑‑ and I include myself ‑‑ we speak with passion. We have different interests and certainly with a lot of passion. I too have a lot of passion for the news business.
12599 I was asked at an employee evaluation just a few years ago how would I rate my loyalty to the company? It is a bit loaded. I said it comes in second. My loyalty is to the audience and it always will be.
12600 Whether I work for one company or Al Jazeera or CBC, it doesn't really matter. My loyalty has always been to the audience.
12601 To give you an example of a lack of media coverage, about 2002 or so I was reading news on one of the AM stations in Edmonton on the weekend ‑‑ I was also the reporter ‑‑ and I forgot to check my faxes. Five hours later I checked them and found an important fax: a news release from the Edmonton Police Department about a homicide. I quickly got it on the air and the remarkable thing was we broke the story.
12602 That illustrates the drought here. That would not have happened in the 70s, there was such competition here.
12603 I'm sure ‑‑ and I hate to say this to a panel of three women, but I have to use a sports analogy.
12604 I'm sure you have watched hockey teams where teams have been playing with two players short. Edmontonians have been watching a game here where their team has been four players short. That accounts for a lot of smoke and mirrors in the industry, a lot of plagiarism. I hate to say it, but it goes on.
12605 I think the big losers ‑‑ I listened to these corporations, the suits talk here about their fear of competition, but really the big losers are the people of Edmonton. They are not given a choice in information. They are not given a choice in many stations, to start with.
12606 It is the equivalent of asking the people of Edmonton to buy their cars at one dealership, essentially a General Motors car. If there are two dealerships, it is owned by the same company. It is not a level playing field, not even close to it.
12607 So not only do Edmontonians need more information, they need different kinds of information, different outlooks, not the same editorial voice. That won't work. It works fine in North Korea or Cuba, but not here.
12608 I know the buzzword that I have been hearing here is diversity of voices. That simply means we need more voices.
12609 I believe consumers need a choice in news, the same way you need a choice when you buy a vehicle or any product. Competition is a good thing and choice is a good thing.
12610 When the Calgary Flames made it to the NHL Stanley Cup finals a few years ago, guess which team followed them the following year to the finals? It was the Edmonton Oilers. That's competition. That's pride.
12611 If we get another great newsroom here ‑‑ and there are some here now and I don't wish to knock the other stations ‑‑ it will only make everyone better, not just the other stations, the TV stations, newspapers.
12612 There is nothing that ticks off a media company more than to get a great scoop and to have them follow it or to try to match it or to beat it. Competition is a good thing.
12613 Again I use a sports analogy here, but going back to the so‑called old days where we played AAA ball here, now it is slo‑pitch. And what is being lobbed across are news releases, news conferences, wire copy. It sure ain't journalism.
12614 Ethics. I am big on that. The broadcast industry has a Code of Ethics. It is administered by the Radio‑Television News Directors Association. The City of Edmonton also has a bylaw prohibiting littering and the old Soviet Union had a Bill of Rights. They don't really mean a lot unless it is enforced, and they are not enforced.
12615 Competition. One of the caveats I would put in my support for Rogers is that they put up a Code of Ethics right in the newsroom for everyone to read and stick it on their website so the public can read and can look over their shoulders and give them ‑‑ take them to task if they cross any lines.
12616 By the way, I am not aware of any newsroom in the city that has a posted Code of Ethics. Some brothels in Vegas do, but newsrooms don't.
12617 A good friend of mine recently turned down a job in radio in Edmonton. He was to be a reporter. I won't identify the station. But he walked out after he saw the reporter steal traffic reports from another station. There was no shame. He said no thanks.
12618 I recently interviewed the infamous paedophile Karl Toft. That story appeared front‑page news in Edmonton Sun. I offered the tape free to a radio station in Edmonton on condition that they give credit. They didn't want to run the story. Management didn't like to give credit.
12619 The voice of Karl Toft speaking was broken by a radio station in Calgary. It happened to be Rogers.
12620 One thing I liked about Rogers' management ‑‑ and it's not very often I praise suits. But a number of years ago while working at a private station here one of our reporters joined the Rogers outfit in Calgary and said, do you know what's neat, they were ordered to credit sources.
12621 I don't know who that person at Rogers was, but I would like to shake their hand.
12622 The CRTC could do its share to. I think you could do more in enforcing standards. I really believe that in some instances you are part of the problem and not the solution.
12623 Have you ever yanked a licence because of plagiarism? It's rampant.
12624 I would like to see the CRTC make newsrooms accountable to indicate the sources for stories, not necessarily names, but to indicate if you pulled that story straight from a newspaper, say so. I mean, you do that now with playlists and Canadian content. I think it is equally as important to have it done for news.
12625 I can't believe I have only talked about ethics and stopped at three minutes, because I could go on for three days.
12626 That is the end of my talk. Thank you and thank you again for coming here.
12627 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12628 We will now proceed with Edmonton Public Schools.
12629 Please introduce yourself, after which you will have ten minutes for your presentation.
INTERVENTION
12630 MR. WRIGHT: Thank you.
12631 Good morning. My name is Stephen Wright. I work for the Edmonton public school system in a role titled Supervisor. Although that role carries a title, nobody really knows what that means.
12632 My role is to work with student transitions dealing with secondary students who are transitioning to post secondary or the world of work and to develop programming, courses and help schools in delivering things to assist students in the successful transition.
12633 One of the roles I perform is the development of the Skill Center which is going to begin pilot operation in September 2008.
12634 Edmonton Public Schools has looked at the programming we provide in our secondary school and has noticed with the recent cuts to education that we no longer provide previous courses to students because we can't provide them in the variety of school settings we have.
12635 So my job and role were to reinvent what can be done at a school, but instead of providing it to all of our high schools to relocate the students to the Skill Center for a portion of their school day.
12636 So one of the things we will be putting in is a hospital ward in order to teach health services to students. We do not have enough students in any one school to fill that classroom, so we will be busing students to and from the site from other high schools to utilize the facility and the teacher, because the teacher must have high qualifications to do that.
12637 Our original plan focused on very traditional courses. Just like the students, we thought of what roles they traditionally go to after high school and we never thought of radio. That was never on our agenda because it was just never in our mind.
12638 Through conversations with the General Manager from SONiC and World FM, we learned of the Canadian Content Development as part of this and tried to look at how this could support school systems or the K to 12 system, not only in providing instruction through the Skills Center, but also such things as a community resource database in which we identify community companies that can support education and things that can be distributed to other schools that are sort of trickle‑down from the work we do with the Skill Center.
12639 The Radio in Schools Program, as part of the Canadian content development, is a seven‑year plan that aligns very well with what we are proposing for the Skill Center, because it is a phased‑in approach that will allow us to build two sites, deliver instruction in radio and broadcast journalism that goes along with other initiatives we're working on.
12640 The money used from this Radio in Schools Program will provide the equipment, teacher learning resources and student learning resources that we currently do not receive funding from Alberta education to buy. We are funded from Alberta education on something called CEUs, which are credit enrolment units, to pay for the teachers we have. But there is no seed money to start up new programs in that.
12641 Also as part of the Canadian content development Rogers is looking at supporting the work done at NAIT and we also are partnered through an innovation grant with NAIT to develop the programming, so this is what content and courses go into that school as well, so we can leverage that money and that grant money to support the development of a radio program in the Skill Center.
12642 Why it is important for us to work with an all news station is because of the interactions of students with the media; that it maximizes the learning time for students. If you look at the curriculum we are starting for Audio 1525‑35 is the name of the course, it has the students constantly doing something and that's what we look for with the all news station.
12643 Also we look at partnering with the all news station because they will have a larger pool of professional people in the radio station to support student learning, so we would be able to tap on more people to come out and mentor the students, work with the students in doing presentations; that there is actually more human capital available.
12644 Another reason for getting involved in supporting this application is media awareness. The partnership for the 21st century skills identified the need for children to understand the myriad of messages from the broadcast medium that surround them every day. Unfortunately, that often comes with students learning to cut‑and‑paste, not citing their sources. Instead, we must have students access and analyze, so they must have the news available to them to do that. Then they must evaluate and create messages of their own to learn and have opportunities.
12645 We feel that the Radio in Schools focused on journalism will provide all four of these to occur.
12646 The third reason for getting involved is, as a previous classroom teacher, I taught math and unfortunately I think I am a good math teacher, but I don't think many kids woke up and jumped out of bed in grade 8 to come into my math class.
12647 We found not surprisingly that students are losing out on their option courses and losing relevancy of education. So they are not hopping out of bed to come to the course any more, but we are also finding we have lost the reinforcement and transferable skills.
12648 If we look at journalism, it is easy to recognize that they reinforce our language, our arts curriculum and our social studies curriculum. But when you look a little deeper, there is statistics, there is ethics, there is technical skills, career awareness, science inquiry. All of that can be reinforced in the option classes. We don't need to keep putting kids into more academic courses and wondering why they're not succeeding any longer.
12649 The one area that I am out of my element in speaking about but I want to mention is the future. This is a seven‑year plan and I don't know where radio will evolve to in seven years. I am simply a consumer of the radio system.
12650 We do know that students readily use new technologies, and often faster than our teachers, but I was fortunate to teach both teachers and students PowerPoint when it was first introduced and we found the same thing occurred in adults and kids: everybody learned very quickly how to have things fly in and the typewriter sound as words appear, but they lost the fact that there had to be a message on that screen; there had to be content.
12651 We want to teach media literacy to our students, not just how to use the equipment.
12652 So I'm pleased today to be a part of this process. It has increased my awareness. It has increased our involvement with the radio community and I am surprised that I bump into more and more people now involved with radio that I never knew before, now that I am involved with it.
12653 So thank you for the opportunity for Edmonton Public to present today.
12654 If you have any questions, I would be happy to answer them.
12655 Thank you.
12656 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much, all of you, for appearing.
12657 I'm just wondering, Ms Kaestner, these funds, Astral, Rogers, these are just the start of this new funding. What other sources?
12658 I think you referred in your remarks to approaching broadcasters, I assume you meant in general, just not people applying for new licences?
12659 MS KAESTNER: That's right. We are essentially going to seek every opportunity that we can. Since the time that we incorporated the Fund last November, you know, it is promising that we already have one funder established, and we are here as part of this proceeding to speak to two other potential sources.
12660 That is barely with really getting the word out. We haven't had a lot of opportunities to really spread the word that the Fund is here and come on over and talk to us, kind of thing.
12661 So I think as time goes by and more people learn about us, I think that the opportunities will open up, whether it is through new licences or renewals or transfer of owners, those kinds of things.
12662 Then outside of the private broadcasters we are looking at contributions from the federal government, as I mentioned, such as through the Department of Canadian Heritage. That is an ongoing thing and we have been focused on that because I think, as I also mentioned in the presentation, the three founding associations have just been putting in any resources that they currently have.
12663 So now the Fund is in a position where it has a development consultant that is available to start pushing this forward little bit more.
12664 THE CHAIRPERSON: So where are you situated yourself? Where is your office?
12665 MS KAESTNER: In Ottawa.
12666 THE CHAIRPERSON: In Ottawa.
12667 MS KAESTNER: Yes.
12668 THE CHAIRPERSON: I think we have met before.
12669 But you will be approaching broadcasters, for example established broadcasters in Edmonton as well, independents?
12670 MS KAESTNER: Yes. As far as we are concerned, we are available to work with multiple broadcasters in terms of ‑‑ I don't know what the best forums or what the best methods are for that outreach, if it is just a matter of picking up the phone and calling them. We are certainly willing to do that and hopefully some people will pick up the phone and call us as well.
12671 THE CHAIRPERSON: I guess I was actually wondering if you were going to be proactive or if you were just going to wait for people like Rogers or others to come to you because they have an idea and they want to put together an acceptable plan.
12672 MS KAESTNER: Our goal is to be proactive. I just started working out of the office at the beginning of April. So getting our website ‑‑ I mean, our website isn't even up and running yet. It is currently being developed. Just getting our address ‑‑ it is actually still a temporary office.
12673 So everything is still in the development phases.
12674 So even though in these cases people have approached us with respect to the Edmonton proceeding, we definitely intend to be much more proactive, even in the coming months.
12675 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
12676 Mr. Hannley, are you also involved with the fundraising aspect of it as well?
12677 MR. HANNLEY: Well, as regard to our individual station, for sure.
12678 THE CHAIRPERSON: And your station again was what?
12679 MR. HANNLEY: It's CJSR. It is a campus and community station here in Edmonton.
12680 THE CHAIRPERSON: Oh, in Edmonton.
12681 MR. HANNLEY: Yes. So we raise money in the same sort of way that CKUA does, through listener donations.
12682 THE CHAIRPERSON: And you have great success at that?
12683 MR. HANNLEY: Not as good as CKUA; but, yes.
‑‑‑ Laughter / Rires
12684 THE CHAIRPERSON: Theirs sounded good. Thank you.
12685 Mr. Christopher, you will be happy to know that I stayed in my room last night to watch the game. I wasn't happy with the outcome, but nevertheless I did watch it. And my husband plays slo‑pitch, so I did get your analogies.
12686 MR. CHRISTOPHER: You can relate to those, yes.
12687 THE CHAIRPERSON: I understand there was a recent change in format with one of the Corus stations in the last few weeks, I gather, to add another new station.
12688 Do I have that right?
12689 MR. CHRISTOPHER: Okay. I would rather not be compromised on that. I worked for that station. I know of conversations that were said there and I would rather not bring them up.
12690 THE CHAIRPERSON: Okay.
12691 MR. CHRISTOPHER: If you are trying to get into there, I must back away from it.
12692 THE CHAIRPERSON: I wasn't trying to get in there. I was just wondering if it was going to be sufficient to address your concern about whether there was adequate news in the market ‑‑
12693 MR. CHRISTOPHER: No, absolutely not.
12694 THE CHAIRPERSON: ‑‑ are adequate diversity of voices?
12695 MR. CHRISTOPHER: Absolutely not.
12696 THE CHAIRPERSON: Absolutely not.
12697 MR. CHRISTOPHER: There won't be a diversity of voices. It's the same news staff.
12698 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.
12699 As for the Edmonton Public Schools, I was just wondering, Mr. Wright, when you had actually hoped to start your Radio in Schools aspect of your Shared Skills Center?
12700 MR. WRIGHT: The Skills Centre will begin operation this September. We are running some pilots this summer to learn from them in the healthcare field and then we will gradually phase in programs, adding them as we go along.
12701 It is a five‑year program in cooperation with NAIT, of which this was the first year in developmental phases. So we are into year two this coming year and we will be adding programs.
12702 We recently met at NAIT to decide which of the programs we will work together on and radio was one that we are working on.
12703 THE CHAIRPERSON: So will the radio one proceed with or without the Rogers money?
12704 MR. WRIGHT: Without the money, it will probably not proceed.
12705 THE CHAIRPERSON: I was curious to know, you mentioned the gentleman from The Bounce; I didn't catch the name. Did they approach you or did you approach them?
12706 MR. WRIGHT: From SONiC and World FM?
12707 THE CHAIRPERSON: SONiC, was it? Okay. Thank you.
12708 MR. WRIGHT: And they approached us.
12709 THE CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. We appreciate you all taking the time to come. We have read your interventions and we certainly will consider them.
12710 Thank you.
12711 THE SECRETARY: Thank you.
12712 I would now call UrbanDNA Events, Jonny Chung, Q99 FM and Peter Kossowan to appear as a panel and present their interventions and to approach the presentation table.
‑‑‑ Pause
12713 THE SECRETARY: We will begin with UrbanDNA Events.
INTERVENTION
12714 MR. BAIG: Thank you.
12715 Good morning, Lady Chairman and everybody else on the Panel.
12716 I am glad to be here and show my support for NEW 107.
12717 My name is Tim Baig and I represent a small group of people called UrbanDNA Events. I am sure you would want to know who I am and what I do here in Edmonton.
12718 I am a part‑time, independent promoter here in Edmonton and we are dedicated to bringing small to medium‑sized concert events and showcases. I consider ourselves more grassroots, meaning that what we do is more trendsetting and always a step ahead of what's going on.
12719 Having said that, you know, I would like to be here today and speak on behalf of the Urban music community here in Edmonton.
12720 What makes me qualified to speak on their behalf? For several reasons.
12721 First of all, I would like to consider myself active in the community, continuously active. I work with venues, retailers, major record labels and most importantly the local artists. It is all in an effort to help build the emerging Urban music community that is happening here in Edmonton.
12722 I also DJ and have been doing so for over a decade now. You know, being a DJ you are always in the know of what's new and what's fresh and the feedback that you get from people and their ideas of the music selection that is available here in the city.
12723 Last, I have been involved with event promotions for the last five years, three years in Toronto working for one of the largest promotions companies in the country and two years here in Edmonton as an independent promoter, which has been successful thus far.
12724 So with all this experience I have been fortunate to meet all sorts of people, most importantly getting the feedback from these people, what they like, what they dislike when it comes to music that is available here in their own city.
12725 Let's just say I just try to keep an ear to the street in trying to see what people are saying.
12726 So that is why I'm here, you know, to voice that opinion of the community and say that something like NEW 107 and its format is something that is in demand and it is something that would be successful, you know, in the City of Edmonton.
12727 If you are wondering how I heard about NEW 107 and why I wanted to get involved, it was through word of mouth initially and from there I took it upon myself to do my own personal research, looking up their website, checking out their pages on Facebook, which is very popular, and I was instantly impressed. I was instantly excited.
12728 The reasons why is because I could relate to the concept and the image that they are putting out there. I related to it on a personal level because it is something that I have always wanted to see, and even on the business level what I am doing with UrbanDNA is kind of what NEW 107 is doing as well.
12729 You know, it is young, it is new, and most importantly it is local.
12730 I was also impressed with the promotional efforts that they put forth and the feedback they generated in such a short time.
12731 You know, it wasn't just me, it was the people that were getting excited and they definitely created a buzz in the city.
12732 So after all that I took it upon myself, contacting John Yerxa, showing him my support and trying to get more information about what I could do, and that's how I ended up here.
12733 So basically I know you are going to ask why do we need a station like NEW 107 here. There are various reasons.
12734 You know, as far as I know, radio stations are supposed to be a reflection of their target listeners and I'm here to say that there is a group of listeners, a large group of listeners, that aren't getting what they want from the local radio stations. More importantly, it is a station that could probably bring new listeners to radio.
12735 You know, if people want to listen to Modern Rock and Classic Rock, we have great stations like The Bear and SONiC, and for those people who want to listen to Top 40 hits, The Bounce is great for that. I mean, those stations are great at what they do, but there is a large market similar to the one that I aim after with UrbanDNA that is 15‑to‑29 years old that aren't getting what they want from radio.
12736 So where are they turning to? I mean, like everybody else that knows it is simple. They are going to their iPods, they are going to MP3 players, they are going online to the Internet and listening to music just because that is the only place they can get it.
12737 The people in this demographic are just doing it at a larger rate, you know, and it is just going to get larger and larger. So, I mean it is not a fad, it is not a phase. This is what is happening and this is the future of music.
12738 The younger people want variety and because of the accessibility today, I mean we are listening to more artists, we are listening to more songs, we are listening to more genres. Everything has just become more, more, more. So we need to make radio relevant again to young people and we need to give people a reason to reach for the radio dial again, because it is losing some appeal with the younger generation.
12739 One of the solutions is what NEW 107 is proposing, having a constant rotation of new and fresh music, which is a format that will keep these listeners coming back and introducing new listeners to radio again. That is how we can keep it more appealing.
12740 The most important reason why we need NEW 107 is because of their commitment to play Canadian content. It is a commitment I have made by always making efforts to include local artists at every one of my events, and I hope that if this station gets approved I could help build these local artists and the music community with NEW 107.
12741 So I guess one of the questions that may arise is that, you know, if NEW 107 is some form of an iPod, then why do we need it? If people can listen to what they want on an iPod, why do we need 107?
12742 For one, it is interactive where iPods and MP3 players and the Internet are kind of limited in that way. People still want to hear a voice. People still want to hear what's going on in their city and they want the information to go along with their music.
12743 Second, NEW 107 is constantly introducing new music, a constant rotation of music that people won't hear anywhere else.
12744 Then just some final notes, probably the most important ones.
12745 I would like to distinguish between an outlet and a source, meaning NEW 107 will not just be an outlet for music like other radio stations. I feel other radio stations are just outlets for music. They are just driving the chart‑based music and they are good at what they do for certain type of listener. But there is a huge demographic of listeners that isn't getting what they want.
12746 Instead, NEW 107 will be a constant source, not an outlet. It will be a source. It gives people a reason to listen. It is what we need and that is the key to the station, because I think the young people now go to the Internet, go to iTunes because it is a source rather than an outlet.
12747 You know, radio needs to catch up with what is going on, especially with the younger target market.
12748 You know, everything else is changing when it comes to the way we listen to music.