It's no wonder we haven't been able to make it back to the Menomonee Falls Now Blog since November. 2009 was a banner year for Channel 14 in Menomonee Falls. There were over 220 locally produced programs that ran on Channel 14 over the last 12 months. In addtion to those programs there were also 60 community service and Government produced programs that were aired. Access centers like West Allis, Milwaukee and Madison, have been providing a similar number of programs for years and Falls Cable Access is proud to join the ranks of the top access centers in the state. What makes this even more impressive is that our budget is 1/4 of Milwaukee and Madison and 1/2 of West Allis. We are lucky to have a great relationship with the school district that provides us space and the students access to state of the art equipment. So Congratulations to all those involved, our producers, our Board of Directors, the School District and the Village Board for their support.
Because of the nature of community access and the number of shows last year, Falls Cable Access has contracted with the Village of Menomonee Falls, SDMF, and the Hamilton school district to run Channel 13 Educational Access channel in Menomonee Falls. This will allow for more programming by the school districts, access to addtional resourses by the Hamilton district, more state and federal programs and open up space on Channel 14 for PSA's, new shows in the works and longer Community Bulletin Board/RSS feeds. We are still working out bugs but eventually both Channels should offer great choices and useful information.
Basketball, Basketball, Basketball. For those regular viewers, you may have noticed that there is a lot of basketball on this past month. Well the Menomonee Falls boys basketball team is generating a lot of interest and the gym has been packed. There were over 100 people turned away from the Marquette game, and a lot of disapointed Hamilton fans this last week. Televising the games offers a little relief and a chance for everyone to see an exciting team led by sophomore J.P. Tokoto. Knowing we were going to broadcast so many games, we parked the mobile truck for the winter and built a mobile tv production cart that gets wheeled over to the gym for each game. Less wear and tear on the equipment and the director doesn't have to sit in the cold trailer. Last year just about every game we did was during a "6 snowfall. This year 12 games, no storms. Setup is still 3 hours before game time and it takes a half hour to "strike" after the game, but our crack crew is great at it. Our broadcast crew has been stellar. Led by Principal Bill Hintz and game announcer Jerry Mislang, John Mercure, Brent Morris and Chuck Demge have provided great game analasys and colorful insight to both the boys and girls cager squads.
Actually the Marquette game was covered by Time Warners on demand crew as well as the Falls Cable Access team. They arrived with 4 cameras, a large (20 ft) production truck, 2 announcers and a crew of 10. The channel 14 crew consisted of 4, with 6 cameras and of course Bill Hintz and John Mercure. While the Channel 32 cameras are of higher resolution, our announcers offered more insight and excitment and the eventual programs were not that different. Yeah we had more mistakes but with 6 less people, I have to say I am very proud of our ammateur crew. A special thanks to all of our volunteers for putting on a great show. Our streaming video website http://fallscable-wi.pegcentral.com/ has been using bandwidth at a rate 5 time normal over the last few months. Holiday shows, Community Christmas Card and high school basketball are driving this surge but our website shows a lot of returning users, which means people are not only flipping through channels but looking for their favorite shows on our website and streaming site. There were over 1700 hits on the Germantown game and the Marquette game, even though it is going to be available on demand on Time Warner, is approaching 800 views.
A quick story. We do get complaints at Channel 14, but most are suggestions and often are good ideas. To me it means people are watching. Recently I received a message from an elderly viewer who was mad that we had too many Catholic masses on in a row on our Sunday/Tuesday TV Ministry. I returned her call and explained that the volunteer who drops off the DVD's was unexpectedly called out to the West Coast for a family issue and we weren't aware of it. She seemed content with our reason and so I decided to ask her about the other programming she may be watching. Well she just lit up over the high school sports. She said she enjoyed it so much and watched everything she could. I politely asked how old she was since she was obviously a watching the Church Services as a shut in. She informed me she was 83 years young.
The INCREDIBLE TRIVIA CONTEST for the Scholarship Foundation will be held on Channel 14 on March 27th, This will be the regular annual slot for the event. Based on the response from the September teaser contest, we are looking to have at least 50 teams competeing this year. Based on the Stevens Point World's Largest Trivia Contest on WSP radio, we will be running highlights from the September contest for the next six weeks. Everyone involved found the contest infectious, from our hosts and crew, to the telephone operators and competing teams. Some rivalries have already been formed. This should prove to be a great community event and provide addtional funds for the Menomonee Falls Scholarship Foundation in theri quest to provide assistance to graduating seniors in Menomonee Falls.
The contest will start on March 27th at 4:00 pm sharp and run till 9:00 pm live on Time Warner Channel 14 in the Falls LIVE. Registration forms are available at www.fallscableaccess.com . Watch the replays to get a sense of how the contest works and join us on the 27th. Guaranteed fun for all.
THIS WEEK ON CHANNEL 14
FOCUS on Our Children....Real life Shuttle Astronaut, Dr. Sandra Magnus visited the scholl district this past week and she graciously sat down with Beth Harwood for a bevy of questions you won't want to miss.
Reel Movie Talk....The Top Ten Movies of the Year are discussed in the Forum as a lead in to the OSCARS on March 7th. The Boys will once again do the OSCAR show live that evening and a studio audience is invited to join them in the studio. By the way, chekc out their new set on the this episode.
Village Voices....Although the Patio Players run of "Where there is a will, there's a relative" will have ended by this posting, the episode will run another week to promote the local troupe. also this week, 2 village employees give insight and information into the 2010 Census and several other village events this spring.
What's Cookin' with KC... More nutritional and health information with our favorite chef as she prepares a "healthy pizza" for some special studio guests.
AS ALWAYS...STAY TUNED!
