Carroll County Chamber Of Commerce : CMC Receives National Award For Best Of Government Meeting Coverage

Press release from the Carroll County Chamber of Commerce :

Sherry Taylor

07/22/2021

The Community Media Center (CMC) received a 2021 Hometown Media Award from the Alliance for Community Media Foundation. The awards program was established to honor and promote community media, community radio, and local cable programs that are distributed on Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) access cable television channels.

The CMC was awarded The Best of Government Meeting Coverage for coverage of the City of Westminster’s Wakefield Valley Park Master Plan Development Community Input Meeting . The City of Westminster asked the CMC to design an inclusive coverage plan that would overcome the public assembly restrictions required by COVID-19 guidelines and include interactive capabilities that could replicate the in-person experience to provide the greatest degree of access to the presentation, allow public opinions to be expressed and the community’s input to be recorded.

Abby Grubber, Director, City of Westminster Recreation and Parks Department said, “The City’s earnest desire to create a virtual public input and engagement opportunity for its citizens was not only matched but surpassed by the dedication, knowledge, and creative, problem-solving approach that the Community Media Center’s staff displayed during the Wakefield Valley Community Meeting on December 16, 2020.” She added, “The most challenging circumstances, a crippling snowstorm and a pandemic, did not stand in the way of the tireless efforts and stellar technical knowledge of service delivery provided by the CMC staff.”

In anticipation of the coming winter storm the presentation was pre-recorded in the CMC green screen studio and then streamed via Zoom. The open platform Padlet.com was incorporated to provide interactive participation. In addition to streaming the program live on cable channel 23, the CMC created and promoted a landing page that included the live embedded video stream and dynamic Padlets including a Google map, photo boards, and various background documents on the development area.

“It is a distinct honor to receive this national award for excellence in local programming for coverage of a governmental meeting,” said Richard Turner, executive director of the Community Media Center. “During the pandemic, communities across the country were adapting and innovating to ensure that local governments would continue to serve their residents. This national recognition demonstrates the significance of the CMC’s innovative uses of technologies to increase governmental access and transparency.”

Each year, nearly one thousand entries are submitted to the “Hometown Media Awards,”. These entries, or programs, are submitted and evaluated on several factors resulting in over 100 award winners. A panel of judges from the industry evaluate the entries. Awards are presented to the most creative programs that address community needs, develop diverse community involvement, challenge conventional commercial television formats and move viewers to experience television in a different way. 1301 Washington Road, Westminster, MD 21157 ~ 410/386-4415 ~ fax: 410/875-2358 www.carrollmediacenter.org

“The Hometown Media Awards celebrate both the excellence of work and the diversity of media that appears on community channels being produced around the country. The ACM Foundation is proud of their achievement and of how they represent their communities in their work,” said Mike Wassenaar, president & CEO, Alliance for Community Media.

About the Alliance for Community Media (www.allcommunitymedia.org)

Founded in 1979, the Alliance for Community Media is a national, non-profit membership organization committed to ensuring access to electronic media for all people. The Alliance for Community Media carries forth its mission by educating, advocating and acting as a resource for the more than 3,000 Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) cable channels nationwide.  

Reference Sherry Taylor 410-386-4415

This press release was produced by the Carroll County Chamber of Commerce . The views expressed here are the author’s own.