Westwood Community Access Television

A contributor to this blog commenting on the post about the last Board of Selectmen's meeting raised some very important issues about cable coverage of these and other town meetings. The good news is that something is actually being done to address these shortcomings. Westwood Community Access Television, Inc. (WestCAT), a not-for-profit 501(c)3 corporation, was incorporated in April, 2008 to manage the implementation and operation of Westwood's public, educational and government access programming. It is overseen by a seven member volunteer board of directors comprised of town residents and is independent from town government.

The mission of WestCAT is to promote and enhance community access television content to Westwood residents via cable and online channels in order to support an informed and active citizenry, increase the transparency and quality of civic decision making, deepen understanding of local issues of importance and promote civility in public dialogue, while respecting the rights to free speech and creative expression.

WestCAT's efforts to date have focused on establishing an operational plan and identifying a location for necessary equipment and business operations. We hope to have a location finalized in coming weeks. Several months thereafter, Comcast will install our connection to their network and we can begin programming. We anticipate being up and running during the summer of 2009. Until then, unfortunately, we have no control over the scheduling of programming on Comcast 8.

We are and will continue to be a largely volunteer organization for the foreseeable future. If you or someone you know is interested in helping us please use the contact form on westwoodblog to send a message to the editor, Dave Atkins, who is also an officer of the nonprofit corporation. Right now we could use some pro bono accounting and tax prep services.

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John Craine, President

Westwood Community Access Television, Inc.