‘Just save the damn station and I’ll be the happiest guy in the world’
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- Published on Thursday, September 29, 2016
By Eoin Devereux
Neepawa Banner/Neepawa Press
In a short period of time, the potential demise of Neepawa’s cable access channel has become a hot topic for many people across the region. Earlier this week, NACTV announced that current president, CEO and acting general manager Ivan Traill will soon retire. That decision, combined with a financial loss accrued by the station last year, has instigated a decision by the NACTV board to cease operations. A motion recommending the TV station shut down will be made at the board’s annual general meeting in November, unless another group is willing to take over.
Ivan Traill, who has been the heart and soul of NACTV for over 30 years, said that many people have approached him in the past few days, expressing great concern about the potential loss of the station.
“Everybody is talking about [the announcement]. Not many have stepped up yet to say ‘I want to do this’, but they are saying that we can’t let [NACTV] simply disappear. There has been that attitude. I hope that’s true, because the truth of the situation is that if we lose our [Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission] licence, it will not come back,” stressed Traill. “Neepawa has the smallest licensed market in all of Canada. There are only about seven or so markets that have this type of local access licence still.”
“All the others across the country have one by one vanished. And the CRTC is not letting any more out, so if Neepawa goes down, there will be just six left. There is no taking a six month hiatus and coming back and trying to get another licence. If [the license] is gone, it’s gone.”
Traill noted that since the television station was picked up by the Bell and MTS satellite feeds, as well as locally on Westman Cable and over the air, people from across Canada have become familiar with the station and the community. He said they know this because people across the nation have reached out to them.
“It’s funny, the number of interactions we have. We’ve had people from Vancouver Island, people in Newfoundland and Labrador, Northern Ontario and of course all over Manitoba who have contacted us about our programming, and that’s all recently, within the past few weeks and months. History indicates that on average, only three per cent of your viewership will take the time to write you or contact you about the programming. So if we have these people from all over Canada contacting us about the channel, you can bet that there are many more who watch but don’t [contact us],”
Traill hopes that a group of people will be able to step up and accept the challenge of keeping the station running. He said that the equipment is in place and the station receives video from many regional organizations on a regular basis, so the contacts are still all there. He’s optimistic that a slightly revised programming schedule for the new people will work, because NACTV as a station already exceeds its content requirements. Traill closed out by noting that Neepawa has something truly special broadcasting over the airwaves.
“We have something here in our community that’s like nothing else in Canada. The other thing people should know is that the CRTC has directed that, if we lose the station, we’d be covered by other larger station. The nearest stations with similar licensing are in Regina and Thunder Bay. They’d be responsible for rural Manitoba and you know that our stories would not be the priority,” Traill said “The thing I don’t want – People are coming up and being sympathetic. I did this job for over 30 years because I was doing what I wanted to do. I’m now backing off, not because I want to, but because I need to, I have to. So, sympathy doesn’t need to be there, just save the damn station and I’ll be the happiest guy in the world.”
