Heel to Toe to Help Heal D is a 5K walk to benefit a 5-year old Oxford boy who has Stage 4 Neuroblastoma. All are welcome to join!
Registration and Heel to Toe’s starting point will be at Green Hill Park’s gazebo across from the zoo. Walk registration will be from 1:00-2:00 PM. The walk will begin promptly at 2:00. Pledge form(s) are available through our website: www.HelpHealD.org. All walkers who raise $150 or more will receive an official Heel to Toe t-shirt. We will be walking rain or shine!
After the walk, we will be celebrating everybody’s hard work and success by meeting back at the gazebo for refreshments, snacks, and prizes. We will be giving out several special awards, including prizes to the walker who raises the most in pledges and the walker who get the largest single donation.
For more information please see our website: www.HelpHealD.org

Media Advisory
For more information on the press event,
please contact Olga Lopez-Hill, EITC Coordinator
at 508-754-1176 Ext/.155

Earned Income Tax Credit Coalition Volunteer Recognition

Worcester, MA—On Wednesday, April 30, 2008, the Worcester Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) Coalition will celebrate its achievements and recognize 52 volunteers who provided free tax preparation and E-filing to income-eligible Worcester residents.

The City of Worcester and Worcester Community Action Council along with the listed Coaliton partners have been working for five years to ensure that eligible Worcester residents receive all tax credit for which they entitled and to maximize their tax refund. This year, the Coalition prepared over 900 tax returns, returning close to a million dollars to Worcester low to moderate income working families.

Approximately 10 to 15% of families who are eligible for EITC do not receive it. The goals of the Worcester Earned Income Tax Credit Coalition are to (1) ensure eligible households receive all tax credits for which they are entitled and to maximize their tax refund; and (2) through the assistance of trained volunteers, provide free tax preparation.

The event will be held at Plumley Village
16 Laurel Street, Worcester
4:30 to 5:30 P.M..

I was somewhat disappointed to read about the Fight posted on Internet fast, in yesterdays T&G.

I wish the T&G would consider writing about all the great and amazing things Worcester youth are posting and streaming on line and presenting on cable at WCCA TV.

They produce educational video, teen news, conduct and present discussions on youth concerns, discuss music sports, and local issues. They also produce music and culturally nurturing videos as well. Search WCCA's website for Teen Central, Young Views Real News, Community Vision News, KidsNet/Youth Channel. This is what Worcester youth are producing on line every day and every week. Participatory and inclusive media is alive and well in Worcester.

Accentuate the positive.

Mauro

WCCA TV
“The People's Channel”

Mission
To ensure people have access to the use of a public forum through various channels of communication including technology and media with education and training resources.

Benefits to the Community:
Citizen Produced programming: Behind every show and every electronic message there is a Worcester person, group or organization behind it.

Increased Communications within the city: WCCA is a voice for all a beacon to Worcester's diversity, fresh ideas, news and information, a home to all types of different languages and ethnic backgrounds. Inspires discussion and encourages community dialog.

Citizen Empowerment through Electronic media: Opened to all on a non-discriminatory basis, WCCA is participatory and democratic media. WCCA provides access to channels tools, education and resources to media which in turn, allows people to make a difference, impact their community through shared ideas, opinions, and action. People become franchised owners through such participatory use.

Shared diversity of Ideas, culture and information: WCCA is unmatched in the number of programs that aere Worceseter centric. WCCA presents locally produced News, in nearly every language, the vast spectrum of ideas, backgrounds ethnicity, technology , institutional offerings, individual opinions, together, contributes substantially to the creative and smart city model.

Promotion of sense of city pride: Watch WCCA programming or read letters we receive from around the world, WCCA is window into Worcester. Community media producers are more than proud of their accomplishments, WCCA is a model public access center, more importantly, the public access process , as a free speech platform, nurtures community spirit and pride.

Community outreach venue: Nearly every non-profit in Worcester has taken advantage of WCCA, as an affordable media tool it is unmatched and extremely valuable.

WHAT MAKES WCCA TV IMPORTANT FOR YOU?
Community Building block giving voice to the invisible in our community
Classes and Workshops on TV or media, from KidsNet/Youth Channel, Young Views Real News, Internships, Weekly production courses, web classes.
WCCA's Interactive website and streaming media,
WCCA's Community Computer Lab
Internships and volunteer opportunities
Producing MY OWN Community Media, your own TV show
Being a guest on any of the hundreds of locally originated WCCA shows.
Local news and information, programming you can not find anywhere else. TV BY THE PEOPLE FOR THE PEOPLE AND OF THE PEOPLE.
Outreach the station provides fro non-profits, cultural events, social service agencies, artist.
Other:

Thanks for your support.
Leave your answer as a comment.

I received this indirectly from Ellen Dunlap , President of the American Antiquarian Society, sent us an interesting article she found in CNNMoney.com

According to CNNMoney.com. Worcester ranks as 38th in the Top 100 best places to live and launch, according to CNN Money.

link

Congratulations to ALL those who helped make this possible. Everything Worcester has to offer, from the smallest and most invisible voice, our many institutions and organizations, our schools, our services, our diversity, to the highest level of leadership, is what makes Worcester as good as it is. We are all proud to be a part of it and to call it home.

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, PEOPLE OF WORCESTER.

Last night, March 19th, WCCA met with members of the city council's Public Service and Transportation Committee to discuss WCCA's operational and capital needs for the next five years.

Councilors Joe Petty, Gary Rosen and William Eddy were very receptive and expressed their support for WCCA. Gary Rosen passionately expressed that he hopes to be joined by all his colleagues on the council in a call for assurances to ensure WCCA will continue the valuable level of service and to meet future community media needs.

Congratulations to YOU, Worcester. Thanks to the people and organizations of Worcester for the tremendous outpouring of support and encouragement you have given to WCCA TV over the past years. You have have helped us with your letters, editorials, post cards, petitions, attendance at cable meetings, and your many phone calls to city leaders. Because of your efforts, the city was able to negotiate a decent contract with Charter. The city will soon be receiving the funding and capital needed to continue WCCA TV's public access mission.

Now WCCA's funding and its future lies in the hands of City Manager Michael O'Brien. It is up to him to allocate funding pursuant to YOUR needs as ascertained by the city. YOU have spoken at those public hearings and through YOUR letters, before the PS&T and Cable Advisory committees. Both Committees echoed your request for increased funding, equipment capital and additional channel for WCCA TV “The People's Channel”, YOUR VISION TELEVISION. The city has been sensitive to all of our voices and, so far, to the needs of public access.

Your continued support is more vital now than ever. Please continue those calls and letters to our councilors and the City Manager.

Stay alert for upcoming public hearings regarding the future of WCCA. Sign up for our WCCA mailing list. Together, we may be able to convince the Manager to see to it that WCCA sustains at least the current level of service and community productions. We must press on together. That is what makes this truly "the people's channel".

Sincerely on behalf of the Volunteers, Community Producers, Interns, KidsNet/Youth Channel Students, Community Board, and Staff, Thank you.
Mauro DePasquale

Only on WCCA TV 13, The People' Channel.

Watch all the preliminary excitement as the new Hanover Theater enjoys it's premier night. Relive the celebration with cameraman Frank Rocco with Gary Rosen and Dottie Hargrove,as they interview crowds on the red carpet.

Cable and web casting this
Thursday night at 9pm, (pre-empting Grecian Melodies), Monday, March 24 at 8:00pm (pre-empting Ted Lalos),
and also on Friday, March 28 at 2:30pm

WCCA's Mike Benedetti also has images posted on Flickr. as well. Congrats to all involved.

Tonight, as I write this, I am swinging to sounds of WPI's fantastic stage band under the direction so Rich Falco. This is the first shooting for WCCA's special music series: BAND EDGE.

Groovy cool big band sounds the way nature intended it.
Awesome, we can't wait to get this on cable and on line for you. Yeah Baby! Swing it man!

Other reasons why WCCA TV, "The People's Channel" matters to you: Freedom of speech, to provide a means for the free flow of information, to help keep an informed citizenry, to provide a platform where everyone can participate, because it is a station that YOU own. TV BY FOR and OF the People. WCCA is your vision television(R)

On a very related note Bill Coleman asks us to consider
Red Skelton's Pledge of allegiance:

Thanks Bill

Every time I view channel 13 or visit this website I am amazed. My love and respect for the people of this is heightened with each viewing or read.

Jeff's (Wormtown Taxi)blog expressing his insight regarding the city's treatment of the cable franchise, reminds me of why this whole situation matters to everyone. There would be something deeply wrong with our city government, it's leadership, it's system of operation if Jeff is right. It would be wrong to toss aside the over 22 years of WCCA's accomplishment, and valuable service. It is wrong to think that advocating for WCCA is just about jobs. It would be wrong to impose further bureaucracy to drain funds mandated by law, that are not tax dollars, away from public access. To do something wrong against WCCA is to do something wrong to the people of Worcester.
Who are these PEOPLE on this channel?

Well, if you take a quick look at WCCA TV channel 13 or on WCCA TV's website, you will see this is a TV station about YOU about Worcester, from the ground up.

YOU ARE WCCA:
You're: the abolitionist(Love146), the youth media student (Young Views Real News, Teen Central), the music enthusiast(Video Jam, Youth Session), Indymedia, a blogger (the Taxi guy), the Cultural Coalition(WCC) , a church, a library, a historic Institution, a college, a museum, an independent journalist (Ramona Interviews), an activist collective, a graduate student, a neighborhood center, a medical society, a monk (Love Truth and Miracles), a politician (Coffee with Konnie), a concerned citizen (Flipside), a technology buff, a charitable organization, an immigrant, a homeless person, a veteran, a retiree, a mom, a friend, a tax payer, a cable subscriber, an author, a cook, an artist, and everyone else. YOU ARE ALL WCCA TV.

Concerns about the future of WCCA are concerns about YOUR voice

It is such an honor to see YOU on WCCA TV.

We appreciate your support and encouragement.

Mauro De Pasquale, Executive Director, WCCA TV,
“The People's Channel”