WFCR Begins Construction of Studio in Springfield
July 3, 2008
| Contact: | Helen Barrington 413/577-0541 |
AMHERST, Mass. − For the first time since it completed its studios in Hampshire House almost 40 years ago, WFCR will construct a new studio facility in Springfield.
Work will begin on Monday, July 7, 2008, and is expected to be completed in October. The WFCR Foundation has leased 1,145 square feet of space on the second floor of WGBY/57, Public Television for Western New England. A few years ago, WFCR established a news desk at WGBY in an arrangement worked out between the two stations. Rus Peotter, WGBY’s Vice President and General Manager, said: "WGBY's collaborations with WFCR have continued to grow over the years. Now, with WFCR's new Springfield studio, our organizations we will be able to take these public media partnerships to a whole new level of service. This expansion will present many terrific opportunities."
The architect for the project is Kevin Chrobak of Juster Pope Frazier, Northampton, Massachusetts. The general contractor is L. N. Berneche, Inc.of Chicopee, Massachusetts. Richard Malawista, WFCR’s Assistant Station Manager, is overseeing this project.
WFCR’s main headquarters will remain in Hampshire House on the UMass Amherst campus. WFCR’s portion of the Hampshire House facility is being rehabilitated as part of the overall growth plan.
This project is part of a four-million dollar capital campaign that the WFCR Foundation is conducting on behalf of 88.5FM for facilities, digital equipment, and programming. Jerry S. Moore, WFCR’s Director of Development, said, “this overall campaign is designed to expand WFCR’s presence throughout the region along with upgrading equipment and ensuring that the most important facet of WFCR—its programming—has a secure future for years to come.”
About 45% of WFCR’s listeners are in northern Connecticut and Hampden County, Massachusetts. The addition of a control-production room, studio, and news office will greatly enhance WFCR’s ability to cover that part of 88.5FM and 640AM’s large broadcast footprint.
WFCR plans to hire a bilingual (Spanish speaking) reporter, who will cover issues in all of the emerging communities of western Massachusetts and Connecticut. In addition, one of WFCR’s current staff reporters will rotate into the Springfield bureau on a daily basis. The station will be engaging additional student interns in the new bureau as well. And WFCR will be looking at ways that it can partner with public television.
WFCR's studio in downtown Springfield represents a new and impressive level of engagement with the city," said Paul Kostecki, Vice Provost for Research at UMass Amherst, who also chairs the university's Springfield Initiative. "UMass Amherst is committed to establishing a larger footprint in Springfield through a variety of partnerships, and WFCR's investment is a wonderful example of the campus' commitment to the city."
Martin Miller, WFCR’s General Manager said: “The last twenty-four to thirty-six months has been a very exciting period of growth for WFCR. The station added programming through 640AM WNNZ, its digital station 88.5FM WFCR HD-2, and at WFCR.org. It also put five translators on the air in Berkshire County to better serve western Massachusetts, solidified our facilities plan and Capital Campaign, brought the Friends of WFCR, Inc. and the WFCR Advisory Committee under one umbrella as the WFCR Foundation, and started the piloting process on some new program initiatives. All of this is possible thanks to the support of Sharon Fross, Vice Provost for Outreach at UMass Amherst, the Five Colleges, Inc. consortium—Amherst, Hampshire, Mount Holyoke and Smith Colleges and the University of Massachusetts Amherst—WGBY, TV/57 Springfield, hundreds of businesses and volunteers, and, most especially, individual contributing listeners who have supported our annual and capital campaign funds.”
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