By Kate Porter
Members of ethnic groups who have been passionate about the need for local radio programs in languages other than English and French will get their station within the next year.
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has granted CHIN TV/Radio International of Toronto the licence to broadcast ethnic programming at 97.9 FM.
The station will give people the sense of being part of a larger community, says Anna Chiappa, executive director of the Canadian Ethnocultural Council.
“Each community organization has its own ethnic press, mostly run by volunteers and individuals trying to do the best they can,” she says. “But the sense of cohesion that a professional station can provide will have a tremendous impact on the city.”
Chiappa says she had never seen Ottawa’s many cultural communities come together as they did during the application process, when they wanted to show the need for an ethnic broadcaster.
“We’re just elated that the commission has chosen us,” says Lenny Lombardi, president of CHIN. “I’m glad we were able to impress upon them the amount of support the community was showing for it.”
The Ottawa radio station will be on the air by next September but they’re hoping for an earlier June 6 launch, the anniversary of CHIN’s first ethnic broadcast in1966 in Toronto, says Lombardi.
Angelo Filoso, president of the Italian Community Centre, says a lot of people have been waiting for the station, which will reach out to 37 cultures in 20 languages, such as Hindi, Portuguese and the third most spoken language in the city, Arabic. He says they all want to get timely news, hear music, participate in talk shows and hear about local events in their own language.
“They have no way to relate or discuss the issues of the day and how it influences their lives,” Filoso says. “During the ice storm, if you didn’t speak English or French, how would you have learned about what was going on with your hydro or your gas?”
For now, campus radio stations CKCU and CHUO provide a limited number of cultural programs by local volunteers, and Rogers’ Channel 22 has some television shows, although Filoso says the programming is not always consistent. Some people tune into CHIN’s broadcasts from Toronto, but he says others, like some seniors in Centretown who speak only Italian, can’t afford the cable to have that cultural connection.
People of minority ethnic origin make up one-third of Ottawa’s population. The new station will work with individuals from the community to create programs to reach these minority groups and 93 per cent of the programming will be in languages other than English or French.
Rowena Tolson, vice-president of the Chinese Community Association, has been a volunteer broadcaster for about 20 years.
“We love the broadcasting business,” Tolson says of herself and her co-producer on her CHUO show, Mandarin Hour. “That’s why we stay with it.”
She recognizes that volunteer stations are great as a training ground for broadcasters, but says they don’t have job opportunities like the new station will.
Lombardi says his company will have to look for the talent in every culture they serve.
The station will employ local people, but CHIN will also give $55,000 each year to develop ethnic talent through song competitions, public performances, scholarships and sound recordings.
“June 6 brought luck to Toronto,” says Lombardi of CHIN’s first ethnic broadcast. “We want to bring that to Ottawa.”