About this time last year I posted some pics of my kids for all to see how they are growing.  It is hard to think that a whole year has already gone by…but it has.  Here are the kids (Brittany 14, Emma 7 and Adam 5) this past week at the Canada Day Celebrations in Summerside, PEI.

Rob got my attention this past week with the very interesting consulting work he is doing with KETC, Channel 9 in St. Lois to reduce the impact of the mortgage/housing/credit crisis that it hitting this area.  This is a very innovative project that has huge potential to save not only individual family homes but the social fabric of the very communities that this crisis is hitting hard.  Have a look…a very cool combination of the use of social media tools, community resource mapping, good ideas and public television leadership.  I look forward to hearing more as this project unfolds.

As my regular readers know, (Context in the link) I am working with KETC, Channel  9 in St Louis on a project funded by CPB, to see how a Public TV station could use its position as a Trusted Space, rather than simply as a broadcaster, to make a difference in the "economic forest fire" that is the mortgage/housing /credit crisis that is sweeping through America.

It is the hope of CPB that Public Media can do more to serve its country than offer great content alone. It is our collective hope that by learning how to do what we are doing now well, that Public TV and Radio can serve the public by acting as a convener of Trust for the community – so that we can draw on the great and latent power that resides in all local communities to take action themselves to solve the great problems that confront us.

Our hope is that our one station in one city can offer enough experience that in the fall many more can join in the work and that soon we may have a national effort underway.