New Public Access TV Channel Aims to Serve Stafford

STAFFORD COUNTY, Va. — A group of area residents have formed a non-profit public access channel, Central Virginia Public Access Television Corp (CVTV), that will cover Stafford and Spotsylvania County. It will launch this summer.

Run by Charles Thomas and Michele Trampe, the channel will showcase 24 hours of original programming a week.

“What we’re proposing is a multiple year ramp up to that, because we want to put good programming on,” Trampe commented, going on to say that the channel will rely on volunteers and fundraising to create and broadcast the programs.

“Living in Spotsylvania and Stafford, we’re located between Richmond and D.C. and that’s really what gets covered on local television. There’s so much here; I get really offended when people say that this area is just a bedroom community of either D.C. or Richmond,” Trampe said.

In addition to this void in local television coverage, Thomas felt that there needed to be more balanced and appropriate options for children and family television programs.

“I’m very passionate about kids, and working with youth, and giving them a good foundation. Having kids myself, and sitting down and watching TV with them at a supposedly family channel, and you look at it and you go, ‘Guys, we need to look at something else’, because they’re not really promoting a good element for children to be watching,” Thomas said.

Both Thomas and Trampe are currently talking with community members in hopes to tap into local talent for CVTV. With intended programming to cover education, family, sports, finances, cooking and physical fitness, “We’re looking for people who have passion about what they’re doing, and want to get that story out; writers, producers, story tellers. I can see the void – I can see the talent that’s here,” Thomas said.

CVTV’s first big program will focus on the history of the John J. Wright museum; a museum located in Spotsylvania County that was formerly a segregated school during the Civil Rights Movement. While the group is still going through the legal approvals, they have met with the Spotsylvania County Telecommunications Board, and expect to be up-and-running by this summer, said Thomas.

To get the word out about this launch, CVTV has relied on the use of social media sites and community meetings to spread the word.

Thomas hopes that CVTV will, “give the communities of Central Virginia programs with purpose, meaning and excellence, through the voice of public access television,” and Michael Nelms, a Co-Chair for the channel, expressed his excitement at the development of the project.