The CBC is throwing it’s support behind Culture Days, a six-day celebration of the arts in Canada.

Today in Toronto, the CBC hosted a series of events around the theme ‘the art of broadcasting.’ A number of CBC radio and television personalities participated in the day long series of events.

That culminates in a one-hour special tonight at 7pm hosted by Jian Ghomeshi, George Stroumboulopoulos, and Bob Mackowycz featuring Great Lake Swimmers, Bedouin Soundclash, and Sloan.

Then in on September 25 CBC Ottawa studios will hold an open house. Visitors can get a glimpse inside the newsroom, sit behind a TV news desks, and read scripts into a microphone like a radio personality.

On Saturday, CBC St. John’s is holding an open house. Finally, on Sunday September 26, CBC Vancouver audiences will have a chance to meet stars of CBC shows like Heartland, Battle of the Blades, Being Erica and radio personalities like Rick Cluff, Margaret Gallagher and Sheryl MacKay.

The idea of culture days is to to raise awareness and accessibility of the arts, and to celebrate the creative spirit and vitality of communities across the country through thousands of free, interactive events that unite artists with their public.

There are more photos of the Culture Days events here.

First the G20, then the earthquake, then the baby blackout.

Now absolute mayhem!

Every summer the CBC Kids department holds a Kidsummer event. Staffers that have offices close to the atrium get an earful, but everyone else delights in the mayhem of hundreds of kids descending on the CBC Toronto mothership.

The event continues tomorrow in Toronto from 10am until 2pm.

Matt Galloway is to replace Andy Barrie as the new host of Metro Morning.

Galloway already hosts the Toronto morning show every Friday. Additionally, since 2004 he’s been hosting the afternoon drive show in Toronto, Here and Now, so he’s familiar with both the show and the city.

Barrie announced he was retiring from hosting the show last week. The full press release of the announcement is after the break.

HERE AND NOW’S MATT GALLOWAY

TO TAKE OVER AS HOST OF METRO MORNING

Accomplished Toronto broadcaster Matt Galloway will take over as host of CBC Radio One 99.1’s METRO MORNING, beginning March 1, 2010, when veteran host Andy Barrie departs from the show.

Galloway has made his mark on radio over the past 10 years working on CBC Radio programs such as THE CURRENT, SOUNDS LIKE CANADA, GLOBAL VILLAGE and Q, and he is already the man behind the METRO MORNING microphone each Friday. He has anchored CBC Radio’s coverage of the 2007 FIFA Under-20 World Cup of Soccer and the 2008 Summer Olympics live from Beijing. Matt has also been wrapping up the day’s local, national and international news as host of HERE & NOW, Toronto’s popular daily drive-home program, since 2004.

Current METRO MORNING host Andy Barrie announced his retirement last week after a successful career of more than 15 years at the top rated breakfast show. Barrie will continue to be a part of the CBC family in a re-imagined capacity.

“We are very excited about Matt taking on hosting duties for Metro Morning,” said Susan Marjetti, Managing Director CBC Toronto. “Matt is, in many ways, already a member of the Metro Morning team. He’s been filling in for the past year when Andy is away and has helped the show maintain its number one standing in the community. We’re delighted he’s decided to make the leap to morning radio full time.”

Galloway’s role as host of METRO MORNING will see him present and represent the realities, experiences and issues that are important to the people of Canada’s largest city, with up-to-date news and information that Torontonians need to get going in the morning. METRO MORNING airs weekdays from 5:30 to 8:30 a.m.

“’Like our listeners, we’re sad to see Andy relinquish the hosting duties on Metro Morning, but we know the legacy and engagement of Metro Morning will charge ahead. Matt’s fresh and fascinating perspective on the city he loves will continue to delight and inform Toronto audiences on the issues they care most about,” said Denise Donlon, Executive Director of CBC Radio.

CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster, and one of its largest cultural institutions. With 28 services offered on Radio, Television, the Internet, satellite radio, digital audio, as well as through its record and music distribution service and wireless WAP and SMS messaging services, CBC/Radio-Canada is available how, where, and when Canadians want it.

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Having worked at the CBC building in Toronto for several years, I’ve always been amazed at the number of pedestrians that stop to pose for pictures with the Glenn Gould statue in front of the building.

In the summer it’s literally a constant stream of people snuggling up to silent Glenn. In fact in the last few years he’s had so many people sitting on his lap that the bronze is totally worn down. It’s smooth and shinny. I’m sure the famous recluse would be amused at the irony.

For the past few years, the Toronto CBC building has rented out space to the International Academy of Design and Technology. In addition to much of the 8th floor, the Academy had ground floor space and took over a separate bank of elevators.

Today, CBC announced that it had “reached a mutually satisfactory agreement with the Academy that they will vacate the Broadcasting Centre as of April 2009.”

The move will allow CBC to reorganize its space for internal use, and organize leased space vertically on the west side of the building. And it will create something staffers like me have clamored for forever: ground-floor access to stairs. (I work on the second floor, but there’s no way to get between there and the ground without taking an elevator. Or pulling the fire alarm.)

Still, I’ll miss the students. At first it seemed to me like an uneasy match, with black-clad youngsters, replete with iPods and portfolio cases loafing around between classes, while CBCers eyed them suspiciously and clutched their laptops. But the Academy grew on me. Being around young people is a good thing, and having the school there made the CBC building part of the neighbourhood. Fortunately, the new plans for the building have neighbourhood involvement as a core tenet (along with finding a new core tenant.)

Well, the Death Star is getting new cleaners. Starting Dec. 1 we’ll be using Omni Facility Management to keep the place tidy. According to Marcel Gauthier, director of the real estate division, the new cleaners will treat different areas differently – studios, common spaces and workstations will get different schedules based on need, and newsrooms in particular will get better service.

They are also bringing in better equipment, “green” cleaning products and bar-code readers to generate reports on how often areas are cleaned.

And – music to my ears – annual steam cleaning, and WEEKLY vacuuming! (Sidebar: Erich, who sits in the next cubicle over, was so unhappy with our icky floor that in addition to regular complaint calls he brought in his own Dirt Devil… and it was stolen the next week.)

Rumours were circulating among staff that the changes were the result of the new once-weekly garbage collection program, and that some cleaning staff were given layoff notices. But the real estate division says that the old contract was simply up for renewal, and that current cleaning staff “will be offered employment with Omni, as dictated by Bill 7 legislation.”

As I write this, I’m dropping muffin crumbs on the floor and starting a stopwatch…

(OK, I know this was of no interest to anyone other than Toronto CBC employees… but at least I’m not writing about our washrooms any more! ~PG)

So, how clean is your office? 

Photo by “El Matador“

CBC Archives editor Paul Gorbold has some thoughts about the sign war:

Who the hell let that happen? Really, does nobody at CBC pay attention to advertising availabilities on our own front door? What’s next, Dr. Phil recycling bins for all CBC employees? Ghost Whisper screensavers?

This, sadly, is a pretty common tactic among media organizations. I remember when BCTV (now Global) bought the billboard right outside CTV’s studios — and right in camera-line with their news shots. CTV now owns that billboard and I expect has optioned a 50-year lease on the space.

The closing of the CBC Museum actually took place May 31st. They’ve been doing inventory for the last month so we haven’t seen anything change. All the items are to be packed up and shipped to a basement in Ottawa, never to seen again.

The unsubstantiated rumours I can concoct pertain to what they are going to do with the space. Maybe they’ll put a big flower pot in the middle of the empty room and leave it like that for a few years, like the empty restaurant downstairs. I suspect they’ll move ST43/65 (which does the The Hour) down into that space.

In an attempt at substantiation, I contacted CBC Communications about the issue, and received this response from Jay Walsh:

The Museum is still open. In the short term the exhibit space will remain in its current location. Over time our plan is to reshape how we tell the story of CBC’s history. We’ll be developing this as part of our plans for revitalizing the public spaces in Toronto’s Broadcasting Centre.

The entire ground floor of the Canadian Broadcasting Centre is slated for a major overhaul – employees can read more about that on this intranet link. Here’s a snippet, listed under “Exciting plans for the ground floor”:

…we are working on a plan to bring local Radio, TV and On-Line programming to the ground floor, in a way that would allow them to integrate their operations, and at the same time maximize opportunities for public contact and impact….The concept is an “internal street” from the Front Street doors to the Atrium, with glass “garage doors” leading to studios on either side, and a full-height mezzanine floor work area above.

No word on what shows will be taped in those studios, of course, but you may recall that “glass garage doors” are what George was used to at CityTV. A similar redevelopment project is underway in Vancouver, with a similar emphasis on ground-floor interaction with the public. In any case, with all this reconstruction it stands to reason that changes may be coming for the CBC Museum.

Personally, I’ve always thought the TBC could do a better job of letting the public interact with the corporation, but from time to time it does a wonderful job – see photos of last week’s Kidsummer event for an example.

So, how does your CBC location to present itself to the public? What would you like to see? Thoughts on the Museum? Spill!

-PG

Nationally, Radio One and Radio 2 together reached 1.8 million Canadians in the eight markets surveyed. The two networks combined reached 12.8% of Canadians surveyed, and captured a share of 11.9, up slightly from the 11.2% delivered the previous period (S2 2006).

The biggest gains were in Edmonton (13.6 share, up from 7.2 last summer), Ottawa (Radio One overall up to 18.8 from 14.6 last spring, with a 25.2 share for Ottawa Morning) and Calgary (Calgary Eyeopener up to 13.6, from 7.2) while Vancouver, Montreal and Winnipeg also showed gains. But in Toronto the numbers dipped overall to 5.4, down from 6.0.

-PG

“About a year ago, I started to notice that my walking wasn’t working the way it used to, and that my handwriting wasn’t looking the way it should,” the host of Toronto’s Metro Morning said.

Barrie says he is at an early stage of Parkinson’s, and that “there’s no reason to believe I shouldn’t be able to function in every way I love to for years and years to come.”"And that will include, at least for the next three years I hope, waking you up every morning, as long as my old bod allows me to keep answering that 4 a.m. wake up call.”

“Michael J. Fox went seven years before he finally revealed his early-onset Parkinson’s. I read Michael’s book, and concluded I didn’t want to make this a secret. So I’m now coming out as a guy with a disability,” Barrie wrote. “Disabled, but not unable.”

Barrie, who has hosted the regional Toronto morning radio show for 12 years, said on-air Friday that he is taking much of the summer off to “chill out” and is scheduled to return in mid-August.

The American-born Barrie has been a Canadian broadcaster for more than 30 years. He has worked at Global Television, and radio stations CJAD in Montreal and CFRB in Toronto. He joined the CBC in 1995 to host Metro Morning, which has grown to become the top-rated morning radio show in the city.

Here’s the opening paragraph:

“Andy Barrie pulls up in a taxi to the Front Street entrance of CBC’s downtown Toronto fortress at approximately 5:30 a.m. After settling the fare with his long-term driver, who jokes that Barrie has paid for at least 10 per cent of his mortgage, the king of morning radio grabs his copies of The Globe and Mail and Now, a Toronto alternative weekly.

“He shuffles toward the doors, letting a few flyers fall out of the papers. Then the soft-bellied man with pure white hair passes through the restricted-access interior gates. He takes the elevator up CBC’s tower to the third floor and heads to his desk.

“Amid family photographs, books, notes and a computer, there is a little black pillow with white lettering that reads, “Everyone is entitled to my opinion.” A large picture of Barrie as a young boy at Camp Skylemar in Naples, Maine, shows him wearing headphones, leaning over a microphone. As the camp’s radio host for “The Wake-up,” the nine-year-old played records, gave ball scores and led “camp chatter.” Barrie’s desk also boasts a plaque congratulating him for 10 years of “outstanding contribution to the success of Metro Morning.” These are not empty words of praise. He is the voice of the morning show ranked No. 1 in Canada’s largest city.”

Also very much worth reading in the same issue is a profile on Carol Off and a full piece following the team of Quirks and Quarks as they put a week’s show together.

Canadian Journalists for Free Expression

The CBC’s Peter Mansbridge, Brian Stewart, Anna Maria Tremonto, and Rick McInnes Rae will be speaking at the rally, to be held at noon in Simcoe Park (beside the Toronto Broadcast Centre).

Johnston is believed to be alive and in good health but there is no sign of his captors releasing him anytime soon. Why he’s being held remains a matter for speculation.

• Tony Burman’s Letter: Why BBC’s kidnapped Alan Johnston needs to be freed.
• How you can help spread the word

Side note: This particular sign — well, the policy it articulates, anyway — is something of a controversy in Toronto; the disabled washrooms are only for people with disabilities. See the discussion on Paul’s blog.

How about your region? Snap some photos of interesting signs around your CBC bureau and send them to me in Groupwise (or, better yet, send me a link to your Flickr set of the photos).

Photo: “Take your able-bodied urine elsewhere” by Paul Gorbould

Ontario’s health promotion minister told reporters that September is not soon enough. “I’m disappointed they are taking so long. I don’t know why it’s going to take months and months to put a no smoking sign on a door at the CBC,” Jim Watson said.

Are you a Toronto CBC employee? What do you think of this decision? If you’re a non-smoker, were you ever impacted by the smoking rooms? 

(Damnit. Did I just say “re-purposing?” God help me; the lingo is starting to seep into my brain. Soon I’ll be talking about how “the value pillars need to align with the stakeholders’ dialogue.”)

Ouimet says:

The much-hated Real Estate department has quietly written policy guidelines for the decommissioning of CBC smoking rooms. It states that “smoking room space will be prioritized as prime space available for all churn and space planning initiatives” and that “all smoking rooms requiring maintenance will be closed. In other words, the smoking rooms are to die a slow, painful death. Much like the smokers themselves.

When I was touring the building with the blog video cam, both patrons in the smoking rooms were rather upset that anyone was drawing even more attention to the rooms. “Don’t get this place closed down,” one fellow barked at me. “Or the ghost of Gzowski will haunt you.” Friendly people….

Their freelancer, Jijou, gave me a short 3-minute tour of their space there.

And things kinda got… uh… weird.

Although what I don’t understand: In some cities, the show is called “Living [City]” and in others, it’s called “Living In [City]“. I know it’s not a big deal, but I hate inconsistencies.

But oddly, the B.C. edition kept calling itself Canada Now (the name of the national/regional hybrid show formerly in that time slot). Did Vancouver miss the cancellation memo? Likely not, as Canada Now’s national show originated from Vancouver. Plus, a bumper voiceover said “You’re watching Canada Now. Where B.C. news comes first.”

B.C. bureau chief Liz Hughes explained to me that B.C. decided to stay with Canada Now in Vancouver because, “for the audience, nothing much changed in Vancouver. The show always had an hour of local, national and international news hosted by Ian [Hanomansing] and Gloria [Macarenko].”

As many of you know, CBC is planning some big changes for television news, so the name change will likely roll-out when all of that is ready.

Anywhere, here’s a taste of what day one looked like in Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, and Vancouver. (Personally, I think the Calgary graphics kick sweet arse.)